DJ Shadow: The Outsider - Solesides.com Personal Review
DJ Shadow – The Outsider.
A personal review by Joost / proud webmaster of www.solesides.com
In September 2006, DJ Shadow’s (real name; Josh Davis) first studio album since 2002’s “The Private Press” will be released. Since then, a few new songs have surfaced and managed to keep Shadow’s fans, and especially Shadow’s online fans, busy. In general, people were positive about the new output, which didn’t sound like anything Shadow did before. The fact that the new sounds were different from earlier works, scared people in a way. Questions like ‘has Shadow fallen of?’ and Is he selling out?’ were much talked about topics and it wasn’t seldom that not very kind and undeserved remarks were thrown into Josh’s direction.
Although the, imo, underestimated album ‘The Private Press’ didn’t blow away people or started some kind of revolution as much as its 1996 predecessor ‘Endtroducing….’ I was impressed by how Shadow’s production skills had grown. The new songs also worked really well live. Many people who went to a Shadow gig during the 2002 “The Private Press” tour remember it as ‘the best gig they ever went to’ and now it’s 2006, no other DJ / Producer had such a great live set, which was, combined with stunning visuals, a perfect presentation of ten years of DJ Shadow music.
We’re in 2006 now and the release of The Outsider is very near. I was lucky enough to get an early copy of the album and I must admit, I felt, like many other long-time fans, scared about it too. I so much hoped the critics were proved wrong and I my opinion, they are.
The album starts with an intro, which is a man with a dark, English voice, telling the story of ‘The Outsider’ It sets the mood for the album, which can be described as ‘spooky’ – Pretty nice intro for the fans who’ve been waiting so long for the album, it immediately gave me the feeling that the album was going to be ‘worth the four-year-long wait’ Major problem with this intro; it’s two minutes long so I’m sure that after a while, if not soon, I’ll skip this right away. After the ‘spooky-ness’ of the intro, there’s the first song “This Time” and can be best described as “Perfect summer listening material” It sounds very nice & sweet. And I’m sure that, after listening to this track, you can’t get the vocals out of your head for the rest of the day. - After that, there’s the track ‘3 freaks’ with ‘Hyphy’ rappers Keak Da Sneak and Turf talk, which is a party banger. This was the first track of the album that did the rounds, but I just can’t get used to this. That said, it’s no secret that Shadow (whose heart is in hiphop) likes this type of stuff and he has always based his music on existing music, so it can’t be a real surprise for people that he made this. Also, I’m surprised by how many people (long time Shadow fans included) actually dig 3 Freaks, so good for them. The track doesn’t really fit after ‘This Time’ either. After that, there’s “Turf Dancing” featuring Bay Area rappers The Federation & Animaniaks. Again inspired by the Hyphy-movement, but this is a phenomenal, high energy track, with pretty good drum programming, hard drum sounds and a nice built up (which sounds like a laserbeam speeding up or something) which can easily become a club-banger. The production here is very tight. ‘Keep em Close’ isn’t as dark and doesn’t sound as big as “Turf Dancing” but the synth sounds here are pretty good. Not sure here about the gun / beatdown sounds near the end, as they’re just going to confirm the thinking that hip hop is violent and all about guns to the casual listener. Nice that it’s in ¾, though. Seeing Thangs with David Banner is my personal favourite of this series of hyphy/crunk/2006 hiphop tracks. It features signature, slammin’ Shadow beats and drumpatterns. Hella tight track, flawless production.
The two-minute track Broken Levee Blues, which is nothing more than a guitar backed by some vocals saying ‘nobody cares’ features some obvious (perhaps already boring?) politics, but builds a very nice bridge to the next part of the album.
Artifact is actually the first, and only track that really reminds me of previous work. Crazy fast beat with guitars all over the place. This can best be described as the sequel to Mashing On the Motorway or even better; “100 Metre Dash part 2” but with rougher beats and samples. Long time Shadow fans will probably label this as the best track on the Outsider so far.
