Donaeo - Indigo Child

The career of 27 year old UK MC Donaeo has been a strange one; like many of his fellow UK rappers his career has been marked by years of struggle. Donaeo has been a star in the underground of dance and hip hop culture for ten years now but had previously been more of a background presence compared to the likes of Tinchy Stryder, Wiley and Dizzee Rascal who have all gone on to enjoy huge success.

2009’s debut album ‘Party Hard’ however, established Donaeo as one of UK urban music’s leading talents with club anthems like ‘Riot Music’ and ‘I’m Fly’ dominating dance floors across the country, yet he still failed to really cross over into the mainstream. Second album ‘When Angels Sing’ makes clear a bid for mainstream acceptance.

‘When Angles Sing’ is a very smooth, competent collection of pop influenced RnB and dance that rides the gamut of contemporary UK dance culture. Elements of drum and bass, dubstep, UK Funky and soul pop can be heard throughout but the one central theme is Donaeo’s infectious enthusiasm and boundless energy.

Doneao has a unique vocal style switching from flowing rapping to sweet soulful crooning, as with Doneao’s previous work the album is littered with vocal inflections and there are countless shouts of ‘Hey!,’ ‘Come On!’ and ‘Simmeh Now’ during the course of the album all these vocal affectations do become rather annoying though.

Donaeo is at his best when he is making stripped down party music and the pounding beats of the Prodigy influenced ’Riding The Wave’ best show off Donaeo’s gift for making a dance floor banger. The sprightly ‘WMMA’ is another highpoint that sees Donaeo expressing his opinion on the state of the economy: ‘Money is a danger, Money is a drug.’

These moments of upbeat ravey exuberance however, are sadly rare throughout an album that far too often strays into insipid and bland emoting, for example on the saccharine love ballads ’Love Is The World’ and ’Universe’, love and romance is a theme that dominates the album to an almost cloying effect, for example the clichéd lyrics of ‘Explode’ which includes Donaeo proclaiming: ‘When we make love my body explodes;’ lyrics are very obviously not his strong point.

It is a shame that a lot of ‘When Angles Sing’ is dominated by romantic balladry as there are a lot of tracks here that show off Doneao’s gift as a producer. For example, the closing track and album highlight ‘Number 1’ is an effortlessly funky dance track featuring Doneao’s sweet soulful voice floating over a Spanish guitar and an old school hip hop beat.

‘When Angles Sing’ may not feature the dance floor anthems that Donaeo was famed for but there are probably enough hooks here to capture the attention of a mainstream audience, you just wonder whether Donaeo has sacrificed his best qualities in favour of a much more sanitised sound to get there.