★★☆☆☆
The way footwork forefather Kavain Space stuffs his sampler, his output should be a multi-speed collage of colour. Tarzan roars, Flash Gordon and Phil Collins adulation, a double helping of Timbaland, Psycho strings Busta Rhymes fans will know well, soundbites from Shogun Assassin and a glut of hip-hop one-liners… yet the reality is that one of the original brains behind the fast and furious/unholy union of hip-hop, booty bass and modern dubstep, defaults on being deft. Drum machine on, samples thrown down, dance floor hijacked.
Boo’s block party booms, chucked onto a bed of bobbling bass and go-go gadget drum triggers, are unceremonious with the scissors and glue. Legacy plays as a juke inverse of Armand van Helden’s Sampleslayer, a crude, in places amateurish-sounding cut and paste of samples and loops vibing for cheap yet familiar thrills. Though long known for such strategies in Chicagoan ghetto assault, structures are built while not entirely bothered whether they win or bust by quality control, at a tempo almost overrunning 4/4 time.
The thrill of sparse hydraulics and drop-it-down-low implications of the super minimal “Red Hot”, produced with a muffle that sounds like you’re outside listening in, isn’t hard to fathom — right place, right time, right on. “Invisibu Boogie” and “Robotbutizm” have a cartoonish element to subdue the screwfaced jacking, and “Sentimental” attempts a slow jam at the given rate of syncopation. Symbolic, in a weird, disorientating, superficial adrenalin rush pushing dance music into a peculiar state of flux.
File under: DJ Spinn, Traxman, Tha Pope