"It's the year thirty-thirty and here at The Corporate Institutional Bank of Time, we find ourselves reflecting... finding out, that in fact we came back... we were always coming back..."
This week I find myself going back and rediscovering Deltron 3030 - hands down my all-time favourite hip hop album. It's getting on in years (released Oct, 2000), but that hasn't taken the shine off what is an incredible body of work. Damon Albarn's eerie intro sounds a warning - this isn't like anything you've heard before. Appropriately, it has been best described, in my opinion, as hip hopera.
Set against a bold and expansive, futuristic sound-scape come to life, the three Deltron conspirators, Deltron Zero (Del the funky homosapien), The Cantankerous Captain Aptos (Dan The Automator) & Skiznod the Boy Wonder (Kid Koala), along with a host of guest artists, set off in 3030 on a journey to reclaim Earth's Music. This album-long concept narrative makes this long play a must-listen from start to finish - a refreshing change from the '3 singles and some noise' formula (where have all the good concept albums gone?) - and cementing Deltron as an underground classic.
Deltron is part sci-fi, part dark humour, part social commentary, part Orwellian, part rap battle. It's the melting pot that forged the Gorillaz sound. It's War of the Worlds meets Canadian beer commercials. It's both left-field and glorious.
Some good reads on Deltron:
BudTrap was born out of our love of music - and the frustration of having to deal with headphones that kept getting tangled up. Nothing's changed. We still listen to an awful lot of music - and go to a stack of gigs - it's our passion. So each week we like to share a little about what we've been listening to - good or bad - and spread that passion. Yeah we get a bit opinionated and worked up, that's what it's all about. We encourage you to bite back, join the discussion and let us know what's been rocking your world.
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