Амон Тобин: Бразильский электронный музыкант и композитор

Brazilian musician

Amon Adonai Santos de Araújo Tobin (born February 7, 1972), known as Amon Tobin ('/ɑː//m//ɒ//n// //'//t//oʊ//b//ɪ//n/), is a Brazilian electronic musician, composer and producer. He is noted for his unusual methodology in sound design and music production. He has released eight major studio albums under the London based Ninja Tune record label. He has also released two albums under the alias Two Fingers with collaborator Doubleclick. His latest release, Nomark Selects V.1, was released on April 28, 2023. His music has been used in numerous major motion pictures including The Italian Job and 21. Tobin has created songs for several independent films, including the 2006 Hungarian film Taxidermia, and had his music used in other independent films, including the 2002 Cannes Palme d'Or–nominated Divine Intervention. A selection of his tracks were featured in commercial bumps on Toonami and in the 2005 anime IGPX, and he produced the musical scores to critically acclaimed video games Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory by Ubisoft in 2005, and Sucker Punch's Infamous in 2009.

Tobin was born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Tobin's father is Irish. At the age of 2, he and his family left Brazil to live in Morocco, the Netherlands, London, Portugal and Madeira. There he began producing electronic music in his bedroom with samplers and other audio equipment including an Amstrad Studio 100 4 track, although he was "not really involved in the [music] scene" at that time. Many of those tracks were later included on his first full length album Adventures in Foam, originally released in 1996 by Ninebar to a limited release of 5,000 copies. DJ Food and Funki Porcini noticed Tobin's work on Adventures in Foam and prompted the label to approach him. Ninja Tune signed Tobin in late 1996, this time under his abbreviated name "Amon Tobin". The official Ninja Tune website has said that Adventures in Foam had been re released without permission by the US based Shadow Records that same year and that this unauthorized version, labeled the "US release", included only 7 of the original songs, different cover art, and that some tracks were titled incorrectly. In 1997 Ninja Tune acquired the proper licenses from Ninebar and re released the album themselves. This version included the original album in its entirety, and a second disc containing previously unreleased material. as of 2008, copies of Shadow Record's "US version" are sold by online retailer Amazon. com. Over the course of its production, Adventures in Foam has been reviewed favorably. Ryan Schreiber of Pitchfork Media said that its break beat style "got totally out of hand", but that it "never fails to let the listener know who's in charge." In a 1999 review, they awarded Bricolage a very rare 10/10 and said that it was "one of the most inventive records of the decade." Tobin released his fourth album, Supermodified in 2000. The album is regarded as his most commercial album to date. and Stylus Magazine saying, "Not many studio bound electronic musicians could put forward such a vivid and dynamic statement or make it as entertaining and downright funky as Supermodified has managed to do."

