Operatic Slacker Hip-Hop from The Streets

First posted on November 2, 2007

I have a gigantic review article for Cadence Magazine that’s due today, so I will be a little brief. English working class slacker hip-hop opera? This would be a group called The Streets. Their second CD, A Grand Don’t Come for Free (Vice-Atlantic) is just that. It has explicit lyrics, so don’t play it around kids. It is funny, sad and well put together.

A bloke loses 1,000 quid as the premise for the story. He runs into trouble everywhere, his girlfriend throws him out, everything is wrong with his life. It doesn’t sound like an opera—in fact it doesn’t sound like your usual hip-hop either. It is just something very different and it certainly got my attention.