Why do I get an "innovative hip hop" album from New York's 857? I'm a middle class English middle aged muso. What would I know?
Well. I'm grateful. I've spent time with my 15 year old's mp3 collection. I've listened out for other things and I've enjoyed the experience. I really didn’t like 857, and I didn’t want to write them off till I had listened to plenty of Jurassic 5, Kanye West, 50 Cent, Sage Francis, De La Soul, Dizzee Rascal, Dead Prez, Young Buck and a bit more.
The problem hits right in with the skit introduction. It's a gruesomely lame joke done as clumsily as a bunch of drama class school kids could make it. The "Throat Drops" joke is even worse. And then (tell me it isn't true) it's repeated later as Milk Shake". This is the US dumbed down to the lower levels of the sniggering sub basement.
Skits apart, the main offering is routine stuff. The breathtaking virtuosity of current commercial hip hop is ignored. But the rough and angry weaponry of Dead Prez or the Anticon boys is left out too. Using simple ingredients 857 manage to sound a bit slow on the beat, short on the rhyme and slow with the mordant phrase. One or two tunes "Frontpage" and "Blood" get the general groove and sense of threat going. But the failure to get a clear view on things disrupts any mood or general story that could convince me that these guys are really serious.Several styles are attempted - but none convince.
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My excursions have convinced me that hip hop has everything and more that the heavyweights have told us. It isn’t simply revolt into style, and it certainly isn't a self-defeating half-revolution. It can connect as directly as the blues and it makes English indie rock look very slack. But with people like Kanye West and Sage Francis around … 857 are part of the audience, not the show.
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