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Grooves
Various artists Various artists A few years back, when an ego-tripping Jermaine Dupri boasted he was music's top producer, it wasn't long before Dr. Dre mockingly referred to him as "Mini Me." You could say that Dupri is the Rodney Dangerfield of platinum knob-twiddlers. He ain't dead yet, though – this year has brought one of his biggest successes, production and cocomposer credits on Mariah Carey's "We Belong Together." Unfortunately, nothing on Dupri's latest comp comes close to that song's easygoing depth. Instead, locked in laughable hard-as-the-streets mode, Dupri showcases one boring rapper after another with Young, Fly, and Flashy, blessing relative newbies like Young Capone and played-out has-beens like Da Brat (time for some payback in the name of Jane Wiedlin) with chintzy keyboard hooks and weak beats. Janet Jackson's little main man seems to work best when he's tailoring to the divas – his recent contributions to albums by Monica and Faith Evans outclass anything on Young, Fly, and Flashy. The only thing worse than the single "Gotta Getcha" is the video for it, where Jackson embarrasses herself further in a cheerleader outfit. Girl, time to act your age. A producer and label head isn't doing well if his compilation isn't as good as Wendy Williams's, and that's Dupri's current fate – his label, So So Def, should be renamed So-So and Deaf. Bigmouthed gossip queen Williams's debut foray into CD queenpin status, Brings the Heat does a finer job of living up to its title. (Yeah, yeah, the highlight's probably Marques Houston's "Naked," a track that has been exposed elsewhere; still, any chance to get naked with Houston is a chance worth taking.) Since Williams gave Amerie her first radio spin, the long-legged girl returns the favor with the lead-off track, "Man Up!" a Nas collabo that's isn't as fierce as "1 Thing" but is hotter than the rest of Amerie's Touch (Sony). For some reason Jaheim always sounds extra sweet dueting with a man, and on "Everytime," Jadakiss gets that honor. Better than its name suggests, "Hood Princess" makes me want to hear more from Deemi. With the exception of the twisted Ann Peebles "I Can't Stand the Rain" sample on "Tough Love" by Renegade Fox and Prodigy (from Mobb Deep), things go downhill quickly after that – especially when Williams adds a campy, inspirational message to Mario Winans's typically torturous "Stand Up" – and when Dupri gets involved, not once but twice. Oh, and one last thing: Guerilla Black may sound like Biggie, but he sure as hell doesn't rhyme or flow like him. (Johnny Ray Huston) Metalux Following up last year's Waiting for Armadillo (Load), Metalux furthers its circuit-bent and vocal-warping explorations for the children of 5RC. Capable of soul-throttling bass drones and repetitive electronic poetry, Jenny Graf and MV Carbon, former members of Bride of No No, lay on guitar scree with the whirlwinds of metallic sheen. Much like early Wolf Eyes, Metalux is actually channeling ur-rock fantasy through home-wired technology, ending up with a messy monster hybrid. Unlike the former's monomaniacal, somatic beat-body meld, Metalux's extremity seems more embedded in its subtly meandering, midtempo molasses creep, constantly fragmenting sound blocks that rarely go for the jugular. This tack seems ever more obvious on tracks like "Tremor Loss," which places dramatic narrative at the foreground of a waning mix of guitar plucks and radio static. The short interlude at the beginning of "Shelldrum" manages to sound like a horde of throat-singing robots. In the midst of what seems like controlled chaos, Graf and Carbon's singsongy deadpan vocals play at humanity, trying and then failing to keep their tools from collapse. I'm wary of falling into gender stereotypes when talking about Metalux, implying that they fail to "rock" where their boy counterparts do, because there's a lack of female representation in what has been ghettoized as a noise boys club. They seem to have more on their minds in any case, with art instructor Graf also producing The Guitars Project, a video and picture disc documenting elderly women with Alzheimer's who are given electric guitars. All things aside, Metalux offers pleasures that don't have to pummel to get their point across. Metalux play Aug. 6, Hemlock Tavern, SF (415) 923-0923. (George Chen) DJ Language What a lame name for such a truly great mix! New York's DJ Language may have been slacking in the title department, but he is definitely on point when it comes to what matters: selection, programming, and the all-important deck skills. I mean, what can you say about a mix that moves from Pete Rock and CL Smooth to Bugz in the Attic to Patrice Rushen without skipping a beat? Well, you can say it's exactly how a mix CD should sound. While some beat a single genre to death with seamless blends, and others take eclectic selection and idiosyncratic transitions to perverse lengths, the Negroclash resident and cofounder, with Rich Medina, of the legendary Stoned Soul parties manages to find a happy middle ground. Starting from the slurred beat of DJ Mitsu's appropriately named "Intro," our feet wander from the well-worn path of Nas's "War," a cut that proves commercial hip-hop can still be slamming, to the less-traveled, dreamy psychedelia of Koushik, probably the only producer on Stones Throw that has folk music-loving fans. In fact, though DJ Language keeps firmly focused on holding down a steady groove, a look at the labels he turns to reveal an equal grasp of the DJ's role as a crate-digging educator. From forgotten gems on majors like Elektra, such as Rushen's "Haven't You Heard," through tracks from established independent imprints like Ubiquity and Compost, to brand-new sounds like LAL' s "BEW Epilogue," on Kevin Moon's (a.k.a. Moonstarr) tiny Toronto label, Public Transit, Language has been busy searching for the soul, no matter where it hides. (Peter Nicholson) |
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