Released 23rd August 2010

Golden Era Records



Unless you are seriously into your hip-hop or from Australia it’s unlikely you would have heard of Hilltop Hoods.  Oz-side, however, they are a very big deal indeed with their last collection The High Road  hitting the top of the charts when it was released back in 2006, cementing their place as the biggest hip-hop act in their home country.

State Of The Art sees the trio making an unashamed tilt for the international big-time, with an album full of melodies, gargantuan hooks and confident in-your-face lyrics that reflect their place as Great Antipodean Hopes.  They waste little time in setting out this stall, with the opening refrain line of the album seeing Suffa (one third of the collective) spitting ‘duck and cover, cos when you fuck with Suffa it’s like the bombs dropped/You spit like Bon Jovi, we spit like Bon Scott’ on 'The Return.'   It’s an inventive couplet and reveals a lot about their influences and audience; this is clearly hip-hop designed to appeal to a wide audience, and not just the hardcore community.  There’s an awful lot here for rock fans, whilst electro-heads will love the swishy Daft Punk electronica on ‘Parade of the Dead.’  This song is also blessed- if you can call it that- with an inventive Apocalyptic narrative of a ‘city on top of a grave/where the dead roam the street like a rotting parade.’  The language is that of a zombie movie (check out this link if you don't believe me), and the song ends with the songs rapper, in the style of the nursery rhyme, shouting ‘I cut up heads and shoulders, knees and toes/Knees and toes, knees and toes.’  K.I.G Family this most certainly ain’t,  and thank fuck for that.

‘She’s So Ugly’ ramps up the volume in a DMX-style rant .  It’s a wonderfully nasty, aggressive old thing with incessant, pounding beats that are synched up perfectly with such chirpy lyrics as ‘this ain’t love and romance it’s hate, gluttons and antics.’ 

The song that precedes it, ‘Chase That Feeling’, could not be more different, being a twisted hymn to devoting yourself to the things that can keep you from life’s less salubrious avenues.  Although prone to the odd overblown analogy (‘I ride the rails of a vinyl track’) it’s a sample-led, violin-heavy number that will appeal to anyone who ever liked ‘Stan.’

Legendary U.S rapper Pharoahe Monch joins proceedings on ‘Classic Example,’ , and this presence is immediately noted with his harsher vocalisation and shorter syllables.  The song itself does not break down barriers ideas-wise- ‘no stopping us now, Hilltop in this, we’re locking it down’ – but it is one of the stronger tracks here.  Not, however, as strong as ‘Last Confession’;  a slow ode to accepting the foibles of your world before you take on that big, bad bucket.  Starting with some mournful jazzy piano, it is soon propelled by violins that lend the track the sense of grandeur that its subject matter deserves, before everything is tied together and summed up by the final couplet- ‘My biggest fear is not knowing you well/ And I ain’t afraid to die I’m afraid of going to Hell.’

Impeccable production drives State Of The Art and, though there will be those that run from this in search of something sparer and less bombastic, this is an album that is universal in its appeal.   As is the way with a weedy indie-type such as yours truly, some of the more self-aggrandising moments grate a little, but that is neither nor there really.  The fact that there hasn’t been much hoo-ha about this album suggests it might not be the album to take them into the stratosphere, but it certainly should win them some new friends away from home.




8/10 

Posted In Album Reviews, Aug 22 2010. Words - David