Track Listing

1. Turn the Page
2. Has It Come to This?
3. Let's Push Things Forward
4. Sharp darts
5. Same Old Thing
6. Geezers Need Excitement
7. It's Too Late
8. Too Much Brandy
9. Don't Mug Yourself
10. Who Got the Funk?
11. The Irony of It All
12. Weak Becomes Heroes
13. Who Dares Wins
14. Stay Positive

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #49364 in Music
• Released on: 2002-10-22
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Enhanced, Explicit Lyrics
• Dimensions: .19 pounds

Album Description
2002 debut is enhanced with the videos of 'Weak Become Heroes' and 'Let's Push Things Forward'. The album is nominated for this year's Mercury Prize, alongside luminaries David Bowie and Doves and was certified Gold in the UK. Vice.

Amazon.com
In a thrilling UK Garage scene, blighted only by a reliance on drippy soul cliché and tiresome braggadocio, The Streets' eminently quotable Mike Skinner may just be the voice to take it to the next level with Original Pirate Material. This debut is a staggeringly eloquent and fearlessly honest snapshot of gritty street-level existence, as experienced by an ordinary bloke. At first listen, the Birmingham-born Skinner's cheeky cockney affectations grate slightly. But for every line that makes you squirm, there are 20 that drop your jaw. "Has It Come to This?" is "A day in the life of a geezer," a seductive encapsulation of London lifestyle, presented raw as a bootleg, but bulging with sharp wit and feverish detail. "Stay Positive" weaves a fearful tale of heroin addiction, while "The Irony of It All" makes a beguiling case for legalization, presenting a fictional exchange between a beered-up, self-righteous lager lout and a fey student weed enthusiast. Original Pirate Material is a milestone, the real voice of British youth set down on record. Don't miss it. --Louis Pattison

From URB Magazine
There are two primary reasons why dance music — the revolution-waiting-to-happen that inspired this magazine’s founding — will continue to have a hard time "breaking" in America: 1) instrumental music hasn’t been wildly popular here in nearly 80 years (for better or worse, more people identify with Springsteen or "American Idol" than Coltrane and Rachmaninov), and/or 2) it’s just not very sexy for a genre of music — for lack of a better term, electronic dance music — to be internally sub-divided along neat, tidy increments of beats per minute. Imagine trying to explain "garage" (or any of dance music’s petty sub-genres, for that matter) to a total novice: It’s like nothing you’ve ever heard before . . . It’s a few beats per minute faster than that other genre, which itself was defined by being a faster take on the genre from which it sprang.

With Original Pirate Material, Mike Skinner, the 22-year-old garage producer and British rapper behind the Streets, has succeeded where many others have failed: He’s made a dance record with pathos. His much-ballyhooed debut fuses two of the globe’s tried-and-true musical success stories (rapping and the much-hyped "Next Big Thing" of the moment — in this case, two-step garage) and is already being hailed as one of the most important (white) British albums in decades. It’s easy to select reasons why they are onto something — where much of electronic dance music is predicated on city-in-the-sky visions of utopia and perfection — grandiose, commendable and over-ambitious visions that often inspire escapism rather than politics — Skinner has done something so painfully obvious and simple that it borders on genius, and it’s a significant argument in favor of dance music as music for thinking, feeling, living people.

On the teetering and vaguely Specials-sounding "Let’s Push Things Forward," Skinner half brags, half warns that "This ain’t your archetypal street sound. " No kidding. As a producer, the sound of the Streets is built on bouncy garage rhythms, deep and stabby bass lines and RZA-ish string lines; it’s annoyingly catchy, shiny and sugary. The glassy, clip-clopping "Has It Come to This?" is one of the year’s great pop tunes, and the ambient drum & bass of "It’s Too Late" and the urgent orchestral dash of "Turn the Page" aren’t far behind. Lyrically, Skinner writes about the mundane and everyday (video games, drugs, parties, friends), and he’s unapologetically British-sounding. He’s a terrible rapper, but what he lacks in coordination he sort of makes up for with his dainty, oddly endearing flow and the fact that even the most pedestrian of his stories sounds interesting when set among Tube stations, flats, water closets and council estates. His lyricism entitles you to a day in the life of a white kid from the suburbs weaned on black British culture trying to maintain in post-industrial London. But where most British MCs of any hue quiver ever so gently because, deep down, they know they sound nothing like their stateside idols, the Streets sounds self-confident and self-confidently white, bad flow (and teeth) and all. The self-confidence — the awareness that this is different, that we’ve indeed "turned the page" — makes a great deal of difference.

