Songs Of Praise
The second coming of Messiah J & The Expert, Ireland’s finest hip hop band.
, 09 Oct 2003
Sometimes, in order to know what you are, you’ve got to be clear on what you’re not. Case study: this nation’s best hip hop proposition by an Irish city block, the scarifyingly young, fiercely talented Messiah J & The Expert.
“Nearly all of the Irish MCs that I’ve ever met,” muses emcee Messiah J (real name John Fitzgerald), “say that at some stage they’ve done the whole American accent thing, embracing Ebonic slang and that, but I never really did. It was always about the natural accent I spoke in. I consciously didn’t want to come across as someone with any kind of pretence: you know, I’m John, I’m a white Irish male. But at the same time, we never really bought into the whole ‘We must be an ‘Irish hip hop group!’ thing either.”
“I think me and John see it as irrelevant,” concurs producer The Expert (Cian Galvin). “Like, we’re just a band. As far as we see it, we’re just trying to make great music.” He thinks. “I don’t know what an ‘Irish hip hop band’ sounds like, anyway.”
Irish hip hop being as much of an anomaly as it still is, you will remember Messiah J & The Expert’s former incarnation: Creative Controle, who gave us those two blazing singles, ‘Check The Vision’ and ‘Bloodrush’, and that splendidly frenetic animated promo (courtesy of Team D.A.D.D.Y). The mutation into MJEX happened with the departure of their turntablist, DJ Mayhem, in early 2002, and the concurrent overhaul of their creative M.O.
“We were getting disillusioned with our influences, getting bored with everything we were doing and listening to,” recalls J. Adds Expert: “We were growing up, basically.”
Sure enough, evidence of a lyrical and musical maturity beyond their years (they’re both 22) is present in spades on their debut LP, What’s Confusing You? , an album less about hip hop’s usual rhythm’n’brag and more about language-and-idea avalanches set to striking beats and melodies. Expert’s production philosophy seems aligned with Buck 65’s or DJ Shadow’s, in terms of putting emotionalism before traditional ideas of what hip hop is or should be: he’s just as likely to hang a rhyme on a beautiful violin phrase or distinctive flute melody as a beat. Indeed, this listener’s current favourite track, ‘Erazors’, is built around an accordion line.
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