Duck Rock

Looking at the reviews for this album, I had not a clue that this "artist" stole much (if not all) of his work from black artists. Knowing that did sour my opinion of the album a bit, but I will try to keep that out of this review. Overall, this album could prove to be very fun. It did get me moving at some points (which I credit to the people who actually made the songs, not McLaren), but it wasn't super consistent. I'd be vibing with one song and the next I would be in an entirely different realm of music. While I'm not fond of the blatant stealing from black artists, this was an okay listen. I didn't hate it.

What I got from an album called Duck Rock is about what I expected. Eclectic and unusual. The inclusion of so many kinds of world music is commendable and interesting, but it sure didn't make for a uniform listen. At least it was different from anything else on this list?

Well, I learned one thing today: Eminem interpolated material from "Buffalo Gals" for "Without Me". I had no idea. But in all seriousness, this was an interesting album. I didn't necessarily love it, but I was intrigued by a super white British guy's interpretation of hip-hop and world music fusion. His material is often too clashing and intentionally avant garde for my liking, but the moments where the various Caribbean, Latin and Black American inspired sounds shine through, it seems fairly obvious that he understood the assignment as far as working with these genres go. And by "working with these genres", I basically mean "taking them from their source cultures and then taking credit"... Anyway, I was intrigued by this album, but ultimately it didn't really land with me. I saw the vision, but the vision seemed to be "scatter as much world music in as possible". Would have liked for things to feel more cohesive and less of a hodge-podge, and for god's sake, AT LEAST credit the people you took this music from.

Like the radio interlude or rather then procession of the radio show in the songs. Obatala, Legba, are the two favs.

Not plain awful, more like raisin I'-d-rather-have-something-else.

Sjukt album. Allt från avslappningsband där man bara väntade på delfinjudet, lite härlig skratching, lärarrap och exotika. Tycker ändå det var lite småkul men kommer nog aldrig lyssna igen.

Holy cultural appropriation Batman! I can see why this would have made a splash at the time bringing a colourful mix of hip hop and world music (and oddly, a bit of country) to British listeners, but we all know McLaren was a right so and so for taking credit for the work and talent of others. This feels more like an eclectic DJ set or someone switching between radio stations than a cohesive album, but it is interesting. Probably not interesting enough to merit a second listen through tbh, although I did get a little buzz from recognising the Eminem hat tip. Disappointing lack of ducks

It’s giving orientalist mish mash unfortunately. Looked up Malcolm McLaren afterwards and it seems to be an accurate picture of the artist. Better sampled by other musicians

What an odd album. Mostly, it's some fairly risible cultural appropriation, but there are odd bits of quite joyful instrumentation and music. The opening two tracks in particular are very strong. But it definitely feels like Malcolm has nicked a lot of early hip hop ideas and is bringing them back to an extremely white British sensibility.

It's not unlistenable just annoying as fuck to listen to

Annoying

boy. there's some real potential here. some really great instrumentals. and then this dumb asshole opens his mouth and starts sing rapping. the world music here should in all rights be pretty good, but having this guy who has the affect of an obnoxious white guy who can't take anything seriously makes this whole album feel like he's spitting in your face. at least paul simon seems like he appreciates the international music he regurgitates. i don't even know what the point of this album is when most of the time it makes you feel like you're witnessing a huge asshole being a quirky annoying british guy over what is some talented backing tracks. it actually pisses me off. if it wasn't for the quality of the music he is leeching this entire album, this would easily be a 1.

1.9 Oof. What a strange one. On the one hand, I admire the effort. On the other hand, everything landed flat. It's as though someone was taken back in time and tasked with recreating the atmosphere of switching through the radio stations on GTA vice city, but without the talent to really nail any genre specifically. Strangely the first track was very AFX'y (surely that's been remixed at somepoint), but after that floated through a range of genres that I have no real interest in.

på den ene side er kombinationen af tidlig hiphop og world lidt interessant og unik, på den anden side er hele albummet næsten kun repetitive samples så ved ikke hvor essentielt jeg synes det er. elsker den er noteret for at "bringe hiphop til storbritannien" som om det land nogensinde har bidraget noget som helst til hiphop udover en meget kort bølge i 2002-2004 ca

Smells like blacksploitation...

