JULY 2006
are repeated songs and half-finished doodles strewn about its landscape, the work hangs together admirably. | Paul John Little the streets the hardest way to make an easy living (vice/atlantic) Mike Skinner has coasted this far on charm. The man behind the Streets has become the face of British hiphop in America and, insofar as he has thrived, it has been in contrast to the Mafioso myth-making of the New World version. Skinner’s narratives are riyl: Dizzee Rascal, Lady microscopic, the Sovereign, Wiley world written in a grain of sand. Sidewalk chalk drawings across the street from grand graffiti art. Then he sold three million albums and entered the unreal world of celebrity. The Hardest Way to Make an Easy Living is unstable and overstated, yet, at times, it emerges as his most developed work yet. Perhaps the primary distinction of Skinner from any other hip-hop superstar is that he does not trust himself. More than anything else, it is this skepticism that anchors an album that walks along the razor’s edge of self-absorption. After all, the hook of first single “When You Wasn’t Famous” sends up the first of many red flags: “When you’re a famous boy/It gets really easy to get girls/So when you try to pull a girl/Who is also famous too/It feels just like when you wasn’t famous.” If the rest of the song wasn’t a bittersweet tabloid-baiting account of an affair with a crack-smoking pop star who dumped him, I might be less likely to overlook the awkwardness of the sentiment. It is a basic celebrity fallacy that just because one seems important as an individual, one’s thoughts also become important. The Hardest Way to Make an Easy Living succeeds most when it turns inward. In particular, “Prangin Out,” the title track, and “Never Went to Church” maintain a worn authenticity. Skinner has always been the master of the well-placed detail that is able to draw the listener in as if involved in a private conversation. Pacing-wise, these moments aren’t allowed to accumulate, as they are broken up by genuinely awful tracks such as “Memento Mori,” which has perhaps the worst hook I’ve heard. “Can’t Con an Honest John” follows, digging the channel deeper. The album ultimately loses internal coherence, the only uniting aspect the surprising insularity of its public narrator. Judging by the press surrounding
the album, The Hardest Way was meant as a red-carpet epic, but it ends up as a widescreen diary, small in every way but presentation. | James McAnally various artists global underground 10 (global underground)
When Andy Horsfeld and James Todd came up with the idea of starting an international music label focusing on house/dance music, I doubt they had any idea just how influential their label would become. Ten years later, Global Underground, the brainchild of the two Geordie clubbers turned music producers, is set to unleash a massive retrospective highlighting their impressive arsenal of global house music. The CD collection is being offered in two formats. For most of us, the overstuffed threedisc collection would be more than ample to get our collective grooves on, but for the hardcore fans of the Global Underground label, there is a limited edition four-disc set just to make sure that you don’t miss a beat. On the three-disc set, the first two platters focus on GU’s back catalogue. The beauty of this particular collection is how GU has mixed up a little something for everybody no matter what your house music taste. If Chicago’s Felix da Housecat’s progressive trance-infused “Silver Screen Shower Scene” doesn’t get you going, then Albion’s swirling trance rhythms on “Air” will allow you to release your inner dancing queen. Out of the 20 (!) artists who appear on disc one, my personal favorite is Fatboy Slim’s “Sunset (Bird of Prey),” with its phenomenal blend of minimalist breakbeats and simplistic vocals. Disc two is slightly slimmer, featuring only 17 electronic artists, but the talent is just as fierce. Highlights include Alcatraz’s “Give Me Love (That Kid Chris Tribute Mix),” the Forth’s trippy “Reality Detached (K Roxx 2006 Mix),” and Dark Globe’s infectious “Break My World.” Perhaps the most impressive track on disc two is from the one-time opening act for Moby, Hybrid, with their progressive trance track, “Theme From Wide Angle.” Where the first two discs allowed us to revisit artists on previous GU albums, the third disc contains 28 house/club gems from 1987–95. In case you haven’t been keeping count, this collection contains 65 tracks logging over three-and-a-half hours of fantastic house/ trance/breakbeat/electro/disco/trip-hop music. While the average clubgoer might be over-
whelmed with the onslaught of music herein, there are so many tasty musical morsels contained in this compilation that it’s a must-have for any club music lover’s library. | Jim Campbell various artists graciously, a gulf relief compilation (funzalo)
After Hurricane Katrina and the Bush regime conspired to turn much of the Gulf Coast into a monstrous aquarium, support of all sorts— a verb like this seems inescapable—poured into the region. That support continues with Graciously, A Gulf Relief Compilation, a 12-track, multiple-artist CD recorded at Tucson’s famed Wavelab Studio, from which a third of the net proceeds will fund the New Orleans Area Habitat for Humanity Musicians’ Village project. Like tribute discs, of course, benefit discs instantly spark suspicion; purity of motivation scarcely necessitates preeminence of music— the road to hell, et cetera. Happily, the good intentions inspiring this Funzalo Records release lead not to the infernal regions but to some fairly enjoyable listening. A fence-sitter of an assessment, that. Contributions from Calexico, John Doe with Virgil Shaw, Robyn Hitchcock, and Steve Wynn and the Miracle 3 all bolster the CD’s sonic gravitas without (alas) producing tracks that transcend basal craftsmanship; gravitas alone does not a groove define. Moreover, Nik Freitas’s “Picture Song” sprawls markedly— although not without merit, it wants judicious tightening—and on “The Gits,” the nasal quaver of Richmond Fontaine’s Willy Vlautin prompts little enthusiasm. That said, before closing with a sweetly dreamy instrumental rendition of “Moon River” from Friends of Dean Martinez, Graciously features various felicities. Luca’s “Shadow Painting” manages the neat trick of sounding at once bleak (“Politics means nothin’ when you’re lyin’ in the grave”) and boisterous, while Amelia White stages an aural parade with the spellbinding “Skeleton Key.” The disc’s most noteworthy track, though, comes from Howe Gelb with Scout Niblett; they perform a four-song medley beginning with “I Want Candy,” an echoic, ebullient effort that should have folks boogying throughout the Big Easy, and everywhere else. | Bryan A. Hollerbach
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