A heavy bassline is my kinda silence
Hip-hop comes in many shapes and sizes, but there can be fewer artists around at the moment who play with the form as fast and loose as the UK’s own energetic bundle of grimy cheekiness, Mr Dizzee Rascal. His Calvin Harris collaboration “Dance Wiv Me” was one of the sounds of summer 2008, and while you wanted to dislike it, particularly the Harris elements, you couldn’t help but give in to the massiveness of the tune as a whole. Rascal’s now trademark frenetic delivery which always sounds as though it is emerging from a mouth on the verge of a huge grin simply bangs you over the head with its enthusiasm and wit until you submit to its pop brilliance.
But here is pop that significantly is infused with the aesthetics of the Grime scene that Dizzee first sprung from, perhaps that most unlikely of commercial sounds from the UK underground. As such it marks something of a mini revolution. Because while the collaboration at the time seemed odd and led to some criticism and inevitable “sell-out” attacks from the subterranean, such was the huge success of this track that it now seems totally inspired, and indeed has inspired many other scene stalwarts to follow suit in their own pursuit of chart success. Dizzee does things his way, maintains the integrity of his influences, and in doing so completely leads the way for UK hip-hop with a club and dance floor mentality.
His track record, soon to be four albums deep with the release later in the summer of “Tongue ‘N’ Cheek”, is impeccable and he seems to improve at every step, suggesting that there are truly great things to come from this son of East London and that rarest of things a consistently great UK rapper.
And latest single “Bonkers” is simply further proof in the pudding. This time the collaboration has a more respectable tint to it, with beats and production from hard house fuzz-master Armand van Helden, and the tune is as big as the ingredients might suggest. On the surface it perhaps appears as just another attempt at assaulting the pop charts with almost novelty effects taken from each of the key influences, ragga-tinged chat from UK garage, squelchy bass loops from house, and even cheesy robotic words thrown into the cartoon-like mix. But then, you realise that this is far from a throwaway tune. “Bonkers”, for those that don’t know, is a UK slang term for someone who is the wrong side of sane, and signifies a person who is nuts, mad, loopier than a fruit loop.
It also has a connotation in describing big nights out, sometimes enhanced with certain pharmaceutical methods, and so the tune could appear just to be a shout-out to a hedonistic carefree crowd, a cheap nod to the hands in the air brigade. But in fact it masks a darker insight, that which opens a window wide into the mind of a lunatic. The repetition of verse and chorus, coupled with the comic-book aural tapestry behind it, serves as a mirror to that world of insanity that defies description. It appears normal to the sufferer, and indeed might be, but is proof that some instability is always in the eye of the beholder.
Is it a parody of the rave scene or a championing of its attitudes? Is it a peek into the Rascal’s headspace or a retort to his critics? Is it house, UK garage, pop or straight-up hip-hop? Is it a continuation of his pop credentials or an anti-chart tirade of noise? Well, it is all of them, and dished up with the biggest of bass lines you are likely to hear all year. Fuzzy, deeper than deep, raw, and throbbing like a nuclear reactor, it is just a powerhouse of a tune. Dizzee? You will be.
But here is pop that significantly is infused with the aesthetics of the Grime scene that Dizzee first sprung from, perhaps that most unlikely of commercial sounds from the UK underground. As such it marks something of a mini revolution. Because while the collaboration at the time seemed odd and led to some criticism and inevitable “sell-out” attacks from the subterranean, such was the huge success of this track that it now seems totally inspired, and indeed has inspired many other scene stalwarts to follow suit in their own pursuit of chart success. Dizzee does things his way, maintains the integrity of his influences, and in doing so completely leads the way for UK hip-hop with a club and dance floor mentality.
His track record, soon to be four albums deep with the release later in the summer of “Tongue ‘N’ Cheek”, is impeccable and he seems to improve at every step, suggesting that there are truly great things to come from this son of East London and that rarest of things a consistently great UK rapper.
And latest single “Bonkers” is simply further proof in the pudding. This time the collaboration has a more respectable tint to it, with beats and production from hard house fuzz-master Armand van Helden, and the tune is as big as the ingredients might suggest. On the surface it perhaps appears as just another attempt at assaulting the pop charts with almost novelty effects taken from each of the key influences, ragga-tinged chat from UK garage, squelchy bass loops from house, and even cheesy robotic words thrown into the cartoon-like mix. But then, you realise that this is far from a throwaway tune. “Bonkers”, for those that don’t know, is a UK slang term for someone who is the wrong side of sane, and signifies a person who is nuts, mad, loopier than a fruit loop.
It also has a connotation in describing big nights out, sometimes enhanced with certain pharmaceutical methods, and so the tune could appear just to be a shout-out to a hedonistic carefree crowd, a cheap nod to the hands in the air brigade. But in fact it masks a darker insight, that which opens a window wide into the mind of a lunatic. The repetition of verse and chorus, coupled with the comic-book aural tapestry behind it, serves as a mirror to that world of insanity that defies description. It appears normal to the sufferer, and indeed might be, but is proof that some instability is always in the eye of the beholder.
Is it a parody of the rave scene or a championing of its attitudes? Is it a peek into the Rascal’s headspace or a retort to his critics? Is it house, UK garage, pop or straight-up hip-hop? Is it a continuation of his pop credentials or an anti-chart tirade of noise? Well, it is all of them, and dished up with the biggest of bass lines you are likely to hear all year. Fuzzy, deeper than deep, raw, and throbbing like a nuclear reactor, it is just a powerhouse of a tune. Dizzee? You will be.
posted by Twelve Bar at 1:07 AM
<< Home