Wascally wapper gets Tongue N’ Cheek

Bow boy Dylan Mills, aka Dizzee Rascal, fourth album, the first exclusively released through his own Dirtee Stank imprint, is released this week.

The title itself is a perfect summation of what’s inside – tongue twisting flow and cheeky ideas, a barrowload of humour and lip-lickingly glossy production.

Leading off with the ubiquitous bassline of the summer, Bonkers, Dizzee’s fourth album starts as it means to continue, aimed squarely at packed dancefloors, with a large dollop of fun and a degree of self-deprecation among the bravado.

That single, along with the sublime Dance Wiv Me and Holiday, are the lynchpins of the record, demonstrating an ability to turn his hand to chart-friendly fare that is a long way from his resolutely street early releases.

Trying and succeeding with ease to cross over the notional boundaries in European music, Dizzee is reaching out beyond his grime foundations, connecting with the pop, rock and indie audiences who bounced across the fields of the continent during his classy festival performances this year.

But the grime and dancehall influence remains, and the record is all the better for their presence, a reminder of the best moments from Boy in Da Corner and Maths N’ English, showing how far Dizzee has come in the relatively short space of his career to date.

Chillin’ Wiv Da Man Dem is Cube’s Today Was A Good Day set in Diz’s London manor, a smooth laid back late summer cut, and his re-imagining of Stevie V’s Dirty Cash is another great floorfiller, sure to be another huge hit single, marrying the house  to a recession rap that will really connect with his ever-increasing posse.

He has said in interviews that the point of the record was to challenge himself, to try pop stylings instead of remaining in one corner when there are other worlds to explore, especially when his easy charm, fascinating backstory and self-awareness elevates him to the chatshow circuit, and access to the audiences they open up for him.

The really interesting thing will be to discover the avenue he decides to follow on his next release, whatever that might be. A maturing Diz can only be more confident on the back of the success he has enjoyed since teaming with Calvin Harris and Armand Van Helden, and Dizzee’s dazzling backing on these tracks, and on Tongue N’ Cheek as a whole, will prove a strong formula to take into the lab and distil for the next chapter.

Bounce…

It’s only evolution

One of the constants of the last 20 years, in my life at least, has been the presence of Pearl Jam as a musical companion. Their ongoing single-minded writing of their own history, often against the constraints and constructs of the music industry, has been an inspiration and now another chapter appears in the shape of their self-released (in the US at least) new record, Backspacer.

It really does not hang about, clocking in at 36 minutes plus change, and the great thing about it is that it doesn’t need to be any longer. Something that has irked for years, particularly as the single declined as a format, was the way that a lot of acts (so many names…) loaded their records with as much filler as great tracks. B-sides with nowhere to go clogged the arteries of otherwise perfectly healthy albums and brought them to their knees with the unnecessary flab they added.

It’s genuinely a thrill to listen to a record that is as long as it needs to be to make its statement, no more, and no less. How often can it really be said these days that a record left you wanting more?

Long-time fans will identify the similarities with other classic albums, especially No Code. That was my reference point for this record on first listen, it’s diversity, strength and downright classic song-writing and musicianship are front and centre here, but with a brighter shade than on previous records.

The Avacado album was weighted down with the hangover of the Bush administration and the war in Iraq, as was Riot Act, and this record, recorded in the early hopeful glow of Obama, brings Eddie and the boys out of the shadows, rocking into the light with a tangible joy that has been pretty much under wraps since No Code.

It’s as though the sentiment of Gone, from the last album, with its Springsteenesque small-town great escape narrative, has come to pass – this band have gotten out of the shackles they were bound by, and this is the sound of what that freedom has released.

Backspacer is a complete record. It knows where it’s going, where it’s been, and what it feels. Take it out beyond the lights at the edge of town, let me know where you get to. I’m sure it will be a good place.

Here’s Cameron Crowe’s mesmerising video for the lead track, The Fixer…

One hand in the air for the big city…

Jay-Z, the coolest man in the galaxy at the moment, played Madison Square Garden on Friday night in aid of the New York Police and Fire Widow’s and Children’s charity, Answer The Call.

Putting aside the motives for a moment (a benefit show for 9/11 victim’s families on the same day as the release of a new record was a little questionable), it roc-ed Manhattan from the Bronx to Statten Island.

A stellar guest-list for the night – Santogold, John Mayer, Kanye, Pharell, Mary J Blige, Diddy, Rihanna, Beyonce, Kid Cudi,  (did I miss anyone?) – a tight-as live band, a magical NY skyline backdrop and the biggest and best beats from his 15 year career… who could ask for anything more?

