CD reviews
Dan Le Sac vs. Scroobius Pip are as screwy as they sound and Tussle just might make you shake
By Dave Tow , Todd Kroviak
Dan Le Sac vs.
Scroobius Pip
Angles
(Strange Famous)
*7.0*
Goes well with: Streets, Happy Mondays,
special edition Nikes with matching hats
Before this album arrived on my doorstep, I’d seen Internet mutterings about the band on MySpace, that reliable web-based barometer. What little I’d heard through tinny laptop speakers sounded like a nitrous-oxide Streets. When I played the Dan Le Sac vs. Scroobius Pip debut collaboration Angles, I realized that my initial impression was not too far off. Both of the components—the beats and the rhymes—are on the screwy side.
Dan Le Sac’s music is a frantic conglomeration of U.K. electronica and 1990s happy hardcore. A fine craftsman with a high BPM and squiggly rhythms, his artistry goes ignored like a Nobel laureate starting a poem with the “man from Nantucket.” For every moment of lyrical competency, Scroobius Pip’s petulance usually overshadows his ability, as on “First Time We Met Musik.” Trying to sound piquant, Pip sounds less like a clever English lyricist—like a Banksy gone-a-rapping—and more like a whiny D.H. Lawrence antagonist. Even more ridiculous, he ruins the Casio staccato of their chart-topper “Thou Shalt Always Kill,” which is actually a decent song, by name dropping rock idols. I get the point: Stop worshipping bad people.
And that’s the central problem with Dan Le Sac vs. Scroobius Pip: They’re talented and intelligent musicians, but somewhere along the way, they confused gravitas and sincere wit with braggadocio. It may seem interesting, considering the across-the-puddle nature of it and its muted confidence rather than overt cocksureness, but people who really like this just haven’t heard anything better. Like artists who spend too long staring at a canvas, Angles is just overworked.
—David Tow
Dan le Sac vs. Scroobius Pip play Sunday, Sept. 28, at The Loft on the UCSD campus.
Tussle
Cream Cuts
(Smalltown Supersound)
*7.7*
Goes well with: ESG, King Tubby, Four Tet,
Liquid Liquid, awkward dancing
I don’t dance. Not that I can’t, it just takes a dynamic concert (not to mention gallons of alcohol) to make me move. You may have caught me awkwardly bobbing to Battles on several occasions, and I think I danced at a hip-hop show once, but as a basic rule of etiquette, it doesn’t happen. Fellow attendees should be thankful.
So, why would Tussle have me shaking my lame ass in unison with the club kids? Well, they have two drummers, which is always a good idea, and their musical palette is far better than the last wave of dance-punk pretenders who seemed to think ripping off Gang of Four somehow gave them credibility (it didn’t). Tussle don’t dilute their experiments with polyrhythm and electronic manipulation by adding lyrics, either, which allows more focus on one crucial concept—the groove.
Not that Cream Cuts is terribly original, but the group blends its touchstones so organically that listening becomes less about spotting the influences and more about admiring the band’s expansive taste. The bass lines on “ABACBA” and “Rainbow Claw” can be attributed to ESG and PiL, respectively, but before charging theft, notice how Tussle layers primitive drum programming and decaying dub synthesizer beneath a coarse skeleton of bass and percussion. These small yet distinctive touches manage to rejuvenate a style that has long since been exhausted. Really, it’s less post-punk than post-funk, if there were such a thing.
—Todd Kroviak
Tussle play Wednesday, Sept. 24, at Bar Pink.
Published: 09/23/2008
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