And now for something Extra Ordinary. That’ll be the new LP from MC Andy Cooper (sometime of Long Beach underground hip-hop crew Ugly Duckling, not to mention frequent Allergies collaborator) and DJ Robert Smith of Berlin’s Dusty Donuts crew (not to mention DMC champion), out solely on vinyl – for now at least. It’s a throwback to the late 90s and early ’00s when you couldn’t move for underground stuff like this – boom-bap beats and samples, and kooky block party rhymes – which was itself a throwback to the hip-hop of the late 80s and early 90s hip-hop before the mainstream/underground schism.
The thing is if you were doing it then (UD started in 1993) and you’re still doing it now, there’s a strong chance you’ve acquired a certain level of grand-mastery as AC reminds us on Dedicated To The Groove, “I’ve been rocking microphones for a coupla decades/ So I know what I’m doing when I step on the stage…don’t stop, go again and again and again/ 10 000 hours, clockin’ in.” The track and its lyrics actually appear on the second half of the LP dedicated to the DJ (the first being dedicated to the MC) so it’s probably just as well that Cooper adds that, “DJ Robert Smith is a certified pro/ Let ’em know,” the second bar of which is completed with Smith scratching in the phrase “I’m ready to go.” It’s a moment that encapsulates the pair’s mission, also voiced by Cooper on the opener and title track when he notes, “I take pride in the beats I provide and I/ still have the drive to keep the artform alive.” That’s right ladies and gentleman, this whole LP is about the almost symbiotic relationship between the DJ and the MC – each pushing the other to go further and never forgetting that the ‘artform’ began with the DJ back in ’73.
Extra Ordinary is a game, then, of one objective (move the crowd with two turntables and a microphone) and two halves, with zero filler. Side A contains such highlights as the album’s fastest cut, Bullet Train, on which Cooper delivers two minutes, fifty one seconds of machine-gun bars and The Definition Of Insanity which puts not so much madness as toxic narcissim in its crosshairs. It could be about an ex, a boss, or the last person who tried to gaslight you but despite its generalised nature it’s hard to listen to this and not think of the current U.S. president. Meanwhile the second half opens with Let’s Take It To The Booth (“dedicated to the folks on the ones and twos/ the ones who get it done in the DJ booth” a.k.a. “a shaman a medicine man, that all the people wanna listen to instead of a band”) featuring the funkiest of breaks and scratching pyrotechnics and closes with something a little bit different – Hand Band – on which Cooper plays the drums. Yep, he’s got skills – it’s funky as hell. The monkey’s favourite cut is number two though – Authentic which finds AC and RS making it all sound effortless over the type of phat organ-led groove. One for the real heads.
(Out now on Breakbeat Paradise Records)