It was an astonishing night, an incredible concert and validation of Jay’s place in the hip-hop firmament. Hova has gone beyond genre classification, and with classy shows like this before an adoring audience, he shows that maybe, just maybe, he is the new Sinatra.

The only down-side was concert broadcaster fuse.tv’s insistence of dropping every profanity from the audio, and not in an elegant way. Armed with a mute button and no subtlety, whole lines and music were deleted – hopefully there will be an unedited version somewhere out there for those not so easily offended.

Open your ears, open your hearts and enjoy…

Resistance is useless! (Well, not really…)

Not many rock gods hail from seaside resorts in Southern England, but Muse, from sunny Teignmouth, have returned with their fifth album proper, The Resistance.

Following on a fairly stellar trajectory from the magnificent launch-pad of Showbiz, they reached the outer limits on their last release, Blackholes and Revelations. The question was, where would they go from here?

Unsurprisingly, they have headed into hyperspace with this new release, a confident musical journey and, while the lyrics delve into more earthly concerns – geo-political consciousness, conspiracy theories, raging against the machine – that on paper look like a flimsy David Icke manifesto and don’t bear too much consideration, the right thing to do is just follow Matt Bellamy’s lead and leap into the void with your eyes wide open.

Still taking style points from the classicism of Queen and the vision of Rush, but with an overwhelming pop sensibility, The Resistance leads off with Uprising, a rousing, rolling juggernought, before the title track arrives, featuring The Edge’s piano making a guest appearance. Undisclosed Desires is Depeche Mode imbibed with a classical thread, and then things just start getting silly, albeit in the best possible way.

United States of Eurasia. Terrible title, too general a sentiment, great song. Starting as a piano lament, it kicks its We Are The Champions heels just over a minute in, and just runs with that. It’s not going to topple governments or make sheep explode at 20 paces, it just rocks daftly and melodically thoughout, towards it’s Chopin-inspired outro (I kid you not).

From there to the closer, the three-part symphonic opus, Exogenesis, there’s great progish pop, a slightly misguided Supergrass moment on I Belong To You that could have been better placed on a B-side, and some hurtlingly huge riffs that will be magnificent in arenas across the globe when they go out on tour.

Exogenesis’ massive orchestration and sci-fi soundtrack overtones blend perfectly with Matt’s falsetto delivery. I’ve no idea what it’s about, but it’s a modern day Pink Floyd masterpiece, and that’s no bad thing in my book.

Set to road-test the new material on that other spaced invasion, U2’s 360 tour, Muse have delivered another set that will develop a second life on stage, and solidify the new songs within their already packed catalogue of solar-system-bestriding anthems.

What a ride.

Bodies in the Bohdi Tree (eh?)

Robbie’s Dharma initiative, or, at least, his return to the public eye after his “my X-files ate all the pies” exile in Los Angeles, has started this week with the release of his latest single, Bodies.

With its multiple layers of religious reference, with Bhudda’s Bohdi tree (that he contemplated in gratitude for a week on the path to enlightenment), Jesus dying, or not, for an unnamed “you”, and Gregorian chants (see Justin’s Cry Me A River for another reference point), Bodies is a proper pop melange, with a big ker-pow of a chorus sure to see the hands and voices raised when he gets back into the stadiums of the world. It’s also a little baffling.

Not even the somewhat tame and confusing video, with Bob in the desert with his motorbike, Bob with his pretty squeeze in a beachbuggy, and Bob’s performance segment in an airplane’s graveyard, really makes things any clearer.

I was hoping for something that put the song in some sort of perspective, but it just doesn’t gel for me. Bob is at his Bobbestness when he shines with a swagger like Kanye, as he has the smirk and the smarts to carry it off. Like this…

The dusty, slightly downbeat and fairly unfocussed video for Bodies has nothing of the class of this mini-movie from the same director, Vaughan Arnell. In Millenium, Robbie’s having a laugh. He knows you know it’s ridiculous, but, hey, what the hell, when the tunes are this good and the budget’s no object?

There’s none of this chummy, arms-around-your-shoulders charm in the desert – it’s all a little too… relaxed, like no-one’s really trying too hard to up their game.

Maybe this is the return from the wilderness, that the best is yet to come, and the Trevor Horn produced album, Reality Killed The Video Star, will push him back into the stellar space that his former That-mates currently inhabit.

