One of the major qualms critics of electronic music have is that it lacks the emotion that “real” music (usually guitar music) conveys. Luckily, I don’t need to address these silly, misguided critics, because their are people like Brandon Hoffman on this planet. Hoffman aka Blocktreat is a Vancouver, BC based beatsmith who recently released one of the most organically emotive albums you will ever hear. Traditionals is a series of tracks composed of chopped up samples of Hoffman’s friends jamming out “casual bluegrass.” It would be easy to fall into the cut and paste sample pastiche that so often accompanies projects like these, but Hoffman’s arrangements are impeccably exact at certain points and wonderfully scattered at others. Traditionals sounds like Shlohmo at times, but way weirder. I hate to throw out the experimental title, but the album really stretches the boundaries of computer music. So before you get into another argument over whether DJ’s are musicians, or Aphex Twin is more than grating bleeps and bloops, pop on Traditionals. At least give it a try. It’s free. In exchange for an email. Simple as that. Stream and download below.