McQuaid's Bruk Out Selections #8

Music

Rejjie Snow – Snow

So Id say that, after my wife and Luke Kelly, Rejjie Snow is now officially the best thing to come out of Dublin. This beat is sick. His flow is sick. Snow may be the best hip hop cut Ive heard all summer, and gives me hope for lyricism in a year thats seen loads of bangers but very few bars. Check out Rejjies soundcloud for more.

Lil Silva – Distance EP

Im happy to say Ive been onto Lil Silva from day one – I got my white labels of Seasonsand Funky Pulse from Uptown Records back when they were less than a tenner rather than closer to a oner. #smug. This new EP from Silva is right up there with the best of his work, with the third Sampha featuring track being the stand out for me. With Silva seemingly writing music from a hermetically sealed bubble of mental, its a classic case of Wot Do U Call It when trying to position these cuts. They just dont sound like anyone else- Ive heard the genre tags post-grime and grime 2.0 floated, but lets face it, they both sound bait. Personally Id like to call em UK Funky, as tho the name had never fallen out of favour – they feel like that sound evolved and evolved, and certainly bear more in common with Apples wild percussive cuts than anything – say – Faze Miyake or Royal T are making in grime. Whatever, listen and enjoy below

Marques Houston and some early noughties RnB classics

I got sent the below track from Marques Houston this week, and its not bad- he offers a re-vocal of Marvin Gayes Lets Get It On combined with some tuff as leather Run DMC kickdrums. It got me thinking about the glut of male RnB singers/rappers who popped up in the early noughties who just couldnt quite go the whole Chris Brown and hit pop mega stardom. Loads of them recorded hot tunes in a time when RnB wasnt getting support from mainstream media sources- certainly not in the UK anyway – like, you know The Guardian wasnt posting salivating reviews when Omarion dropped an album in the way they do for Drake now

Anyway, I thought it was time to revisit some classics, and seeing as I mentioned Omarion, why not start with him – here are two cuts off his debut solo album that I think knock hard to this day. The first is a minimal, jacking Darkchild produced number and the second is a Jackson 5 homage with some really memorable vocal lines. Both deserve to be bigger –