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DJ Vadim - U Can't Lurn Imaginashun
A lot of people over the years have been able to turn bad experiences into a positive energy that can give a massive happy ending to a story that up has all too often up to this point had a massive negative force around it.
Artists in particular thrive on this sort of stuff, Bon Ivor seems to get more loved the more miserable he sounds, Blur reinvented their sound again with 13 thanks in no small part to Damon’s traumatic split from his partner and the reason I love the Wedding Present as much as I do is because David Gedge manages to bring a melancholy brilliance to every scenario in his songs, the majority of which are very personal to him.
All of them of course turning adversity in their favour creatively, the one thing you do struggle to find though is people bringing out a party album that follows one of the most traumatic years of their lives, yet thar’s exactly what we have with the latest DJ Vadim album, maybe Russians handle things differently to us in that sense?
In 2008 DJ Vadim had the following happen to him: His Dad went partially blind after three failed cataract operations, his Mum nearly lost her house, his wife was seriously ill and then to cap it all he found out he had cancer of the left eye and went blind in it. Fortunately the surgeons were able to sasve his eye thanks to a delicate operation that I can’t even think about without feeling slightly repulsed.
But here he is nearly a year later with U Can’t Lurn Imaginashun, a wonderfully diverse album that is his best yet as he shifts focus from track to track without ever losing the feel that this is a cohesive album with it’s finger on fun and funky.
It opens with the skanking, sunshine filled track Soldier, that somehow blends dancehall, hip-hop and ska, after a track like that nothing should really be able to surprise you, yet somehow he does, to the point where you end up beaming like a kid with the worlds biggest ice cream in his hand.
- DJ Vadim
- U Can't Lurn Imaginashun (2009)
- Category: Album
- Label: BBE Records
- Reviewed by: Kev
- Published on: 16 Jun 2009
- Comments: 0
- Beat Surrender Rating:
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Add to favouritesA prime example of that is a hat trick of songs that follow each other. That Lite is a great hip-hop track with a fantastic groove, a real head nodder, that is then followed by the party track Thrill 103, mixing male and female vocals, the best though is saved for the slowed down, soulful Beijos.
Few artists could get away with that sort of mix, but like I said previously, it works. Elsewhere on this 18 tracker you get the more electro Pink Stiletoes, the dubby Under Your Hat (my favourite on the album), the funky as you like Maximum and the female soul of Always Lady.
It’s an album you never really want to end and certainly one of my favourites of this year, not just because of the overcoming adversity factor, but more importantly because this is forward thinking music from a man who has come close to the edge of despair last year and realised that he’s got a lot now to be very thankful for…and we can all celebrate that with him.
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