Search This Blog

Friday, March 2, 2012

Track of the Moment: Gorillaz, James Murphy & Andre 3000 - DoYaThing

Hello everyone! I'm excited to post my first track of the moment...about shoes! Well, it's not really about shoes, just made as a promotional tool for the shoe company Converse. The company has gathered three artists together for a collaboration in each of the last four years, but they had been nothing but a nice curiosity. The first song "My Drive Thru" with Santigold, Pharrell and Julian Casablancas of the Strokes was good, and the eclectic collaborations continued with featured artists from Soulja Boy to Best Coast. Some of these artists have serious music cred, some of them don't; overall, not much buzz was generated.

This year, the bar has been dramatically raised. Getting more of a dream collaboration than Damon Albarn (Gorillaz), James Murphy (ex-LCD Soundsystem) and Andre 3000 (OutKast) will be very tough. Each is a commercially successful and critically revered figure, and has been for more than a decade. I can't count more than two artists with that kind of status in past Converse songs, and this year we get three. Needless to say, expectations were high, but they were actually exceeded. I think that "DoYaThing" has a good chance to be regarded as one of the best songs of 2012.

The best thing about this dream collaboration is that spontaneity was strongly encouraged and necessary. After all, they only had 3 days holed up in a studio to come up with something good. Turns out that they did that, then went the extra mile. The final of the product of the brief session was a 13-minute, one-take, stunning freakout that had to be cut to the four and a half minute single length. Removed is the fantastic and completely spontaneous second Andre 3000 verse that centers around the phrase "I'm the shit!" Hilarious boasts such as "The sun is jealous of me!" are punctuated by full-out screaming, and sometimes the screams are chopped up or dropped an octave to thrilling WTF effect. Murphy leads the charge in driving this freakout, throwing in tons of chugging distortion and sending synth frequencies into the stratosphere.

Full version link: http://blogs.1077theend.com/endmusicdiscovery/2012/02/23/end-music-discovery-gorillaz-james-murphy-andre-3000-do-ya-thing-13-minute-version/

While the ending of "DoYaThing" is a crazy twist, the song works because Albarn, Murphy and 3 stacks all play exactly to their strengths. Albarn has his buzzing, Plastic Beach-era synths and "Rhinestone Eyes" style vocal delivery for his two verses. Most of Murphy's work is concentrated on the production, with quintessential LCD drums that are reminiscent of "Drunk Girls" as well as the aforementioned freakout. However, it's Andre 3000 who's the star of the show, going from a solid hook to two great verses, the first featuring a flow straight out of "B.O.B." and the second...well, you know. Those three elements and styles are classic on their own, but "DoYaThing" makes them sound like they were meant to be together. That surprise makes the song better than I'd ever hoped.

No comments:

Post a Comment