As such, Original Pirate Material is also the most genuine expression yet of post-hip-hop, white-kid British lyricism. Where fellow garage stars So Solid Crew or Roots Manuva, New Flesh and their unfortunately named "Bouncement" contingent of hip-hop/dancehall/soul fusionists all embody a black Atlantic/black Briton sensibility, the Streets is British like Blur, Pulp or the Smiths ("Sounds like Arab Strap over two-step," complains my roommate) are British — full of suffering and pomp, malaise and the ambition to be anthemically emotional. The Streets’ novel pairing of dance music and wordplay hits the mark more often than not and it’s a step in a potentially interesting direction, but ultimately Original Pirate Material is not the lone answer to our future music culture prayers. America ain’t ready for a geezer who lamely shouts out Paul Oakenfold and references Carl Jung. It’s taken long enough for America to warm to the white rapper, and remember still, nobody listens to techno.

Hua Hsu

Customer Reviews

You're listening to the Streets
Don't listen to the righteous hip-hop "martyrs" who claim this album is a droll monotone Brit rhyming over a bedrock of crappy Casio beats. It's those close-minded fans who have stagnated hip-hop into the bling-bling and b*tches joke that it is today. Hip-hop was never supposed to be exclusive to anyone: whoever could tell a story had every right to. Go through a list of rappers selling albums today and 90% of them are an absolute joke.
It's about time a breath of fresh air came from ANYwhere in the world, even if its from the United Kingdom, which has been entertaining garage and hip-hop for years behind the US's back. Mike Skinner, producer-writer-rapper extraordinaire behind the Streets, has crafted an album many rappers would kill to call their own: at 48 minutes long, it doesn't overstay its welcome; it's free of filler and worthless skits; and it actually says something. In between smart stories about everyday life for burned-out British kids wasting life on Playstation and in "greasy spoon cafetarias" are sharp social commentaries on the irony of legal alcohol and illegal weed, and the hopelessness of the drug culture many kids fall victim to.

Turn the Page: apocalyptic, his statement of intent. A+
Has it Come to This?: devastating description of his surroundings. A banging track. A+
Let's Push Thing's Forward: a call of arms for originality to slay "pop formulas". Ska-influenced. A
Sharp Darts: a little bragadoccio. B
Same Old Thing: bangs like a couple of prom night. A
Geezers Need Excitment: a strange beat, great story of hoping to see fights in bars. A-
It's Too Late: a love lament, inspired. A
Too Much Brandy: been drinking again? A-
Don't Mug Yourself: no, that girl doesn't like you, stop being so whipped. A
Who Got the Funk?: "Just a groove" B
The Irony of it All: the aforementioned "fight" between Terry the drunk and Tim the pothead. Funny, yet sharp. A
Weak Become Heroes: the absolute best lyric about the drug culture, set to a dying beat. A+
Who Dares Wins: good title, but only 30 seconds long. B
Stay Positive: the second best lyric, encouraging a friend struggling with a heroin addiction. Jaw-dropping finale. A+

Tell me some duschbag like Fabolous or Ludacris or any of those dime-a-dozen rappers could craft something so insightful. In terms of capturing a particular moment in a generation, the Streets' album does it the best. A supreme achievement.

Is it rap? Spoken Word? Who cares; it WINS
Was so far under the radar that it's a crime. This record is the best hip-hop record of 2002 you never heard.

Well, calling it a hip-hop record is a little disengenuous. The vocal stylings of this one-man show (UK layabout Mike Skinner) come off like rap, but the vocal rhythm is all over the place and it ends up coming off like spoken word more than rap. Thing is, the second you think he's going in one direction, it flips into others and we're left with a record that almost defies every category but trip-hop comfortably. Even the beats are all over the place in context: dance, hip-hop, drum-n-bass...the kid's got a mad record collection at home.

