Math is Hard is an intense look at the experimental music scene through the eyes of San Francisco based Thumbtack Smoothie. The mix is obscure and damaging to those who like an easy listen. It steps over into the realms of noise and smiles as it moulds sound into chaos, building to a pinnacle and staying there. People who want proper music run a million miles.
Aural Innovations

The second release for San Francisco's Quaketrap Recordings, and first solo album release for Thumbtack Smoothie, Electrickitchentableland is one of those complex musical voyages that borders on the edge of a different universe, a futurist soundtrack with unknown parameters. The music will test your mind on many levels, and slowing time down around you will enable the ears to see the genius pool of tracks whose parts are greater than intended musical sum, a feat few artists can accomplish.
Digital Artifact Magazine

If there were an asylum for techno tunes gone mad, that's where you'd find some of the tracks fom " Math Is Hard " a release of experimental noise music from Thumbtack Smoothie...like trance and ambient noise crashed into a twisted heap...like an escapee from the Aphex Twin recording studio..." Math Is Hard " could be the ambient backround noise for a digital horror movie. These sounds and more make my ears pleased. Grade: A
MusicCorner

Complex, fast, layered intense, challenging, experimental electronic. Thumbtack Smoothie challenges the listener sonically on every track on "Math Is Hard". The varied tempo keeps one glued to their headphones as the artist unleashes a barrage of sonic assualt gems delivered in what could best be described as noise waves. This music could easily be the soundtrack to the brain function of a brilliant and misunderstood, manic, obsessive- compulsive mathematician. The production on this CD is incredible, headphone listening is highly recommended.
CD Baby Magazine

Thumbtack Smoothie, who hails from SanFrancisco, does not have a problem mixing hip-hop, trance, electronic, trip-hop, drum n' bass and every other bit of noise that he can muster up, to create a sprawling, blippy psychotic trip through the ventricles that we call life. This CD explodes in your face. There is nothing neutral or relaxing here. It is what it is and there are no apologies for it. That's the beauty of this mÈlange of sound that drips, bleeps, screams out of its nerve endings that convulse sporadically like a nervous twitch in your arm. This is an experimental journey that takes you for a roller-coaster ride full of jolts and heaping mounds. You think you know the road ahead of you, only to end up doing a three sixty in reverse, followed by a screeching stop. This recording is meant to open the pores in your body that need a deep cleansing. Awaken your senses. Wake up people. This recording is anything but boring. This is experimental music of the highest order.
Midwest Ursine

Experimental but accessible electronic adventures that utilize a banquet of equipment including drum machines, samplers, turntables, synths, and virtually everything that could be found in a fully stocked Toys 'R Us store. Drum 'n Bass, Dub, hip-hop, and various other dance rhythms combine with spacey bubbling synths, countless samples, and childlike melodies to create a crazed collection of freakout tunes. Pulsating flying saucer sounds, hip-hoppy beats, and non-stop transitional twists and turns keep the music flowing and the ride fun and intense. This may well be the freakiest music I've ever heard that can still [almost] be danced to.
Aural Innovations

Thumbtack Smoothie goes down about as easy as his name suggests. Start-and-stop drill'n'bass tunes, full of squiggly Industrial sounds and deep, fuzzy basslines drift off into robotic Ambient textures. Atonal washes of keyboard delirium, elephantine trumpet screeches, and chopped-up vocal samples lead into dizzyingly fast breakbeats. Hard-edged Techno beats weave themselves into this frenetic mix, providing brief moments of relief from the onslaught. Fractured piano loops wind themselves around beats that would fit into the "Funky Breaks" category, were the bass not subsumed by a hi-hat line so spastic and hyperactive it'll make even the most patient third-grade teacher reach for her emergency stash of Ritalin. Sometimes he switches gears, crafting surreal, soothing Ambient lullabies.
Listen.com