Dälek - Abandoned Language

Label: Ipecac
Catologue Number: IPC84
Format: CD
Date: 2007
Style: Hip-Hop / Rap / Noise
Rating: 8/10
Reviewer: Sidney James

Most people believe that hip-hop has got to the dogs as an art form. Sure if you just look at all the bling, bitches and blunts hip-hop that dominates the charts and the radio. However there is a lot of fantastic music being made under the hip-hop banner. Bands like the now defunct Antipop consortium, artists like MF Doom and labels like Def Jux offer the flipside to the commercial crap that is chucked at the mainstream audience.

Dälek are a part of this underground and are perhaps the band that is the most way out there. The fact that they recorded an album with avant-garde legends Faust and have been previously described as the hip-hop My Bloody Valentine should give you the idea they are light years away from the likes of 50 Cent.

Abandoned Language is Dälek’s fifth album and perhaps their finest release so far. If their last album Absence was a dark blast of noise infused rap that had more in common with Techno Animal and Godflesh than any other hip-hop bands, then Abandoned Language is the rough hangover from that sonic attack..

Like the best albums its one of those records that grows on you with every listen. Details in the sound appear where previously there was a wall of static. Rhythms seem to flow where previously there was just broken beats. MC Dälek’s vocals slowly appear from the sonic murk to force home the band’s message.

Abandoned Language is a heavily layered album that takes time and patience. All of which makes it an album to constantly return to and discover more on each listen. People looking for instant pop thrills need not apply; those with a more discerning ear will be rewarded by what is one of the best underground hip-hop releases of recent years.