Micachu & The Shapes - Chopped & Screwed

The eccentric talent of Mica Levi was refined and bred at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, where she studied composition. And this surprises a lot of people when you tell them, mainly because her debut album under the ‘Shapes’ moniker suggested very little restraint or any other common characteristic of your composer-by-numbers. Levi, you see, is anything but by-numbers. That debut, ‘Jewellery’, was one of 2009’s finest records. Many saw its appeal solely through the fact that Levi and co. managed to construct a chorus out of a hoover’s sucking sound but beneath the experimental guise were some beautifully-constructed pop songs. Pop songs that weren’t, y’know, by numbers.

Her second, wildly ambitious project isn’t strictly classed as Micachu & The Shapes’ second album proper. But it’s one for the collectors: During ‘Chopped & Screwed’’s half-an-hour, Levi familiarises herself with The London Sinfonietta, performing the albums’ entirety in what seems like one take. Throughout, the group experiment with a technique, namely to chop and screw, which involves slowing down a song’s tempo, applying beat-skips and other alterations, for the sake of giving the song an original, musically mutilated form. This technique thrived during the 90s hip hop scene - so that adds another field of expertise to Mica Levi’s vast, jumbled palette.

With ‘Chopped & Screwed’ it’s absolutely essential you listen to it in one take - try putting any of these songs on a playlist next to 120bpm chart-toppers and you’re left with a headache. The songs, dense and sloth-like in their tempo for the majority of the time, are the prime example of this aforementioned technique; tempo is entirely unpredictable; fidgeting like a kid with too much Sunny Delight. The only tracks that could be released as songs on their own are ‘Everything’ and ‘Low Dogg’. You imagine those two are being demos on ‘Jewellery’, before being laid bare for their chopping and screwing operation. The former is the only to use the debut’s signature, de-tuned guitar style, Levi musing “Fears, they saturate my time, my space” on top of an erratic, incessant beat. ‘Low Dogg’’s deep, throbbing tones are met with the lyrics “How can I complain / My everyday’s the same / Stays the same, stays the same, stays the same”. You’re unlikely to believe Levi’s claim that every one of her days is like the other…

It is, as one would expect, a deeply uncomfortable listen. But that’s the appeal of The Shapes; classically-trained but far from your average graduates, experimentalists with a genuine appreciation of what goes into making interesting, challenging music. This project, like ‘Jewellery’, will pass many by, but it’ll help make a crucial part of this unique talent’s legacy.