First Impressions: Dan Le Sac Vs. Scroobius Pip - Angles

Well the immediate first impression is that if you've heard the stuff that's gone to radio in the past year or so then you've heard the best stuff on the record. However that's only half true, if you've heard the stuff that's gone to radio in he past year you've heard the best of Dan Le Sac's contributions to the record because the glitchy, stuttering, catchy beats that were such a strong element of early singles "Thou Shalt Always Kill", "The Beat That My Heart Skipped" and the Radiohead sampling "A Letter From God To Man" don't feature nearly as much on the other songs on the pair's debut album.

Instead the more discrete but no worse sounds that he's constructed allow the focus to fall more on the words of Scroobius Pip. It's a good idea too as Pip's rhymes on the non-singles touch on some pretty heavy stuff. At times he addresses, with his slightly skewed but constantly moral world view isolation, child abuse, depression, suicide and it's aftermath, and our contemporary idea of what beauty is (and puts forth a compelling argument that if you want to find what beauty really is then look no furthr than Tommy Cooper dying on stage to rapturous applause). This guy has something to say and I don't think the dichotomy of putting those words to club friendly beats would have sat too well.

Pip is at his best when he allows his slamming past to shine though. He seems more comfortable when his flow comes across more like poetry rather then that of a more conventional MC and it's on songs like those, and in particular on the one that I'm putting up, is he most affecting and does he seem to have the most gravitas.

It's a super record, not the one that I thought they'd make but how it's turned out is a really pleasant surprise.

MP3: Dan Le Sac vs. Scroobius Pip - Magicians Assistant from Angles.

The pair are in Ireland early next month:

4 May The Limelight Belfast
6 May The Nerve Centre Derry
7 May Button Factory Dublin
8 May STRESS @ De Burgo’s Galway
9 May Trinity Rooms Limerick