THE FALLOUT
CAPPO & STYLY CEE
Son
Hip-hop
Son reach 50 not out and let two of their chief head-knockers let off party poppers like they’re grenades; heaviness asking if you can handle it
An old-fashioned hip-hop album of funk drums against tough rhymes, one mouthpiece versus one on the decks. And that’s where the sentimentality ends. The Fallout took root from Styly Cee and Cappo’s Nottingham knockout H-Bomb EP from ‘08. To commemorate Son’s not-to-be-sniffed-at achievement of reaching a half century, the pair display a hunger like label debutants eager to secure long-lasting props. Either that or they’re smashing up the place as if they know their time is up, but something tells you these boys are gonna run and run.
Cappo is his usual dangerously dour self, skirting round the mic stand like a matador and always bringing out red rag flourishes, unstoppable out of a stone-faced posture, grabbing sentences irrespective of how imperfect the fit of words may be (no-one in their right mind would so much as question the non-rhymes), as is his way of playing human wrecking ball. At times oddly and unintentionally comical (particularly with his football-related similes namedropping local Championship managers and flame-haired midfield dynamos) and paraphrasing Mobb Deep and Fat Joe, at others The Grand Imperial remains unmistakably everyday abstract, a veritable “white knuckle ride through my mind’s eye” with sometime summaries that couldn’t be any more perfect (“petrol-doused rap”).
Styly Cee’s breaks are thicker and juicier than a Homer Simpson-endorsed T-bone steak. You’re getting fast-paced crate-digging for Throwdown and Music Maker’s Revenge – party-honed jams that despite the gritty vocals and cymbals flaying with the crash of a perfect storm, are made to see who can bring sweat with a grin. But there’s a level beyond funk recovery and renewal generating million dollar humdingers. Winning Spirit starts the trend of Styly pistol-whipping drum kits through soundsystems left wheezing on the ropes, in time honoured NYC appreciation also showing that the one MC-one DJ formula remains undefeated. More impressive is that there’s very little in the way of extra adornments – few leading horn licks, guitar jangles and such, just a one-on-one of primeval rhymes and rhythm.
Telepathically they’re goading one another in a game of high stakes chess. Cappo's omnipresent disdain aggravates Styly to up his own game; Styly drops bouncing bomb Wild West blitzes such as Crazy Freaks and Volition sorting the quick from the dead, to see if Cappo is hype enough to play his part in what often verges on an unfriendly rivalry. Drum machine anarchy and electro-distorted stress for Yo Ass, is Styly making the wrecking ball get extra pendulous. This isn’t a Fallout, this is bare-knuckled boxing to a bloody death. Regenerate serves Edan’s Rock n Roll at his own Torture Chamber, Cappo and Styly slugging out beats and rhymes as dual grandmasters, both wielding axes as they hack away in time at anyone forgetful of hip-hop’s essence.
More Portnoy-style damage lamps the title track – stripped down, giving the drummer some until veins are bulging out of newly formed biceps. The pair’s stamina levels rerouted (probably for their own good as it’s been a monumental effort up until this point), Scan 7 and Thought Apache, having gotten the skins sectioned, go undercover on electro assignments to bring new intensity; while Cappo hasn’t adjusted his mic grip, focus mode never dipping under 110, he sounds even more at home when planning subterfuge and alluding to the title’s inference of something post-nuclear.
Styly Cee definitely overshadows Cappo here; and that’s no slight against the ripper of so many great moments in UK hip-hop, it’s just that his East Mids brethren has stepped up his game by taking it back and showing detonative ramped up funk breaks need the right conductor to push down on the plunger. Anyone pondering that hip-hop, UK or elsewhere, was just teetering off the boil, here’s the caustic earwash to have your understanding matters again with crystal clarity. 9/10