I’m hoping, too, that the return of former songwriting partner Guy Chambers as well as having one of the key producers of the last 30 years will help put Robbie back where he belongs, at the upper reaches of the pop firmament, making cock-sure, cocky and confident statements, aurally and visually.

I’m just not sure this is as sure-footed a step as it needs to be to set him on the road to Bodhisattva.

See what you think…

We believe in each other, we need one another…

And so, it ends.

An unkind word, a flippant, witty reply, a smashed guitar, and it’s all over.

Well, there’s a whole lot more to it than that, but that’s the compressed version of 16 years of a career in music.

You have to stop flogging a dead horse eventually, and although it has prompted some hagiographic nonsense among some critics, the common sense view is, and should be, a collective sigh of relief that Oasis are, finally, no more.

I remember coming back from backpacking in the Far East, and the one thing I did between getting off the plane and collapsing into bed for the next 48 hours was hit a record shop to buy Definitely Maybe. They meant that much. In 1994.

At that time, they lifted you up from the mundane; it was an antidote to 14 years of Tory rule in the UK, hedonistic escapism for people who didn’t fancy clubbing, driving, tuneful, guitar music that was just so right for the time that it sparked something inside a nation.

Then came Morning Glory. A hype orgy preceded it’s release, it sold in its millions, it was a validation of the initial rush. And the songs were pretty good, too.

Here they are at the height of their powers. Oddly, everything after these two gigs in London’s Earls Court arena, which I was privileged to be at, was downhill.

The ongoing obsession and blind faith that many had with Oasis came from that initial blaze of glory. But you knew deep down, after Be Here Now appeared, a bloated, cocaine-fuelled, tossed-off mess of a record, there was never going to be another Columbia, another Don’t Look Back In Anger, another Acquiesce. There as a stagger, not a swagger.

The loyalty remained, and as long as they slipped a good single onto an otherwise terrible album, there was hope they might rise again, that Noel might regain his muse, and that Oasis might send you on the rocket-trip euphoria of the intro to Cigarettes And Alcohol once again. They didn’t.

Hauling their emperor’s new grooves around the world each year has made them hugely rich, certainly, and given another generation the opportunity to experience an Oasis show. But having been at Slane earlier this year, and having left after an hour, I had the impression that they really could not go on doing this any more, to themselves, their recorded legacy (the first two records), or their fans.

The V Festival no-show was the beginning of the end, Rock En Seine the final straw. Hope remains that Noel will come back stronger, with better tunes, and the determination that he left at the door when the initial rush of success bought everything he ever wanted. Having nothing left to prove led to a decade of plodding. Having nothing to hold him back might just give him the space to grow as a songwriter and performer.

Oasis might not have been the Beatles, but Noel may yet grow into something more than a Paul McCartney wannabe.

It’s Hova’s world, we just lucky to live in it

As the album leak spreads across the globe, it would be irresponsible not to do the decent thing, accept Jay’s invitation, and enjoy The Blueprint 3 before it officially drops on September 11.

So, eleven albums in, Jay-Z has delivered what will come in time to be considered as… about his fourth best album.

Reasonable Doubt, Blueprint 1 and The Black Album will always trump most things that other rappers release, hands down, and, in turn, those releases have become the yardsticks that Jay’s music will be measured by for as long as he’s in the game.

That’s not to say Blueprint 3 is a poor relation to those massive records. Its big production, its beats courtesy of Kanye West, Pharell, No ID and Timbaland, guest appearances and Jay’s own smooth, smooth flow, set it apart.

The best moments are the purest rap ones, where Hov just rhymes and amazes with his ability to weave words, dizzying with imagery and his stream-of-consciousness style.

But, on some tracks, Jay feels like the hype man, not the main attraction. Whereas it’s great to give props to the new life blood of hip-hop, you wonder if his presence might have served the collaborators better by these tracks appearing on their own releases, not this one. Would these songs absence have made Blueprint 3 a better cohesive whole, focussing on Jay and Jay only? Isn’t that what we really want?

That said, this is an exceptional ride, and, from start to finish, the mood is up and the chrome-shining production puts a smile on your face. You can’t help but bounce to What We Talking About, DOA, Empire State of Mind and On To The Next One, and the rhymes are packed and skilful, sending you back time and again to catch the meaning, nuance and humour.

If the album that follows takes the promised experimental direction, then The Blueprint 3 can be seen as a line drawn under a fine, if unexceptional, run of form since The Black Album, before Jay-Z hopefully jumpstarts another revolution in hip-hop and his own career.

Update: Here’s some visuals – ROC Nation is in the hay-oose!