Country: U.S.A.
Genre: Hip-Hop, Electro
Label Number: 2061-62503-2
© 2005 Hollywood/Hard Left Records
Live, DJ Z-Trip infringes copyrights like nobody's business. He's won
over turntable heads and jam band fans with his genre-jumping mash-ups,
and his most influential moments have come in the form of MP3s that are
traded well below the RIAA's radar. So how does a swashbuckling
bootlegger of a DJ release an album on a major label? By declaring
himself a "producer" and brewing up new tracks. But Z-Trip has a secret
up his sleeve -- he's a great producer and able to celebrate the music
he usually bites by capturing the spirit rather than just copying it.
Shifting Gears is a reminiscing album that is in love with a time when
breakdancers and b-boys ruled and living without your Adidas was just
impossible. There's plenty of breakbeats, vocoders, and "to the beat
y'all"s, but there's also a bunch of up-to-date rapping from the
alternative rappers and a wealth of furious scratching that is more
concerned with tearing it up than nostalgia. Z-Trip is a monster behind
the decks, so much so that it's easy to ignore Shifting Gears'
rock-solid base. Firm infectious beats fill the album, supporting both
the DJ's own scratch-fests and complementing the style of every rapper
who stops by. A phat, quirky beat supports Murs' uplifting and innocent ode to Saturday morning cartoons and sugary cereals, while Lyrics Born gets some tasty bongo loops and Gap Band-style synth to anchor down his party chant. Giving Chuck D a Rick Rubin-y crunch behind him seems like a cop-out, but it's still a serviceable track. On the other hand, Z-Trip's team-up with Linkin Park frontman Chester Bennington
falls flat with forced angst from the vocalist and surprisingly drab,
faux-noir backing from the Z man. Of course, one monkey don't stop no
show, and the rest of Shifting Gears is more than you'd expect from a
turntablist full-length and a great argument for Z-Trip as producer.
* Due to past abuse, comments for the Hip-Hop section have been disabled.
tags: z trip, shifting gears, 2005, flac,
