Shallow and Profound

by Dean Carlson Shallow and Profound. Nineteen years old and Hungarian. Yonderboi's particulars describe nearly everything one can expect from his twilight beats and boozy jazz persona. In fact, this debut album for the respected Mole Listening Pearls label is unusually both dull and bizarre, simultaneously both predictable and impressive. Yonderboi may want to be a new downtempo wunderkind, yet Shallow and Profound fails time and time again by too much of a dependence on techniques in the realm of "safe" and "old." So for every enchanting sampledelic jazz piece (the Doors-based "Pink Solidism"), there's a slab of humming tedium ("Road Movie"). For every sleazy Kid Loco-like "100% Trevira," there's a rhythmically challenged "Sinking Slowly." One could chalk up Yonderboi's faults as being one of young naiveté, yet that's what potential prodigies usually do best. The reason seems to be more that Shallow and Profound's qualitative flips back and forth are disconcerting. Truly, little can be said against the fact that the album becomes less of a listening experience and more like watching a frantic tennis match from the exact center of the net.