Super group Two Fingers (Amon Tobin and Joe “Doubleclick” Chapman) featuring UK Mobo winning artist Sway have been busy distorting the sound of hip hop for the debut album Two Fingers
And describing what these guys have been up in Montreal as a distortion is not meant in a bad way and if you’re caught up with their Two Finger bootleg remixes (particularly Kool Keith‘s ‘Drugs’), you’ll know what I mean as their sound is scary, dark, foreboding.
It’s like Tobin’s The Lighthouse for a dubstep/grime generation with d’n'b and breaks roots. Two Fingers could have gone B’more school but that would have been a bit obvious. The album mostly features Sway who was an inspired choice; apparently he went and found them rather than the other way around. The wit of This Is My Demo has been left behind and it’s just the dark side of that album that makes it into the world of Two Fingers; like the album cover, there are mere shards of light in the darkness. Notably, from the souk of ‘Jewels And Gems’ that’s a standout as Sway hits us with his street philosophy>. He proposes that money grows on trees as money is paper – very Roots Manuva.
It’s not as dancehall/dubstep as last years album by The Bug London Zoo (also on Big Dada) but it gets close on ‘Bad Girl’ as it features dancehall legend Ce’Cile, she’s still hot like we.
Back on the darkside, there’s two tracks with the rapper from Philly who was signed to Timbaland’s label, Miss Jade. ‘Better Get That’ and ‘Doing My Job’ keeps up with the Diplo‘s of the B-more scene which is strangely at odds with the “London” of the title track; well we’ll let that one go as Sway is North London after all.
Tobin fans know that is what this beatsmith is all about. See HERE the interview on the with him on release of Chaos Thoery back in 2005 and that track ‘The Lighthouse’ is still one of the best things he’s done. Teaming up with Double Click has not done him any harm though and all the backing tracks are impressive and particularly the instrumentals like ‘Moth Rhythm’ and the middle eastern influenced ‘Keman Rhythm’ (current office favourite for dubstep dervishes).
So as Two Fingers stick up their musical two fingers to anyone that wants to label them, we agree with their press, “Like all the best music it transcends genre to stand on its own – icy, transcendent, brilliant”.
Forthcoming Gigs:
Wed 13 May – Scala, Kings Cross, London
Thu 14 May – Maria, Berlin
Fri 15 May – Amsterdam Melkweg
Sat 16 May – Elysee Montmartre, Paris
Reviewed: Two Fingers – Two Fingers (Big Dada) Cat No. BDCD135/BDDNL135 Release date: 30th March 2009
Tracklisting:
1 Straw Men featuring Sway (2:58)
2 What You Know featuring Sway (3:14)
3 Better Get That featuring Ms. Jade (3:05)
4 Two Fingers featuring Sway (2:49)
5 That Girl featuring Sway (3:15)
6 Keman Rhythm (3:16)
7 Jewels And Gems featuring Sway (3:52)
8 Bad Girl featuring Cecile (3:39)
9 High Life featuring Sway (3:15)
10 Doing My Job featuring Ms. Jade (3:39)
11 Not Perfect featuring Sway (3:27)
12 Moth Rhythm (3:13)
Links:
www.myspace.com/2wofingers
www.msjade.com
www.cecileflava.com
www.friedmylittlebrain.com
Busta Rhymes – Don’t Touch Me (Two Fingers Remix)
Kool Keith – Drugs (Two Fingers Remix)
www.bigdada.com
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dada