Not terrible enjoyed more than expected but nothing great. Bit different from Sex Pistols days.

Even the good songs are annoying.

A hilarious, early attempt at mashup. It screams “eccentric gives music a try”, but hey, it’s not that bad, and in general it’s well-received to be included on the 1001 albums list, which could use much more weirdness.

This was a bizarre but fun album. How can joyful African and Carribean reggae jams NOT be fun. Mix it with some early hip-hop and a "framing" structure of each track being played on a New York morning show or something - complete with call-in listeners. Definitely an interesting listen on my morning commute. This was the era when all these "World Beat" styles mixed with post-punk and new wave, much moreso in UK than USA. I was pleasantly surprised to see Trevor Horn's involvement in this production. It kept me listening. I could see playing this as background music at a party - but really, that's about it. An enjoyable spin.

Started out ok but got progressively worse.

What the fuck is this mess

If this album were any good, I'd be conflicted on how to rate it, as Malcolm McLaren is a serial appropriator of musical sub-cultures who attempted to capitalize on whichever cool new thing came wafting through his window. Thankfully it is not.

I did not like this one bit. I suspect McLaren just stole a bunch of music from other artists and stamped it with his name on it.

i expected something annoying....and it was annoying but different annoying than i thought

3.4/10

Yeah it was awful, I liked the Soweto sound but those were just lazy samples

meh?

2,5

No lo terminé de escuchar. Un tanto irritante

Interesting in its really early experimentation with samplings, but not much substance to listen to. I’ll admit that disliking McLaren’s character is not helping

A nice try for early polystylism and sampling experimentations, but the result is far from enjoyable, sadly.

hat potenzial, aber sehr zammgewürfelt und manche tracks nerven extrem

"whoever made this list grew up in the UK during the 80s and 90s cause there’s a lot of absolute bullshit on here that no one else would tell you you need to hear before you die" is how i'm feeling. Buffa gals made me nostalgic because eminem

The UK grapples with its changing multiculturalism in the 80s and is influenced and altered, doesn't know if it's appropriation or embracing. I'm still not sure either. Some sounds overwhelmingly 80s, some bang.

yeah idk not my cup of tea i think

Meh

That's not my taste in music

Not a fan Didn’t know eminem’s sample was off of one of their songs

Definitely funky, some cool old-school hip hop beats. The Appalachian folk tunes at the end were odd. Favorite song(s): Double Dutch.

I can recognize that this is different and maybe ahead of its time, but it’s definitely not for me. Very odd imo

Never heard of this, after reading about it it seems McLaren was more a producer who didn't credit a lot of the musicians who contributed to this record, it's a mix match of genres, interesting in parts, hard not to love African beats

It's quite good but just doesn't feel right

I can imagine it was fresh and fun when it was new. It's cheesy now. Favorite song: merengue

2.5

The last track is horrendous, and the rest is not much better, but the South African songs are okay. 2 stars

Not the worst thing I've heard, but I don't quite get what they were going for -- it's part African music (which is the best part), part old-school hip-hop (which is much less good), and part dicking around in the studio (which is not good at all). Was probably going light 3-stars before "Duck for the Oyster" which was like the proto version of Rednex's "Cotton Eyed Joe" I never needed to hear. 2.5 stars.

Didn’t really get what this album was the old hip hop tunes where the best but this was not for me

2/5. not much i liked from this one but it wasn't complete garbage

Very strange

mid

Cultural appropriation the musical.

