Original hip hops!

Original hip hops!

By Steve Hsu
http://swankarmy.net/stevetek
ATLANTA
November 13, 1998

Artist : UNKLE
Album : The Picture of DJ Shadow and James LaVelle, Pysence Fiction
Studio : MoWax Music / London Records
Tracks : 12
Running Time : A little short
Rating : 4.0 / 5.0

UNKLE is the digital collaboration of many of today's brightest stars in music, masterfully directed and pivoting around DJ Shadow and James LaVelle. Richard Ashcroft (the Verve), Thom Yorke (Radiohead), Kool G Rap (original New York Hardcore rapper), Jason Newstead (Metallica), Mike D (Beastie Boys), Wil Malone, and Massive Attack all collaborate with these two young prodigies to produce a fabulous CD. Individual tracks on the album are binding, breathing representations of the artist's minds and show that the digital and DJ scene deserves all the praise it gets, and is making a major impact on how we all perceive music now and in the future.

The truly amazing aspect of this album (not to take away from the actual and objective quality of the music, which is very high) is how many different representatives of different genres of popular music James Lavelle and DJ Shadow have been able to unite and fuse together into a continuously thrilling album.

Each song, regardless of the style of the composer, be it Mike D or Thom Yorke, flow into each other seamlessly and yet the musical identity of the composer is always retained. It's said that this is one of the most highly anticipated albums of the year, and it doesn't disappoint.

The album starts off with "Guns Blazing (Drums of Death Part 1)", the blistering hardcore rap collaboration of Kool G Rap and ubiquitous DJ Shadow.

Shadow lays down smooth lines of bass over an abrasive drum beat, touched up with Atari space invaders samples and other products of his digital arsenal. The album loses no intensity even if the pace slows momentarily with Richard Ashcroft's "Lonely Souls" a melodic, trip hop-ish documentation of one man's mental torment and resolution.

The album picks right back up with "Getting Ahead In The Lucrative Field of Artist Management" and "The Knock", a Mike D and Jason Newsteads hip hop collaboration. The album closes with the soothing ballad from Atlantique Khanh and the easily recognizable track from Thom Yorke, very much in the OK Computer vein, since they were recorded concurrently.

Personally I've never had much of interest in hip hop since the Fresh Prince and DJ Jazzy Jeff tape I bought in fourth grade, and that's pushing the definition of hip hop, I think. Frankly, all that I've heard from hip hop in the past few years are overly sampled tracks and poorly composed songs with indecipherable lyrics. In fact I heard one song (by Wu-Tang?) that was just a Kraftwerk song looped over and over again with the Clan rapping over it. Pathetic!!

The album is done well and I can't pick out a single recognizable sample-call me crazy, but I enjoy original music. Then again DJ Shadow has been called the "greatest thief who's ever lived" by NME, so maybe it is chock-full of old hits and I just can't recognize them. It seems to me that this album breathes new life into hip hop. I hope this represents the beginning of the end of musical shysters like Puff Daddy.

Copyright © 1998 by Gregory S. Scherrer, Editor and by the Student Publications Board

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