KILLED in CARS

DJ Nate - Da Trak Genious (Planet Mu, 2010)

When listening to DJ Nate’s Da Trak Genious, I immediately recalled an old review of Prefuse 73’s Vocal Studies + Uprock Narratives, specifically references (I wish there were citations to the actual quotes) to Herren “disrespecting the role of the real MC” by chopping up vocals to the extent he did. That is, VS & UN was treated as something of a reassertion of the producer’s role, and that aggressive dynamic shift came at the expense of the MC. There needn’t be a hierarchy in the prominence of the elements.

I made sure to relisten to Prefuse 73 before writing this, because the sounds are quite different, even if the approach is somewhat similar. The difference lies in the way Herren hews to an instrumental track. Chopped vocals and the rhythms produced are more extensive than some of the scratching that typically would accompany hip-hop tracks. However, the rest of the production, the keys, the drums, aren’t chopped along with the vocals. That is, Prefuse 73 presented an album that is mostly instrumental hip-hop of the conventional variety, albeit buttressed by dramatically arranged, hyper-repetitive vocals. Indeed, there are significant to the jazzy dalliances of ’90s hip-hop, and if you’ve seen Prefuse 73 live as a full band, you’ll see the connection more to jazz and turntablism than juke.

However, that reception of VS & UN remains. To 2001 ears, there was something different, radical. Moving forward to 2010, DJ Nate’s album Da Trak Genious brilliantly embodies a more fearless reconstruction of hip-hop, albeit under the juke genre. To me, especially noting the sample sources, DJ Nate is a fully formed example of what was only perceived back in 2001. That is, instead of chopped vocals accompanying instrumental hip-hop seen as a reverse trend in production, Nate’s intense repetition, the distortion of the totality of the track, heralds a leavening of the playing field in hip-hop instrumentation. MCs haven’t been made subservient to an instrumental track with the producer as a detached composer. Rather, hip-hop tracks have been eaten whole and reformulated, in their entirety, bordering on the absurd, as scrap metal shards flying in all directions while synthetic beats dot the landscape as rubber-bullet interstitials.

If the comparison is being lost, let me rephrase: while the former album, in the turntablist/instrumental hip-hop tradition, salvaged parts of other records (or recordings), and transformed them to fit a particular composition, hip-hop by way of juke, doesn’t pick like a vulture at a track, but radically reshapes the entire thing via the familiar tools of hip-hop and sprinkles it with percussive elements. The results are hardly rhythmic in a hip-hop way, but the apparent production techniques involved speak to a distinct connection.

So what’s the deal? Is it good? The answer is simple: I think the record is fantastic. Indeed, revisiting Prefuse 73, that music seems quaint, conservative… Da Trak Genious is aggressive, abrasive, off-putting… it’s visceral in how raw each component is. Thanks to Cass for the pointer on this album. I’m hooked and scanning for more.