It's catchy stuff, with sung choruses and VERY funny stories if you can decipher the UK dialect ("roight? Sod off, blud'y bastard!"). He's got smart, great takes on the music industry ("Let's Push Things Forward"), the legalization of weed, youth rebellion and Playstation, especially on a super-witty self-duet entitled "The Irony of it All" about how off it is that alcohol is legal and weed isn't, especially in light of the (here) frequently comicly violent outcome of alcholics when weighed against the puff-puff-live philosophies of your average weedhead. This track is a instant classic.

The beats are almost straight old school, but fresh, bootleg-like takes on the genre. "Sharp Darts" and "Geezers Need Excitement" could just as easily have ended up on a dozen hip-hop records that came out last week. The more dance-oriented fare even manages to keep the attention of the electronic illiterate on tracks like "Has It Come To This?"
One of the most winning tracks on here, one so witty it bears pointing out single-handedly, is the extremly fun "Don't Mug Yourself", which is about a guy getting all bent up over a girl while his boys dog him out for being soft. Hilarious, and real. Oy!

The cool thing about this record is that it isn't about being the best rapper or having the most vast and overwrought production, it's about being oneself...something The Streets does with not only grace, but a sharp eye for what wins hearts.

English sense of humour.
I know the Streets have many fans the world over but I feel I must address some of the negative reviews expressed by the American market. I am not saying people are wrong to criticise the album, if you don't like it you don't like it, fair enough, but some of the negative remarks levelled at it seem to show a lack of understanding. This, however, is not the American record buying public's fault. Unless you are actually British there are aspects of the Streets that you just wont get. References to American culture often leave English listeners cold and I presume the same can be said for the reverse. Typical cockney slang and references to mundane day to day British institutions create a sense of unity the uninitiated just wont get. There is also many gripes about the monotonousness of Mike Skinner's voice. This is a reasonable complaint unless you have worked dead end jobs in London, gone to work in industrial Sheffield with a chronic hang over or been clubbing in some seedy nightclub in Southend. Only after experiencing the uniquely British working class way of life can you begin to appreciate that monotone is the only style plausible. It isn't exciting, it isn't glamorous, it isn't `ghetto' or `pimpin' its day to day boring British life. It rains, its cold, the food is processed and nasty, and our jobs are dull. We live for the weekend We moan about it but that's how it is.

In celebrating this brain crushingly lifeless existence Mike Skinner is giving a depressing beauty to the humdrum activities of the disenchanted British Youth. Like the musical equivalent of a Lowry painting. He picks on shared experiences or stereotypical characters like some sort of urban observational comedian replacing the laughter with a frighteningly accurate truth about the futile yet strangely fulfilling nature of the `weekend culture' generation.

Many complain that the beats and samples are generic and over played but THAT'S THE POINT. They are original yet you would swear you have heard them somewhere before. Each one is a stereotype of itself echoing and emulating some forgotten club classic (the same piano loops over and over) the origins of which you cant put your finger on but which stirs memories and feelings of drunken nights with friends, hazy flashbacks to the night before and people you have spent entire nights talking to but would never recognise again.

His vocals follow a similar vein of familiarity. Whilst not sticking to traditional syllabic vocal patterns Skinners lyrics are delivered in more of a free form style, one which is much closer to everyday speech than rapping. In doing this he takes on the role of the average guy in the pub giving his opinions of the world to anyone who will listen. Rhymes are rarely perfect and his words fit only loosely to the beats. We all know blokes like this. Skinner, however, picks the overriding social and political attitudes of the nation's down-trodden youth and cleverly vocalises them in a constant stream of buzz word ridden, alcohol infused stories of urban life. Generalisations maybe, but the truth nonetheless.

So please don't judge this as a rap album and compare it to Jurassic 5 or Gang Starr for that is missing the point entirely. It's a document of British urban life, a snapshot of the despondency yet underlying optimism of the millions occupying our club scene, dole queues and factories around Britain. This album is the sound of Monday morning heading to work with a hang over, it's sitting in a grimy local pub with your mates watching your football team lose, it's getting ready to go out on a Friday night with a pocket full of cash and nothing to spend it on but a weekend of clubbing, it's the worst kebab in the world which tastes fantastic because it represents the filth we put up with in Britain yet endure with a smile on our face.

After all its only five days `till the weekend.

We all smile we all sing.