This album is a miracle of fortitude. Sound upon sound hits you left and right and, just when you're starting to feel a consistent groove, out comes another sound to keel you over. Repetition is not the name of the game here. DJ Shadow grabs hundreds of sounds from the attic and comes up with one of the freshest and most timeless hip-hop/trip-hop/what-have-you albums of all time. It's become THE measuring stick for any producer/mixer worth their salt. This album's been blowing minds going on twelve years now.

Take note, Puff Daddy. Timbaland. Kanye West. And bow down. There aren't a lot of albums on Amazon with 100+ reviews that maintain a five star average, but this is deservedly one of them. Check it out for yourself and see why.

Moody, groovy, dead on. It's all about the space in between, the skip beat, the timing. Extrordinary phrasing and phasing. One color builds on the other, layers that create a single vison. You feel sound and hear the air. What great music to move down the highway at a high rate of speed. This is traveling music. Stare straight ahead and get this one.

I bought this CD mostly because there are very few 5 star CD's anywhere on Amazon, so I thought this one must be spectacular, right? Wrong. It's a huge disappointment. Especially considering how good everyone makes it out to be. Where are the catchy bass lines or the driving drum beats? There aren't any. He's a DJ, yet you can't dance to any of the songs on this CD. If you played this at a party, or in the car on a crazy night out, you'd make everyone confused.
To give him credit, What Does Your Soul Look Like (Part 1) and Midnight in a Perfect World are great songs, but just know beforehand that those songs are worlds better than any other on the CD, and even then, they are really slow paced songs. On a CD that has a 5 STAR RATING, you would expect nearly every song to be amazing, but they aren't... at all.
The first three songs are weak. They all have remarkably weak bass lines, if any at all. Changeling is okay, and so is Mutual Slump, and Why Hip Hop Sucks is mildly entertaining the first couple times you hear it, but that's it. HALF the songs are MEDIOCRE. Just by reading the reviews, it seems like Shadow appeals mostly to the pseudo-intellectual music nerds out there, and that's the vibe he gives off in most of his interviews. It isn't about the music, it's about the hype. Save yourself the money and only purchase What Does Your Soul Look Like (Part 1) and Midnight in a Perfect World, and MAYBE Mutual Slump and Changeling if you like it that much. This is honestly only a 3-star CD, and that's being modest.

Este es viejito, de 1996, pero se convierte en el mejor disco que tengo de éste género. Tarde en entrarle aunque ya había escuchado los rumores de los 10 dedos prodigios de DJ Shadow, también ya había oido que UNKLE sin él jamás sería igual (y me gusta el UNKLE actual). Es una selección de canciones originales que parece que fueron escritas para él, para ser puestos todos juntos y remezclados para sonar de ésta forma. Temas destacados? Todos! De principio a fin, hasta los sampleos que duran segundos son indispensables, pero si quieren saber, éste disco lo pedí nada mas con escuchar "Building steam with a grain of salt"
SAMPLEA UN SOLO DE BATERÍA! ¿Si han visto a alguien samplear? No es una tornamesa!

Reseña en "Yo Soy Aquel..."
[...]

I just heard this album for the first time about a week ago. I came away very impressed. Not the typical type of music I listen to, but this takes some serious skill. Building Steam with a Grain of Salt is sick.