But then there’s the 7-minute-long ‘Backstage Girl’ with Phonte Coleman from hiphop group Little Brother. I love this from the beginning to the end. There’s so much detail in the first seconds already, it make me smile from ear to ear. It also builds up very nice. Track can best be described as ‘Blues meets hiphop’ The beat is fat, sounds clean and the guitar samples give even more power to the song. In a way, the track reminds me of “Twice the First Time” by Saul Williams. After that, there isn’t much going on other than a looped harp/guitar backed by moody sounds in ‘Triplicate’ and I guess it would’ve done the album good if, after the awesome ‘Backstage Girl’ it directly moved on to ‘The Tiger’ which features Kasabian. Personally I didn’t expect much of this. But it’s an incredibly tight produced and good sounding track with some nice drums and a Shadow-esque / dark vocal sample. Nice heavy guitar build-up to the end. The best drum programming of the album is on the track ‘Erase You’ The vocals are by Chris James from Stateless and really add to this track, that also would’ve worked as an instrumental. It sounds great. Then there’s ‘What Have I Done’ - not sure about this. This beat-less track sounds nice and may be a welcome addition to the people who haven’t finished meditating after ‘Erase You’. People who have can move on to “You Made It” which features Stateless’ Chris James again. Beautiful, Coldplay-esque (I happen to like Coldplay) pop-song and I really think it’s brilliant that a DJ / Producer can create this kind of tracks, that sound so ‘real’ – this also counts for ‘Backstage Girl’ ‘The Tiger’ and ‘Erase You’ - The track is easier to listen to, so it builds a nice bridge to ‘Enuff’ which is a cheesy, happy hiphop track with Q-Tip and Lateef, executed perfectly. The drum programming is pretty nice, Lateef really let’s the track work. And after that, there’s only one track to go, which is ‘Dats my Part’ feat. Bay area rapper E-40. If you’re searching for a straight up, head-nodding, party-hiphop track than this is the one you need. Dope, fun.
After having listened to the album for some time, I felt ready to write a well-though-about review, which ‘The Outsider’ deserves. So I really hope, although it’s far from listening to the album yourself, this review gives a nice picture of how my view on “The Outsider” is. Production-wise, ‘The Outsider’ can be labelled as ‘Best Shadow album to date’ Simply because the production is flawless. Some people may think it all is incoherent as an album, but I don’t agree (true, “This Time” doesn’t fit really in between the dark intro and the party-banger “3 freaks). There’s a nice bridge between the first series of hiphop tracks to the…how can I best describe it… ‘uk rock/song/pop part of the album. Also, the difference in tracks isn’t a big problem nowadays, now there’s the “IPOD generation”
The die-hard fans of sample-based music and MPC-style beat-chopping may be disappointed by The Outsider in a way, but it’s no doubt that all fans of Shadow’s music, want him to grow musically and artistically. And in order to grow, you have to change. In 2002, DJ Shadow showed that 6 years after Endtroducing, he was grown as a producer. In the last four years, he has grown even faster and bigger.
Looking at his complete output so far, with releases like Endtroducing, Brainfreeze, Product Placement, UNKLE/Psyence Fiction, The Private Press, In Tune and On Time, loads of production work for other artists and now The Outsider and even more to come, there’s nothing less we can do than congratulate Josh Davis with this this all. We’re dealing with one of the worlds greatest producers (ever?), people.
Well Done, Josh Davis.
DJ Shadow – The Outsider.
A personal review by Joost / proud webmaster of www.solesides.com
In September 2006, DJ Shadow’s (real name; Josh Davis) first studio album since 2002’s “The Private Press” will be released. Since then, a few new songs have surfaced and managed to keep Shadow’s fans, and especially Shadow’s online fans, busy. In general, people were positive about the new output, which didn’t sound like anything Shadow did before. The fact that the new sounds were different from earlier works, scared people in a way. Questions like ‘has Shadow fallen of?’ and Is he selling out?’ were much talked about topics and it wasn’t seldom that not very kind and undeserved remarks were thrown into Josh’s direction.
Although the, imo, underestimated album ‘The Private Press’ didn’t blow away people or started some kind of revolution as much as its 1996 predecessor ‘Endtroducing….’ I was impressed by how Shadow’s production skills had grown. The new songs also worked really well live. Many people who went to a Shadow gig during the 2002 “The Private Press” tour remember it as ‘the best gig they ever went to’ and now it’s 2006, no other DJ / Producer had such a great live set, which was, combined with stunning visuals, a perfect presentation of ten years of DJ Shadow music.
We’re in 2006 now and the release of The Outsider is very near. I was lucky enough to get an early copy of the album and I must admit, I felt, like many other long-time fans, scared about it too. I so much hoped the critics were proved wrong and I my opinion, they are.
The album starts with an intro, which is a man with a dark, English voice, telling the story of ‘The Outsider’ It sets the mood for the album, which can be described as ‘spooky’ – Pretty nice intro for the fans who’ve been waiting so long for the album, it immediately gave me the feeling that the album was going to be ‘worth the four-year-long wait’ Major problem with this intro; it’s two minutes long so I’m sure that after a while, if not soon, I’ll skip this right away. After the ‘spooky-ness’ of the intro, there’s the first song “This Time” and can be best described as “Perfect summer listening material” It sounds very nice & sweet. And I’m sure that, after listening to this track, you can’t get the vocals out of your head for the rest of the day. - After that, there’s the track ‘3 freaks’ with ‘Hyphy’ rappers Keak Da Sneak and Turf talk, which is a party banger. This was the first track of the album that did the rounds, but I just can’t get used to this. That said, it’s no secret that Shadow (whose heart is in hiphop) likes this type of stuff and he has always based his music on existing music, so it can’t be a real surprise for people that he made this. Also, I’m surprised by how many people (long time Shadow fans included) actually dig 3 Freaks, so good for them. The track doesn’t really fit after ‘This Time’ either. After that, there’s “Turf Dancing” featuring Bay Area rappers The Federation & Animaniaks. Again inspired by the Hyphy-movement, but this is a phenomenal, high energy track, with pretty good drum programming, hard drum sounds and a nice built up (which sounds like a laserbeam speeding up or something) which can easily become a club-banger. The production here is very tight. ‘Keep em Close’ isn’t as dark and doesn’t sound as big as “Turf Dancing” but the synth sounds here are pretty good. Not sure here about the gun / beatdown sounds near the end, as they’re just going to confirm the thinking that hip hop is violent and all about guns to the casual listener. Nice that it’s in ¾, though. Seeing Thangs with David Banner is my personal favourite of this series of hyphy/crunk/2006 hiphop tracks. It features signature, slammin’ Shadow beats and drumpatterns. Hella tight track, flawless production.
