An old dog for the long road, Alex Omar Smith has made enough roughneck electronic music to predict the twists, turns and bumps up ahead. The fourth album from the Detroit producer and former car factory worker is a gritty joy, full of big hypnotic swingers, rugged heartfelt grooves and soulful washes of sound. Inbetween the macro indicators, Smith does let loose with more intricate details, burnishing I Just Want, for instance, with ghostly, gauzy keyboard stabs and vocal traces. But this is an album for the big emotional leaps and jumps, as seen in the beautifully raw and uncut approximations of a classic, foolproof approach to house and techno scene-setting on both the title track and Its Money in the D. He also doesn't believe, it seems, in spending too much time or effort on album artwork. omarsdetroit.us Download: Its Money in the D, Thank You for Letting Me Be Myself