More Or Les And Les Fresh Kils

More Or Les

Everything about the Les Kils ep shouts out old skool hip hop, right down from the design to the music itself. From the graffiti images on the cover of More Or Les & Fresh Kils, to the minimal, blue and white design, to the Pac Man arcade game. The images of the samplers and drum machines on the front really is the only thing that gives it away as modern.

What this EP is a is collaboration between Montreal based MC(DJ etc) More or Les and Fresh Kils who I can only seem to find out is a producer, part of the Backburner Crew (who I can again find nothing about). But really it doesn’t matter as this is a really great EP.

It has that total old skool good time vibe of just a group of guys having fun with the beats and not worrying about bling or taking things to seriously, and it really works for them.

Yeah it’s really just a good party record, but not like in that typical ho’s and booze way, but rather just in a fresh flowing funny way. The words are rapped quite masterfully and there is some really sweet scratching that sounds just great. And at 8 tracks, it’s a pretty full EP too. Which means more band for your buck, which in these tough economic times is a godsend.

And really that is the best way to look at the Les Kils ep, as it is just a good solid hip hop album. It’s not going to change your life, or change the genre, but it is nice sometimes to just have something that is a really quality product. And who knows in the future they may produce something genius.

But for now the beats are good, the samples are good, the rhymes are good and god, I don’t know, it’s just a fine, well-done album. And thoroughly enjoyable: the songs draw you in the beats make you move, some interesting lyrics, things that get you thinking, which hey makes things stand out right there.

Being an EP, it really just serves to get you excited about what more is to come. Hopefully there is a full album in the works, which if it keeps up this calibre of music will be well worth checking out. And I really like on the inside cover that they are eating cupcakes.

- Matthew Rich

Pigface 6

Pigface

6 is, and this a hugely shocking surprise, Pigface’s 6th album. Hooray yay. Okay not really all that important but it is. So there you go. Continuing down the road of what you’d expect from Pigface, if there really is such a thing.

Dancish beats and eclectic electronic sounds and Industrial flourishes with lots of weird broken passages and a gigantic spectrum of artists participating on each song is really quite unpredictable. Unpredictable, but within that sort of Industrial rock play zone. Well even that isn’t completely true. But okay it is something, that is for sure. Lots of chanted like vocals.

Pretty good line up this time actually including that guy from Bile, Hanin Elias(Atari Teenage Riot), Jim Marcus(Die Warzau), Levi(my life with the thrill kill cult), Chris Connelly, En Esch, ummm the Enigma(?), and a bunch of others. Not the best Pigface album, but hell still pretty awesome. I mean with this diverse a range of contributors really I don’t think Pigface could make an uncoupling album.

What I really appreciate about listening to a Pigface album though is the sense of fun that everyone seems to be having. It just sounds like all the musicians are just fucking around and having a good time, yet without becoming banal or trite. The skill and performance level is there and the songs are for the most part fluid and nice to listen to. I mean there are many projects out there where it sounds like artists are just screwing around having a good time in the studio, but they are missing some sort of coherence or something beyond empty calories.

But no, 6 is not like that at all. I mean it’s a good time party record but it’s not vacant. It still feels like something, feels like more than just a novelty project, which I suppose, after how many years, you really can’t view Pigface that way. Yeah basically 20 years, if they are a novelty act then I suppose my definition of novelty is a tiny bit fucked.

And through all this chaos, of revolving door members, of new musicians on each track, there somehow still remains a cohesive ‘band’ element to it, and in this you can’t really say Pigface is a band, and as such, in some ways is a novelty project.

But using novelty as novel something that is continually new and unique, rather than something fleeting, a trinket, a passing fad But novelty in that every song is slightly different as there is a different group of people working together.

In fact a Pigface album can not escape the novelty. And this is a good thing. Rather than to become tired or repetitive the listener really never knows what to expect from the next track (well okay to an extent it still operates within a basic rock framework but still). And this serves to really just keeps thing extremely dynamic. Pigface still keeping the spirit of playful Industrial music alive.

- Matthew Rich