This collaborative project by established artists Tenacity, Shi Dog and Oznoh comes with a bold mission statement: to 'break the chains of trend.' It sounds promising, but also like a pretty tall order, which means they need to have cooked up something pretty out of the ordinary.
'Intro' comes on with the sound of dragging - or breaking - chains, over which a distorted robotic vocal tells you just what you're listening to. It sort of sounds like a jingle for a wrecker's yard recorded by an industrial metal band.
The unexpected continues with 'Substance,' which features a woozy, muzzy loop and a disorientating time signature. Musically, 'The Bomb Threat' falls somewhere between 'Enjoy the Silence' by Depeche Mode and an 80s arcade game, creating a retro-space-age backdrop over which the lyrics batter the listener.
There's slowed-down trip-hop rhythms and eerie, expansive samples looped together on 'Let's Get it On,' which isn't the chicks in bikinis in the club sexism-fest the title suggests, instead presenting a bleak survey of the scene on the streets while swiping at the 'trash-talk' bilge pumped out by other rappers. There's still room for a truckload of egotism about how good Tenacity's rhymes are, though, and it seems like very familiar territory in genre terms.
The same is true of 'G by Nature,' a slug-strewn tale of the hood, 'Uncle Shoes,' a minute and a half cuss-out of 'ho-assed rap bitches,' to whom the Chain Breakers collective are, naturally, infinitely superior. There's more of the same on 'Get it Poppin' and 'The Hotness,' the primary focus of which is their own lyrical prowess and adeptitude at dropping beats. How hot are they? Hot 'like sunburned shoulders,' apparently. Not convinced? Really, 'you can compare it to a stove top with a boiling pot.' Yes, 'this music's hotter than a supermodel's body, hotter than a hottie getting naughty at a party.' Sizzing, for sure. But really, enough of the bragging and the build-up, when are you actually going to deliver these mind-blowingly awesome lyrics? Or am I (internationally) missing the point?
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'Don't Play With Fire' does genuinely offer something different, an interchanging second and third person narrative detailing a man's descent as the result of a succession of bad decisions. The sparse, disconnected backing track is the perfect sonic representation of the isolation conveyed in the lyrics. Similarly, the noodling muzak of 'So Marvelous' (sic) stands out for being different from not only the rest of the album, but much of the music of the genre. There's no question that 'Chain Breakers' is at its most interesting when they take a break from bigging themselves up and offer some genuine commentary, coupled with glitchy, off-beat beats that do deviate from the standard rap blueprint, and it’s a pity they don't do it more often across the sixteen tracks on the album.
I have to wonder just how possible it is to 'break the chains of trend in the rap game' by working within the parameters of the genre. Despite the promise of 'hard hitting beats and next level lyrics,' it still sounds like, y'know, a rap album to me. Or perhaps that's the point: by criticising rap and all its cliches by the vehicle of a rap album, Tenacity, Shi Dog and Oznoh represent (or perhaps reprazent) the very height of subversion.
Credit where it's due, though, these guys aren't all about the money, and are giving the album away for free - which means you can judge for yourself...
http://abprojects.com/files/Chain_Breakers.zip
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