It is nice to know that in this world were a lot of rap and hip-hop has been dumbed down to mumbling bedroom wannabes talking in street tough cliches over the same off the shelf meandering beats, that occasionally you can still stumble across something which reminds you of the golden age. Apologies For The Delay swaggers like an old school hip-hop classic but is nothing if not forward looking too, talking in the language of today and adding a real street edge and dark anticipation through the choice and flow of words. It is sharp, punchy and for a change revels in its own lyricism, something which seems to have ironically been lost from the genres which arose from a cappella street poetry.
If opening salvo Apologies harks back to a big 90’s sound, subsequent tracks show that Shegz is not just a one trick pony. Fire plays with off-beat reggae, Glue wanders slicker, chilled R&B territory and Don’t Touch My Creps is a truly new creation taking elements that you may be familiar with but putting them together in totally new and original ways.
Hip-Hop, rap and the whole urban sound has come a long way since it was first found hanging around on the street corners of The Bronx but Shegz proves that it is far from having run its course, if anything it has just as much energy and imagination as it ever did. Perhaps more.