In 2002, Tobin relocated to Montreal, Quebec, Canada where he had spent time previously at Ninja Tune's North American Headquarters. There he produced his fifth album Out From Out Where released that same year. This was his first album created primarily in a professional studio. In January 2004, Tobin was contracted by video game company Ubisoft Montreal to compose the soundtrack for the third installment of their critically successful Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell series, Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory. To facilitate using the music in a video game, where the level of action or plot can change in real time, each track was broken down by Tobin into four distinct but similar parts based on their level of intensity. The game's developers could then use each section to provide music based on the actions of the player. Despite not being an official album in Tobin's discography, it was considered a ground breaking work in the world of video game sound tracks described as "an entirely new era of media" by Tiny Mix Tapes. The album continued the trend Tobin started with Out From Out Where, as he used more field recordings during production. He later recorded a Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound version of the album with audio engineer Bobby Azinsky in a dedicated Solid State Logic studio in Los Angeles. Tobin's sixth studio album, Foley Room, was released in 2007. The title alludes to the "Foley rooms" used by recording engineers and Foley artists to record sound effects in the movie industry. On this album, Tobin concluded his transition away from prerecorded source material that started with Out From Out Where. All of the samples used for production were recorded by himself using an omnidirectional microphone. Recorded primarily in Montreal, San Francisco, and Seattle, the samples came from a wide range of sources including motorbikes, tigers, insects, and water falling from a tap. Also contributing to the album were the string quartet Kronos Quartet, drummer Stefan Schneider, and harpist Sarah Pagé. Foley Rooms use of field recordings was used to help promote the album, including two official pre release trailers posted to YouTube. Nate Dorr of PopMatters. com called it a "smooth, natural progression" from his work on Supermodified. The first single, "Bloodstone", was released to the iTunes Music Store months before the rest of the album. Ninja Tune also published a DVD titled Foley Room: Found Footage which documented the recording process. In September 2019, Tobin announced the Nomark Club, an annual subscription service that grants access to all of Tobin's material as it is released, including some member exclusive content (the material is delivered via Bandcamp's subscription service). A supporter exclusive extended play album titled Fine Strips of Violence was released in tandem with the announcement. Long Stories, which arrived October 2019, was made in parallel with Fear in a Handful of Dust and features prominent use of a broken Omnichord. In December 2019, Tobin released a two track Nomark Club exclusive album titled Nine Bars Back under the alias of Cujo—one that had not been used since the release of Adventures in Foam in 1996. Tobin released The World As We Know It in July 2020 under the alias Figueroa, which marked a departure in Tobin's usual instrumental style, as it was his first major release to feature prominent vocal work. The album's lyrics were performed by Tobin himself with technical guidance from producer Sylvia Massy. Tobin describes the lyrics as being rather ambiguous, stating in an interview that "I want the feeling of the songs to be the priority, rather than the specific meaning." West Coast Love Stories, the debut album by new alias Stone Giants, "celebrates the relationship between voice and machine from an altogether different perspective humans and electronics pooling resources to explore themes of love and being none the wiser for it." The "cinematic and apocalyptic" How Do You Live, released under Tobin's name, arrived in September 2021. In February 2021, Tobin was announced to be involved in the soundtracking of the Meow Wolf Omega Mart installation, along with Beach House, Brian Eno, Santigold, and others. Tobin's soundtrack to the installation, A Living Room (Music from Meow Wolf's Omega Mart) was released on September 23, 2022, on his Nomark Records label as a single sided vinyl record with an etching on the reverse. As Two Fingers, a trio of collaborative singles with the German producer Muadeep came out in 2022: Blood Moon, Banished, and Lost Gods, leading to the trio's album Cronos. Also in 2022, the Only Child Tyrant alias released a pair of singles: HoneyCup Troll and Make Better Friends. In 2023, the Nomark Records label released the Nomark Selects V.1 compilation album, an album that contained singles hand picked by the Nomark Club members.

Tobin is best known for his use of audio manipulation techniques, where any given source material is transformed to produce a new sound. His fifth album Out From Out Where began the gradual shift away from prerecorded material by incorporating original guitar samples. His techniques began branching into technical sound design, taking break beats or single instruments, modifying specific frequencies, and producing new sounds. Tobin experimented with various instruments. He does not come from a music family, nor has he had any formal training in music theory. Tobin's albums are often compared to soundtracks,

Tobin began performing live shows in clubs with other Ninja Tune artists after releasing his second album, Bricolage. His shows generally contained music that he had produced during his career, mixed with modified songs from drum and bass, hip hop, or other genres. It incorporates the use of new video mapping techniques that are projected onto a large cubic structure from which Tobin performs. The show has been met with international acclaim described by Vice Magazine's Creators Project as "revolutionizing the live music experience". Tobin has performed individual shows in many countries including tours in Europe, Australia, Japan, and the United States. His 2003 live performance in Melbourne, Australia was used for the fourth album in Ninja Tune's Solid Steel series because Tobin was not available to record a studio mix at the time. A second Solid Steel album Foley Room Recorded Live in Brussels was recorded in Brussels at the Ancienne Belgique in 2007, and was released for free in November 2008. According to Tobin's official website, "After months of back and forth and despite everyone's best efforts the mix was in danger of being edited into the ground to accommodate big labels and publishers. Rather than release a compromised version commercially, the decision was made to give it away for free instead."

Amon Tobin's sounds and samples are frequently used in the British car based TV show Top Gear, and his song "Four Ton Mantis" has been used in advertisements for Nissan Qashqai and Juke. Tobin's music also appeared in several major motion pictures including The Italian Job, Tideline (Littoral) and 21. He has also produced tracks for a number of independent films, including The Last Minute, and has created production music for the BMG Zomba commercial library which is used in various films. In 2006, he scored the soundtrack for the Hungarian horror film Taxidermia which was made available on his website. He also produced the score for the 2009 documentary Pax Americana and the Weaponization of Space. In April 2010, Tobin composed and produced a small body of work for the video game Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Conviction which was available for streaming on his website. In 2013, Two Fingers composed the theme music for the BBC America/Space original series Orphan Black.