Wednesday 28 October 2009

'Revenge of the Blowfish' - Squid Ninjaz (album review)

Drawing comparisons between Squid Ninjaz and Wu-Tang would be easy, lazy journalism – but I’ll do it anyway because it seems so apt: there are lots of them, they’re dirty and grimey and there’s the whole martial arts thing too.

The production comes from Metabeats mainly although Dogruffbeats, Lousain Hekla and Imakemadbeats all pitch in too with beats. Sparse, crunchy and dusty and ultimately very heavy backdrops back up the Squids – the LP’s strength.

Opener ‘8 Bars’ features fifteen MCs who all come in full on ill lyrical mode. However, as the album goes on the allusions to violence and misogyny wear pretty thin – if you can stomach it to begin with. I appreciate their quest to bring “raw raps” but I’m pretty sure that doesn’t necessitate so much sordid imagery. For some heads – this is just what you’re looking for. For me, it’s not. Having said that, all these MCs have skills – they all rhyme the rhyme well – it’s just the relentless content that’s the problem.

Single ‘Luna Disco’ is a dope track and I can’t front on that!

‘Revenge Of The Blowfish’ will be out on December 7th on Squid Ninja Records.

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