edIT - "Certified Air Raid Material"

edIT - Artsy Remix (feat. The Grouch) (Alpha Pup 2007)

edIT - Certified Air Raid Material / Alpha Pup

My original plan was to review that new EP by French electronic artist Tepr this week, but I thought better of it when edIT came along. Here's why: Tepr's release is all remixes and edIT is fresh material. Additionally, I knew nothing of edIT - this is a guy who went to college with Daedelus and hung down at LA's Konkrete Jungle, so clearly he's no amateur. The man who started life as The Con-Artist and was one of Dublab's first DJs has banged out his second full-length, and I use that term intentionally. Certified Air Raid Material is nothing like the decidedly downtempo debut of 2004's Crying Over Pros for No Reason.

Not that it's a bad thing, but perhaps after being named one of Urb's "Next 100" in 2006 he got it in his head to try something more along the lines of what everybody else who was recommended in Urb's list was getting mixed up in. What that means is, Certified Air Raid Material sounds like an album that got infected with a whole lot of France and not a little Prefuse 73 (which he has officially acknowledged). "Battling Go-Go Yubari in Downtown L.A." is a perfect example of how the canon of Ed Banger has infiltrated the glitch-hop that edIT had performed so well before... But the best literal example of France influencing this album must be TTC's appearance on the tightly packed "Crunk De Gaulle," which also manages to squeeze in verses by coffeeshop backpacker Busdriver and D-Styles. A bilingual treat normally reserved for customs agents at your closest international airport, "Crunk De Gaulle" rides an acoustic-almost-flamenco guitar line and big-banging beat normally reserved for serious club action only. Somehow the four parties manage to make this track, a total disaster waiting to happen, into something excellent.

This album is pretty evenly split between instrumentals and those songs which feature vocal guesters. That proves itself to be a wise decision as this album plays on, because the mix keeps things interesting. These songs could work as instrumentals - and in fact some do, such as the orchestral "Straight Heat" or the broken glass beat of "Fire Riddim" late in the going - but why keep all the heat to yourself when you could share the love with like-minded musical pranksters? As a result of that, guys like The Grouch and Abstract Rude can lend their two cents to an album that begs for verses on some of these songs. "Artsy Remix" proves to be the most amusing of the non-instrumentals, thrown in the mix early on with just the right kind of satire that makes me fall for songs that otherwise suck. Luckily, this one does not. Its beat isn't distracting, but as has been mentioned, everything's more forward on this album. The words, the production, the concept. edIT's throwing it in your face and daring you to do something about it.

If there's a unifying theme to this aggressively crafted album then, it's edIT's insistence that he is trying "to use this album as mirror to present state of affairs in our world. With this album he is trying to show that we have no more needs for bombs, violence, fear and negativity. Altenatively this album can be viewed as a soundtrack for us to release all of those aggressions on the dancefloor. In a time when the world is falling apart slowly at the seems it is most important to realize there is always hope." And the hope, of course, comes in the universal appreciation for music. Namely: his.

He hasn't broken down any walls and he hasn't revolutionized hip-hop or electronica (Guillermo Scott Herren already did that for us, after all), but with Certified Air Raid Material edIT has shown that, along with a crop of similar producers such as the aforementioned Prefuse and TTC as well as Dabrye (for starters), there are still lines being blurred to great effect on the great frontier between hip-hop's gritty metropolis and electronica's woodland wanderlust. If any of the names dropped in this review appeal to you on a regular basis, check edIT out. If none of them do, check it out anyway. Not supporting edIT is the equivalent of supporting ignorance, which in a roundabout way is supporting terrorism. See how important edIT is? If you don't listen to him, you're letting the terrorists win. Seriously, bro. I thought you were better than that.