Follow Sach O on Twitter. He’s starting to get the hang of it.
Note to Gringo rappers: rhyming over Dubstep isn’t easy. Try some cutesy bullshit and you’ll end up looking like an ass-out trend hopper desperate for attention. Word to this abortion with the fake T.I style hook. Thankfully, Zilla Rocca, my #1 source for Hip-Hop by artists who don’t give a fuck about Fashion Week, has seen fit to point me towards this new project by Elucid to remind me that there’s still potential in cross-pollination and still some US emcees that aren’t major cornballs.
Grabbing beats by 12th Planet, Breakage, Vex, Skream, DVA and El-P, Super Chocolate Black Simian mines the dark and fucked-up side of Bass music to fantastic effect, recalling the noisiest side of Def Jux spliced with the tempo experiments that have gone down from Atlanta to Bristol since then. The content is appropriately aggy but Elucid wisely stays in the pocket, flowing with the beats rather than fight against them. A couple of moments may be jarring for fans of the UK originals (the Hard and Next Hype beats should have been left alone) but overall, the approach is distinctly American and subterranean: some unapologetically fucked up next shit for people digging deeper than the standard blog-rap format. Whereas Grime emcees might use these beats to hype up a set, Elucid’s in angry-but-not-emo stress rap takes this into the realm of headphone music and points towards an interesting way forward for rappers who grew up on that evil underground shit.
Stream:
01 Super Chocolate Black Simian MANGLEDMIX Part 1 by E L U C I D
Download:
MP3: Elucid – Super Chocolate Black Simian (Via Concrete Soundsystem)
5 comments
khal says:
March 1, 2011 at 9:55 am (UTC -7)
haha, my two favorites are the flips of “Together” and the “Next Hype” remix!
Sach says:
March 1, 2011 at 10:04 am (UTC -7)
They’re not bad flips by any means, it’s just weird hearing someone else over those instrumentals because the tunes are such anthems if you’re into that scene. It’d be sort of like hearing Ghetts rapping over “Brooklyn Zoo”, I can’t imagine that beat without those ODB verses on it.
khal says:
March 1, 2011 at 10:17 am (UTC -7)
I feel you. I guess I should say I have sort of a personal stake in this, I watched it grow and was personally surprised that more MCs hadn’t rhymed over the Breakage riddim after “Hard” came out – but I see what you’re saying. glad to see you picking up on this, though.
jack says:
March 1, 2011 at 2:48 pm (UTC -7)
FILTHY! His flow is bonkers.
Rippy says:
March 1, 2011 at 4:56 pm (UTC -7)
I fucks with this kid. Shit is official