The 2kDozen 500: #297 - Stu Bangas, "Diggaz With Attitude"

Some "underground" hip hop. It could be right under the surface and known from Somalia to Sunderland as far as I know, so far is my thumb from the pulses. I know clips from The A-Team and The Departed and Rocky when I hear them, mind. Stu is the producer and he isn't scooping too far from any trees. It's pretty solid stuff - R&B, touches of soulful jazz and some big Eighties keyboards.

"Where I'm from you either flip grams or be a janitor."

I don't know any of the MCs. Wais P on "Okay, Player" has a nice raspy edge to his rhymes. Blacastan on "Spyhunter" has some flow, but sounds like an auld fella, talking about MP3s like he hasn't quite caught up with the tech yet. ILL Bill also knows his way round a word or two; he's the same age as me. On "Vikings", one of the MCs actually says "Mind your own beeswax". Not something I thought I'd ever hear on a hip hop album. For all the title suggests some heavy crate-digging, the sounds aren't heading in any new directions; but maybe again that's the point. That other hypermasculine trajectory - change nothing, be no different.

But I don't have any insights to offer. These lads seem so keen to tell the same story as everyone else; the more they tell, the less they're saying. Time is tight. No-one has leapt out of the box so far. It's that dark, masculine talk in that same stressed not-shouting/not-talking register with needling synths steepling in the backdrop. My head might nod, but nothing sparks it off.

Even though we're all middle aged men that seem to have seen the same movies and TV shows.

Rating: Dark Talk out of Underground Car Parks