DA DA DA DADADUNK DUNK DUNK DUUUNK DADADUNK DADADUNK DADADUNKDUNK…
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[7.14]
Anthony Easton: I missed grime, and I like grime. I can hear the Caribbean in the noise of this, and his voice over the noise is pure London. That the lyrics are hyper-specific to place only adds to the ambiance; it makes the aggro music, the riddim toasting and the abrasive aggro butchness forgivable. I’m reading the new Zadie Smith novel, which tries very hard to do this; Smith’s lists, fractured narratives and circular rhythms have more to claim from grime or hip-hop than the modernist novels that she quotes and reviewers have picked up on, but sometimes one form does a better job than another.
[8]
Pete Baran: From the first five seconds you wonder if it can stay this good. Then about thirty seconds you are asking the same. About a minute in you think it has settled in to be slightly less awesome, but then you think the trebly tumbledown backing with sparse bass drops would sound incredible on a manky soundsystem. And the seventh time I played it through my manky stereo (broken tweeter) I decided it really is that good.
[9]
Katherine St Asaph: That beat. That fucking beat, harsh and skittery like tumbling down an avalanche. It’s so good the vocalists don’t register for the first few listens; when they do, Takura’s overdrive of a voice registers before ostensible lead Max’s. (Let’s put it this way: when he talks about cougars, he sounds like he means 25-year-olds.) But let’s not quibble with greatness.
[8]
Alfred Soto: It’s one helluva meaty-beaty-bouncy beat, and it’s looking for an MC for something at stake….
[5]
Patrick St. Michel: The beat is blown-out pandemonium that would be challenging for most rappers to tussle with. Maxsta tries, but his rhymes about treating MILFs and cougars to meals sound lackluster next to the mutant brostep production. Instrumental only, please.
[5]
Jonathan Bogart: I don’t know of a better music than grime for making me feel both assaulted and exhilerated: the density of this, especially as it builds towards the final explosion, with dubstep wub-wubs and party-rap airhorns, is magnificent. Particularly since it’s not dense all the way through: Show N Prove’s build and shift, with its skittering different sections, gives weight to what is after all a pretty innocuous pop tune.
[7]
Iain Mew: The beat trips over itself in delightful chaos, then pops off and back often enough to energise again each time, with Maxsta and Takura holding the fort in the meantime. When they join the sawing sounds in sentiment and break into “fuck off” too, the track reaches its full abrasive potential.
[8]