I once went on radio and raved about McLaren’s Madame Butterfly as the ideal pop single: catchy, trashy, highbrow, lowbrow, exploiting the latest technology, and completely disposable. That was probably just on‑air jibber-jabber, but some of it holds, especially because Un Bel Dì, Vedremo is gorgeous, whatever you do with it. You could make a similar argument for Buffalo Gals or Double Dutch, McLaren's UK hits. They were clever, infectious, but not long lasting: like a cold virus. But here’s the rub. No one cares much about McLaren exploiting Puccini. The plunder of African musics, however - Highlife, mbaqanga, South African township sounds - sits uneasily now. McLaren’s failure to credit the records he pillaged and musicians he played with seals his reputation as cultural irritant rather than musician. Zeppelin and Paul Simon caught flak too, but no one denies they had chops in the material they lifted. As Eliot had it: immature poets imitate; mature poets steal. McLaren stole, sure, but was he mature, or just a cheeky wee glyp? It’s worth remembering that in the early ’80s, no one was crediting samples. Only in the ’90s, after black artists fought labels in court, did the law grudgingly recognise recorded sound as property. And there’s a line of precedent stretching back through musique concrète, Cage, the avant‑gardists who stitched reality into art. McLaren, ever the Situationist huckster, liked to cast himself in that French tradition rather than the bloated rock lineage of Zeppelin and Simon. In that light, Duck Rock is closer to Joni Mitchell’s Burundi rhythms on The Hissing of Summer Lawns, but brasher, gaudier, more self‑consciously Now. Then, at least. It couldn' last. McLaren was no great artist. He was a scavenger of ideas, sometimes of people. But that’s what gave his work its bite: you were never sure if he was creating or conning you, or both. If you share his taste in music (his jukebox in the Sex shop was legendary), you’ll like it; if you find him unbearable, you’re supposed to. Either way, irritation was part of the show. And yet - let’s be blunt - Duck Rock was beaten to the punch. Byrne and Eno’s My Life in the Bush of Ghosts did the same trick two years earlier with more depth and less smirk. Duck Rock was probably fun at the time, a bigger hit in the UK, but there doesn’t need to be two of them on the list. 1.5 I sense that this album is designed to invite a listener’s puzzlement. Is it earnest pop music or mere comedy? Is it affectionate curation of World Music or is it scornful exploitation? Thoughtful innovation or mere arbitrariness? Fortunately before Duck Rock is any of these things it is, first, shite. The clutter of mundane musical ideas with a side slop of McLaren’s clowning obviously passed for entertainment for a lot of people (I was bored personally) but they didn’t waste their time analysing this right? Everyone knew this was silly rubbish, didn’t they? Didn’t they? 1.5/5

I wasn't convinced by this album. It started off with some cool recordings of African drumming, so far, so good. Then it seemed to descend into a sort of GCSE music class improv session where the aim was to seem clever by munging together as many genres as possible. A little bit too much like an academic exercise and although the music is often quite pleasant, it lacks an authenticity, grit, or heart. I guess, in context it gets some extra kudos for introducing some new sounds to the UK at that time and laying the groundwork for 90's hip-hop. This album is definitely at its best during its purer African moments, like the "Song for Chango" which would have liked more of.

Some of the music is okay, but the album is all over the place. Throw the spaghetti at the wall and see what sticks? I'm not sure what the McLaren is trying to accomplish here? I'm also not sure why in the hell this album qualifies as something I need to hear before I die? I guess it is interesting that McLaren borrows (steals) from so many other artists if diverse styles, but what do they bring to make it different or their own? I don't get it and am not inclined to try to.

Eminem origin story

You can tell this is the hip-hop album that put the British public on the genre because it’s 1. Made by a narcissistic white guy and 2. It’s bad. The only good parts are the parts stolen from various African artists.

Really interesting but not so enjoyable for me as a listen through. Feels a bit aimless as its going between hip hop, the skits and the south African stuff.

Hmmmm. Odd choice really. Whilst pretty different to anything else around at the time, did it unleash a movement off the back of it? Do bands regularly name-check this as the reason they make music?

Complicated feelings. On the one hand, this album was likely the first exposure to African world music for Western audiences, so in that sense, it's groundbreaking. But it now seems clear that Malcolm McLaren lifted many of the musical ideas for Duck Rock from the South African artists who performed on the recordings but weren't credited on the album. Really tough reality, since I was rather charmed by the goofy, eclectic range of songs on this LP. There's some really fun early hip hop and African / world music here: Buffalo Girls and Soweto are the standouts, but Duck for the Oyster is laughable — it sounds like a country jamboree song performed by Chuck E. Cheese. Was ready to give this a 4 for unexpected freshness and, most critically, for not being another punk album, but I'm downgrading to a 2 because Malcolm McLaren is a culture vulture.

