Dels - Gob

The rarest, most-elusive thing in rap can often be an album devoid of self-obsession. Equally rare would be a man touted by some as ‘the future of hip-hop’ namedropping Joe Goddard and Micachu as his influences upon signing for his label, Big Dada. Add to this his touring buddy, Ghostpoet, making one of the releases of the year so far and DELS has the stage perfectly set for a memorable debut, named ‘GOB’. However what’s sampled here is even more than that, DELS indulges every idea, even his misadventures are amplified, every last urge, fear and insecurity exposed.

Starting with the bouncing industrial, yet tribal, bleeps of ‘Hydronenburg’, DELS lays his tracks through nearly every point on the musical map. While the first track is a brash disenchanted anthem, save for a touching breakdown, the second sees DELS firmly raiding 8-bit for the Sega-soundtrack to DELS’ dissection of his own character. ‘Shapeshift’ is the first flash of DELS’ wit, a story of his constant morphing: ‘I tried to morph into a car… a shiny gold bar even Bret the Hitman Hart.’ DELS’ mastery of pop-culture references from Sonic to Only Fools Horses further draws the album away from the almost-assumed arrogance of up-and-coming rappers.

After three relatively straightforward tracks the record takes on a mid-album malaise where DELS best explores his own lyricism and the sparseness of his production and the looseness of his song-structure. That introversion, almost shyness, is shattered by the unmistakable voice of Roots Manuva (the artist most comparable to DELS’ fluid delivery) and the pace is upped again for ‘Capsize’, the second track on the album to feature Hot Chip’s Joe Goddard. A scathing reflection on British youth culture, the song just steers clear of wandering into the cliché that has been so far artfully avoided.

The piercing alarm of ‘Violina’ and the stuttering unnerving production make for a jarring song of lost-love that is truly difficult to listen to, whether this achievement is to be applauded or derided can be decided by the listener in this case. This is almost the final underlining of how hard DELS is to compare to his immediate contemporaries where perhaps the most similar bands, musically, are rooted in electronica like PVT, Suuns and HEALTH’s remixes. His final act, and grandest of them all, is standout single and title track ‘GOB’ a pulsating anthem sounding like Trent Reznor and ‘Marshall Mathers LP’ era Eminem producing Roots Manuva and building into a fascinating crashing crescendo, which is unarguably one of the most vital tracks of 2011.

While it’s hard to criticise DELS’ approach, his dedication and his uniqueness, it’s still fair to say this album has its fair share of dead ends, alleyways that offer not much more than darkness and a route to the next point of interest. Packed with lyrical content (from Cheeseburgers to Domestic Violence, through a broken-hearted desolation rarely as well explored as on ‘GOB’), bursting with musical ideas and showcasing almost every aspect of DELS’ game, ‘GOB’ may serve best an entrancing prologue to a body of work in which DELS can fully explore everything he has touched on here. That’s not to discredit this though, ‘GOB’ is full, lush, relevant and most of all a fantastic listen, providing you can accept the sudden drops in pace, the sudden onset of introversion. But if you can’t accept that, there’s a fair few albums out there for you anyway. DELS once offered a great alternative to the chart-friendly empty rap that had become almost inescapable. Now DELS has made it.