City Vibes

 |  December 25, 2009

Artist:
Various
Album:
Five Years of Hyperdub
Rating:

What is it about Dubstep that makes it one of the most exciting and dynamic sub-genres to emerge out of the British dance underground? The dystopian grooves and mismatched beats are truly a product of tense urban dissatisfaction and fevered experimentalism that have been the hallmarks of the most successful dance organisms to emerge in the 21st Century, as music becomes less defined by genres and more amorphous…and confusing. Hyperdub have been the pioneers of Dubstep from the beginning and this collection exhibits the very best in dark, nefarious and razor sharp dance music that is nigh on impossible to dance to, but engaging for every spliced second.

Artist:
Susan Boyle
Album:
I Dreamed a Dream
Rating:

I don’t expect you to care about Susan Boyle, I certainly don’t! However, Boyle is the quintessential allegorical tale of the vacuous, predatory world of the major record labels and their cash-obsessed minions to destroy independent thought and stultify us with an endless environment of musical detritus. Boyle was made famous, not because she sang well, but because she was ugly and sang well. What a fucking revelation! The poor woman has now been thrown to the media lions as the public suck up her meteoric rise and cataclysmic fall like pigs at the trough. That fall is exemplified by this shockingly soulless stocking-filler that will be the soundtrack to many a bland Turkey dinner. Happy Christmas!

Artist:
Various
Album:
Yeah Ghost
Rating:

Regular readers of this column will be familiar with my rants over Warp’s exemplary outputs. It is perhaps the best record label of modern times… a controversial statement? Well, allow this 20th anniversary collection of Warp’s material to nullify your cynicism. The evidence is laid bare in a sumptuously exuberant box-set of cochlear treats with the substance to justify their pretentious packaging. For anyone thinking what the hell is Warp? Where the hell have you been for the last 20 years?!!! Your life is incomplete! Lucky for you Warp have taken the trouble to rejuvenate your empty existence with this history lesson in the best music of modern times.