How the hell did I miss this piff

Can't believe I've been sleeping on this chick for so long....

I'd been going thru serious urban alternative withdrawal for months after Kala and Seeing Sounds until I finally opened my ears and started paying attention again today. I'd been hearing Jay's joint Brooklyn Go Hard from the soundtrack of Biggie's biopic for a couple weeks, but it only dawned on me today that the chick on the hook rocking the extra verse was the same girl on My Drive Thru with Pharrell and Julian Casablancas:



I made the first connection after hearing the reggaelicious Shove It and realising that it was the same artist reprising her own opening lines from that song for the Jay-Z track, but it took longer for the other connections to sink in. I came across Santagold serendipitously (as the best music discoveries always are) after trying to find her single Unstoppable; on first cursory listen I could've sworn she was Nelly Furtado, given the quasi-dancehall chanting on the track, but after being swiftly corrected on that assumption on iTunes, I was instantly smitten with this treasure I'd unearthed and started hunting down more from her. I wasn't disappointed. I was, however, nonplussed that it took me so long to start listening, given that she shares so many musical influences with some of my favourite artists, moves in such wide circles (she's toured with everyone from Hov to Bjork and written for Lily Allen), and has even been compared to the Pixies, whom I've posted about before. It's not as if chick is underground or anything. Makes me wonder just what the hell else I'm missing out there if I passed over this chick for almost a year.

BTW, I know that M.I.A. is obviously the first comparison that springs to mind, but I think that's a bit unfair to Santogold. Given that both females share mutual admiration for each other and affinity for each other's inspirations, work with much of the same people and are in turn admired by so many of the same people in music, it's no surprise that their common lineage is evident. They're practically musical siblings, but that doesn't follow that one is consciously trying to emulate the other. Great minds think alike, leave it at that. I also think it's unfair for Santogold to be categorised as rap or R&B by American publications, whereas her 'sister' M.I.A. is given freer reign... since their styles are so congruent, I can't help but think that Santogold's race is the only possible factor in assigning her to the 'black music' pile. In M.I.A.'s case, since she's a Sri Lankan British-based urban alternative artist and experimental in her choices, if a descriptive genre label has to be applied, jungle works just as well as any other; however, since Santogold is a Philadelphia-raised Brooklyn-residing black woman, it seems that it's easier to just call her a rapper. Or another R&B act. Even though she hates R&B.

Some of my favourites:


School me on some more wikid genre-bending urban alternative piff like Santogold, N.E.R.D, M.I.A. etc... I'm gonna give Kid Sister and Yo Majesty a listen later, suggest anyone else you can think of along the same lines.