The two-minute track Broken Levee Blues, which is nothing more than a guitar backed by some vocals saying ‘nobody cares’ features some obvious (perhaps already boring?) politics, but builds a very nice bridge to the next part of the album.
Artifact is actually the first, and only track that really reminds me of previous work. Crazy fast beat with guitars all over the place. This can best be described as the sequel to Mashing On the Motorway or even better; “100 Metre Dash part 2” but with rougher beats and samples. Long time Shadow fans will probably label this as the best track on the Outsider so far.
But then there’s the 7-minute-long ‘Backstage Girl’ with Phonte Coleman from hiphop group Little Brother. I love this from the beginning to the end. There’s so much detail in the first seconds already, it make me smile from ear to ear. It also builds up very nice. Track can best be described as ‘Blues meets hiphop’ The beat is fat, sounds clean and the guitar samples give even more power to the song. In a way, the track reminds me of “Twice the First Time” by Saul Williams. After that, there isn’t much going on other than a looped harp/guitar backed by moody sounds in ‘Triplicate’ and I guess it would’ve done the album good if, after the awesome ‘Backstage Girl’ it directly moved on to ‘The Tiger’ which features Kasabian. Personally I didn’t expect much of this. But it’s an incredibly tight produced and good sounding track with some nice drums and a Shadow-esque / dark vocal sample. Nice heavy guitar build-up to the end. The best drum programming of the album is on the track ‘Erase You’ The vocals are by Chris James from Stateless and really add to this track, that also would’ve worked as an instrumental. It sounds great. Then there’s ‘What Have I Done’ - not sure about this. This beat-less track sounds nice and may be a welcome addition to the people who haven’t finished meditating after ‘Erase You’. People who have can move on to “You Made It” which features Stateless’ Chris James again. Beautiful, Coldplay-esque (I happen to like Coldplay) pop-song and I really think it’s brilliant that a DJ / Producer can create this kind of tracks, that sound so ‘real’ – this also counts for ‘Backstage Girl’ ‘The Tiger’ and ‘Erase You’ - The track is easier to listen to, so it builds a nice bridge to ‘Enuff’ which is a cheesy, happy hiphop track with Q-Tip and Lateef, executed perfectly. The drum programming is pretty nice, Lateef really let’s the track work. And after that, there’s only one track to go, which is ‘Dats my Part’ feat. Bay area rapper E-40. If you’re searching for a straight up, head-nodding, party-hiphop track than this is the one you need. Dope, fun.
After having listened to the album for some time, I felt ready to write a well-though-about review, which ‘The Outsider’ deserves. So I really hope, although it’s far from listening to the album yourself, this review gives a nice picture of how my view on “The Outsider” is. Production-wise, ‘The Outsider’ can be labelled as ‘Best Shadow album to date’ Simply because the production is flawless. Some people may think it all is incoherent as an album, but I don’t agree (true, “This Time” doesn’t fit really in between the dark intro and the party-banger “3 freaks). There’s a nice bridge between the first series of hiphop tracks to the…how can I best describe it… ‘uk rock/song/pop part of the album. Also, the difference in tracks isn’t a big problem nowadays, now there’s the “IPOD generation”
The die-hard fans of sample-based music and MPC-style beat-chopping may be disappointed by The Outsider in a way, but it’s no doubt that all fans of Shadow’s music, want him to grow musically and artistically. And in order to grow, you have to change. In 2002, DJ Shadow showed that 6 years after Endtroducing, he was grown as a producer. In the last four years, he has grown even faster and bigger.
Looking at his complete output so far, with releases like Endtroducing, Brainfreeze, Product Placement, UNKLE/Psyence Fiction, The Private Press, In Tune and On Time, loads of production work for other artists and now The Outsider and even more to come, there’s nothing less we can do than congratulate Josh Davis with this this all. We’re dealing with one of the worlds greatest producers (ever?), people.
Well Done, Josh Davis.