Home
sign up| features / music interview |
 content by: editor |
 spank rock interview
 to access audio and video on collective you need real player.Prepare to get smacked. Anyone familiar with the work of Black Star, an early vehicle for Mos Def and Talib Kweli, might consider it a long march from there to songs about backdoor sex. But that’s the journey made by Naeem, 24-year-old rapper with Spank Rock, currently bursting out of Baltimore with the brilliant album Yoyoyoyo. As a teenager Naeem was hanging around Black Star’s friend and sometime producer, Shawn J Period, convincing himself he was in line to be the group’s fourth member and even getting himself arrested for truancy by sneaking out of school to buy their album on the day of release. “And they didn’t even have it in the local mall,” he laughs. “Black Star were too underground for them.”  Since then things have changed. Spank Rock’s sound is far removed from the old underground, closer to the Bmore Club music of their native city – a breakneck techno marrying the rhythms and attitude of Miami bass to the sonic adventurism of Detroit. Although producer Alex XXXChange draws from a more diverse range of influences, from electro and hip-hop through to German glitch. “That underground scene had grown stale and I was desperate to work with someone whose music was a challenge,” says Naeem. “It has to be totally different to anything I’ve done before, otherwise there’s no point. Alex pulled a really new style that I never expected anyone to make.”  Spank Rock’s sound is both diverse and subtle. As well as the self-explanatory Backyard Betty, there are tunes like IMC, which Naeem describes as akin to backpacker rap, while Touch Me takes a Neptunes-esque chorus and bleeps the hell out of it. “It’s not really about content so much as it is about spirit and timing. I made the decision to have fun with the record, try a few things and be myself.” Spank Rock are splicing the real reckless humour of hip-hop with the energy of punk and the invention of the bedroom geeks. If you don’t get it, you’re lost. Prepare to get smacked.
Steve Yates
Spank Rock – Yoyoyoyo, released 10 April 06 on Big Dada.
 comments
Read members' comments related to this music.
comment by Spinky
Apr 10, 2006
I'm liking that Sweet Talk track - reminds me of the Chemical Brothers "Not Another Drugstore" - the kind of big beat rap I always wished there was more of.
|
 |
related info
 useful linkswww.bigdada.com
note: The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.
music  music archive Watch music sessions and interviews from 2002 to 2008. books  books and comics archive Author interviews and reviews from 2002 to 2008. |
send to a friend
spank rock
access 1000s of articles