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LET LE DAMN DOG OUT!
Le Damn Dog is a hellhound of a new project from top Parisian DJ-producer Erik Rug and DJ-MC Dynamax from the South Bronx. The surprise element is the musical tree on which the pair have chosen to cock their leg: a slavering mix of, hiphop and rock ‘n’ roll delivered with pure punk attitude.
The pair have been working together in various projects for over ten years, initially throwing together their respective groundings in house music and hiphop but, after discovering a mutual love for great rock music and punk’s energy, finally solidifying a venture which is electric rather than electronic and destined to raise a few roofs this year.
Songs like ‘Watch Out’ and ‘Freak Of Nature’ bang together Erik’s Stooges-style raw power guitar barrages with Dynamax’s new-found ‘Black John Wayne’ persona, howling or panting to ram home the hard-hitting lyrics. The remarkable street-scene of ‘Wrong Again’ even recalls ‘Nightclubbing-era Iggy partying with the Cramps, although ‘Rollin’’ and ‘Stop’ recall the hard-hitting late 80s New York hiphop style. ‘Rules And Laws’ is sheer punk in message, early P-Funk when they pushed out the space-boat musically. The music heightens its point through deft use of space and pressure cooker dynamics [like the unsettling ‘Love Is Poison’ where Suicide enter the equation], the duo’s anger heightened by a self-imposed regime of sleeping on the floor and starving themselves.
The hardship paid off as this seductively startling bunch of songs work their gutter magic, the electronic dance music awareness and love of outfits like Can and the Clash having a subliminal effect.
Another revolution in 2009: the year of the canine. Bow-wow-wow-yippee-yo-yippee-yay!
Kris Needs, January 2009
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