RIFF MARKET

Bite Down On My Anticipation

Two big albums I expect to devastate my topten riffs 2006 list are this Basement Jaxx Crazy Itch Radio guy and then Hell Hath No Fury, by the rap blog world's most overrated "underrated" act the Clipse. Over the weekend I heard the lead Jaxx single "Hush Baby" and the next Fury single "Wamp Wamp (What It Do)," which has Slim Thug on the hook, so some early thoughts:

Basement Jaxx: "Hush Boy (Radio Mix)" (MP3)

Two weeks ago I went home tasked with making J one of those embarrassing "this is what I listened to when I thought Rage Against the Machine's Evil Empire was the most aggro shit ever" type mixtapes. I had to tear open all these boxes to get to my old CDs and tapes and records because my mom, who swears she still loves me, boxed all my stuff up as soon as I left for school and gave my room to one of our dogs (the older, shittier one).

Either way, I forgot how much big-budget late70s early80s FUNK I listened to--Gap Band, Cameo, Lakeside, Ohio Players, Tower of Power, Brothers Johnson, Average White Band, Mandrill, Earth Wind and Fire, LTD, Heatwave, Bar-Kays, etc., and obviously Kool and the Gang and Parliament and an obscene amount of Bootsy Collins. We're talking full LPs, all the shitty ballads, everything including the Kool and the Gang video footage from the Playboy festival (they wore matching sequins jumpsuits). "It's because you used to play the horn, Nick," mom says, "so that's why you like horns, why don't you play the horn, your dead hornplaying grandfather resents you..." and so maybe my liking for "Hush Boy" starts with the big horn lines and overall overblown "shitty funk" vibe.

As usual for BJaxx, the song doesn't breathe at all, gills stuffed and the rest. Fine, but the vocals... really lame decisions on the melody, which stays obvious and relies on the chick to sex it up, emote in that awful "awful eurohouse" way that repels people the same way the old themesong to the Oprah Show ("Oprah's on!") screams fun fun fun. I'm smitten with rappers repping facebook and myspace and their favorite FTP servers but for some reason the Jaxx's "found the restaurant on the internet" line falls flat for me--I'd much rather the song be about how awesome the party's gonna be tonight than "so the food is good, I had a chicken fajita," then turn into yet another "check on it"/"take it slowly" anti-"Promiscuous Girl" track where both male and female are indecisive and unempowered and lame. 62/100 RIFFS

Clipse: "Wamp Wamp (What It Do) [ft. Slim Thug]" (MP3)

Obviously I'll probably end up liking this song because the lyrics are so on, so impossibly referential with a pretty great bite on the "Horse & Carriage" hook delivery too, but for now: I hear "Wamp Wamp" and think (a) pretty lame attempt at getting a signature catchphrase started (cf. Rza's aborted "boom boom") and (b) I can't wait until somebody synches this up with the scene in The Little Mermaid where that fucking crab's playing the marimbas. The crab would also say "wamp wamp." 72/100 RIFFS