DEEJAY PUNK-ROC: CHICKENEYE
Recipe for Chicken Eye by DeeJay Punk-Roc: take your standard rap album and remove 90% of the lyrics. Toss in the occasional trumpet sample for variety. Microwave until it explodes. Chicken Eye really is a rap album at heart. 1980's style big beats combine with record scratching and highly tweaked samples. It's very danceable. The only catch is, DeeJay Punk-Roc is not a rapper. Instead, he seems to identify more with the "screw communication of ideas through music, let's just dance till we bleed" ideals of well, punk rock, than with the "I'm the baddest mofo on the block" posing of hip-hop. "I Hate Everybody", for example kicks off with a dialogue about music that would be sure to inspire riots of violent dancing at any rave. "Dedicated" contains a looped flute of some kind integrated with your standard hip-hop drumming and shouts-out, while "My Beatbox" introduces itself with a bogus police scanner alerting all cars to the presence of "DeeJay Punk-Roc, and he's bad". The song with one of the best titles I've heard all year, "The World Is My Ashtray" is a suprisingly beautiful track composed of soft, wordless singing, and trumpets and would be almost mellow if it weren't for the relentless drums. "Busted Speaker" contains a funny look at loud music through a parent's eyes, and "Rockin' It" closes the album on a solid note. DeeJay Punk-Roc is no DJ Shadow, however, and even though there's nothing revolutionary here, it's still a good album, particularly for the dance floor. Just don't pay $16.99 for it at the Wherehouse...
Review by Aram at: Frames Per Second
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