Major Lazer (Oblivious Opinion)

I am obnoxious. Periodically, I’ll rethink my life for a day or so. I’ll try to be a really respectful young gentleman. It never last more than an hour or two. This part of my personality drives a large portion of the decisions that I make. Most of the things that are supposed to be major choices, to be taken incredibly seriously, end up being opportunities for me to come to a conclusion that makes me giggle, and is typically pretty dumb.

A great example of this is my car. I started out looking for a responsible car that would be a nice, conservative method of transport to and from work (it was one of the respectful young gentleman moments). However, shortly into looking, I stumbled across a jacked up, metallic gold 1986 Chevy Blazer with a 12 speaker system, including four 12 inch sub-woofers. I couldn’t resist.

This incredibly intrusive system has also done a lot to shape my recent music tastes. I’ve always had a soft step for seriously hard electronic beats, but it was never my “go to” genre of music. Having mad booms now, however, has pushed this format directly to the forefront. So, slowly, my tastes have evolved from fun disco house, to drum and base, to jungle, and finally resting at the hardest fucking dubstep I can get my hands on.

This is harder than it sounds. While I’m trying to get the hardest hits around, I still need it to be musically appealing, weather for fun samples, or catchy melodies, or inventive lyrics. Typically, I’ll download something with the highest hopes and end up falling back to Caspa and Rusko’s Fabriclive set before I make it through the whole album. Creatively speaking, there’s not a whole lot going on, but there are so many different levels of ridiculous bass patterns, that it’s a never miss.

This search led me to an album that was a complete surprise to me, although, it probably shouldn’t have been. I had read the reviews all over the place about Diplo and Santogold’s Top Ranking, and I had liked Diplo’s work with M.I.A. as well as his Fabriclive set. I also really liked Santogold’s Santogold. But, I just never put it together that this was a prime candidate for entry into the Blazer Blastfest. Finally, it was randomly put on, and I was floored. Instantly, I had a new fallback album.

So, when I heard about Diplo and Switch’s new album, under the pseudonym Major Lazer, I couldn’t snap it up fast enough. The first trip through the album was fun enough for me to go on a road trip around the city for absolutely no reason other than listening to it directly again. This album is a loving nod to Jamaican Club music, and, in my opinion, a lesson to it as well. Guns Don’t Kill People, Lazers Do, is packed full of tongue in cheek references, ridiculous samples, and an overall joking vibe. But, don’t let that throw you. The music itself is incredible.

It moves all over the spectrum, sampling everything from psych out surf music to an auto-tuned baby’s wail. There are straight bangers, club anthems, and outright Hip Hop blasts. But, most importantly, It actually puts a fear in me that I may shatter a window in my truck, all while infecting me with melodies that I can’t stop humming all day. This album was enough to officially cement Diplo as the official provider of noise pollution in my little corner of Garfield Heights.

Call Mi

Hold The Line