DJ Shadow, Run The Jewels prove they’re a winning team on “Kings And Queens”

The legendary producer and foremost hip hop warriors reunite for a potent mix of soul, trap beats and nostalgic rap

The legacy of DJ Shadow as an innovator is secure: he is, after all, the man who invented Trip Hop, and inspired crate-digging producer/DJs all the way down to the Avalanches and beyond. In the past few years however, he has tried to stay relevant by playing with the sounds of today, and convincing current hip hop stars to play with him. It doesn’t always work, unfortunately.

It does, however, work brilliantly when his running mates are Run The Jewels. On his last album, the absolute highlight was their fiery, surf-rock-meets-hard-funk collaboration.

On the latest outing by DJ Shadow, he once again fails to reignite his creative fire. But the ace-up-the-sleeve still works, as the highlight of the new album is, unsurprisingly, the one where RTJ guest.

Though the production isn’t groundbreaking, it is still a solid soul-inspired foundation for RTJ to play on top of. And they kill it! El-P delivers a verse about how a neighbour’s dog, Fluffy, jumped off the building roof for survival, a courageous feat that inspired his mother and himself. Killer Mike tops it with a verse about how his mother fell for a sweet-talking drug-dealer, Five Finger Freddy, before her eyes opened and she stabbed the shit out of him. As expected, the two stories are recounted in funny, dexterous, rapid-fire verse.

Shadow needs to find his mojo again, for sure, but as long as he can tag with RTJ for this kind of fun we’ll be listening.