Getdown Services – Cream Of The Crop
Similar artists: Ian Dury, The Fall, LCD Soundsystem
Genre: Post-Punk, Indietronica
The thing about modern rap culture is that it promotes the kind of things that most fans of these artists will never be able to afford. It may seem counterintuitive. This is, after all, an art movement born out of the grimy streets.
The result is also surprising. People love the rap and rockstars that flash their jewelry, display their cars, and proudly brag about their social status. It’s an unachievable goal for most. These stars help people live out their fantasies.
Still, that can’t work on everyone, especially those that have seen riches up close. They’re the ones who can see that the wires propping this system up are getting loose. They’re the ones warning about the whole thing coming undone.
And, most of the time, they’re British or sound like it. Getdown Services’s Cream Of The Crop is a beautifully potent post-punk rant against capitalism. Interestingly enough it’s set against a musical backdrop borrowing heavily from disco, the sound of rich middle-aged people investigating the nightlife. It’s a catchy tune about just saying “no” to the illusion of power through wealth.
Mononegatives – Cro-Magnon
Similar artists: Nervous Gender, The Screamers, The Sound, Tubeway Army, Reducers, FUTURISK
Genre: Punk, Post-Punk, Post-Hardcore
You can track the modern history of pop music by its two main intentions. There’s one school of thought that this kind of music should represent a form of entertainment that puts the mind at ease. It’s supposed to get audiences to loosen up.
This school of thought produces dance crazes, global hits and, if all the contracts have been studied carefully by the right lawyers, provide tremendous wealth to those involved. Naturally, it’s the strategy that gathers the highest number of disciples.
The other, less trodden road, involves trying to make people face up to the harshness of the world. It’s objective is to get an audience to feel uncomfortable, to involve them in some kind of scandalous act, and to help them understand that things can’t go as smoothly as they might wish.
Mononegatives’ Cro-Magnon sounds like theatrical music made by computers. Its goal is to disturb. It borrows heavily from synth-punk bands like The Screamers, a style that, unfortunately, never really caught on. Mononegatives produce a kind of aggressive electro-dance music for future generations where the attention span has dwindled from 8 seconds to 1.