Pretty eclectic collection of songs assembled like a radio show. But apparently this guy is not the original artist. If I make a mix CD of awesome songs would my name make it on this list? lol I think not and for that I rate this down.

not for me

conceptual

it's kind of giving mambo number 5 in terms of lyrics and spirit, if not sound.

Wildly erratic, genre-bending stuff... I dunno. 2 outta 5?

Meh

Mér fannst tónlist furðuleg en samt furðulega skemmtileg blanda sem virkaði einhvern veginn. Það sem eyðilagpi ánægjuna voru aftur á móti þessar útvarpsútsendingar með The Supreme Team. Mikið fóru þær í taugarnar á mér

Not a bad album all over and an interesting listen but I'm not sure what's going on here. Could be me and the listen I gave it. Maybe it would be stronger with headphones. I don't know.

Experimental and fun listen. Nice to know where the Slim Shady line came from, but does not have a lot of replay value.

Buffalo Gals is the only thing keeping this album from getting a 1.

Meh

Bit odd

Feels appropriative, and also it's just not very good.

1,6/5

Type of album to listen once and forget like a random radio station.

Not so bad

A mess. Not fun. 2/5

Wow. Totally bizarro. Half early rap, half kid-like, & half artsy Technasia. Enjoy that math. lol Also not for me but not Bruce Springsteen bad.

Relatively enjoyable to listen to for the most part but not something I would be likely to revisit. There were good samples but some of the album seemed to run together.

weird pick. this album reminded me a lot of Beyond Skin, but this one was executed much better.

All That Scratchin' Is Makin' Me Itch 1001 Albums Generator 84 (07/29/2025) Malcolm McLaren's Duck Rock is one of the strangest albums I've ever heard. I have no idea how to classify this without using the slightly antiquated term of "World Music". Double Dutch reminds me of some Soukous music I've heard from Central Africa, while Merengue is named after its genre, a dance genre from the Dominican Republic. "World Music" is not constrained to the global south by the way. Buffalo Gals is an early hiphop song, and Duck For The Oyster is a really shitty country song. This is world music in the truest sense of the term, in that every song feels like it take inspiration from different parts of the world. The whole thing is also interlaced with these radio broadcasts that make it sound like you're listening to the most culturally vast radio station you've never heard. Sometimes its eclecticism works in its favor. The opening tribal ambience of Obatala is the sound of a drum circle in heaven. It sounds slightly far away and reverbed and has these little synthesizers and vocal chops that are quite inspired. Double Dutch and Soweto are both wonderful bits of African inspired music that really scratch my itch. Soweto especially is really fun since it mixes Western elements with the African ones. Merengue is a really fantastic take on the genre, with the musicians and backing vocals working really well with this style. If it weren't for McLaren's shitty vocals, I could believe this was playing at one of my wife's family parties. That's the thing with this album though. The McLaren of it all. I am not some crusader against "cultural appropriation", whatever that is, as I actually believe that sharing culture is one of the most import aspects of an integrated society. However, I do believe in giving credit where it is due, and the fact that most of the musicians that McLaren brought in to record on this album were uncredited is extremely shitty. Even if he had no legal obligation to do so, I still think it is the morally right thing to do. I don't judge the quality of this album based on this fact, but it really doesn't help McLaren's case when he is the reason why it kinda sucks. And gosh sometimes it really does suck. Legba is a song where nothing ever happens, choosing instead to wander aimlessly through ambient, uninspired synth landscapes. Jive My Baby is really annoying and Song For Chango is a completely forgettable African song. Duck For The Oyster is one of my least favorite songs I've heard on this challenge. It is some sort of parody of country pop with terrible, annoying vocals and sound effects in the background. Duck Rock is a mess. Some of the songs, especially in the first half, are pretty good, but the album is extremely unfocused and many of the experiments do not work. 2.5/5, rounded down to a 2. Favs: Obatala Merengue Soweto Least Fav: Duck For The Oyster

you're going to hate me but i liked this album and had fun listening to all of the things that turned out to be samples that i heard of in other places...but the things i liked the most were like the mbaqanga music and the early hip hop and he didn't credit those people so bye

what was he cooking

Eh. Some fun beats but not much else

Strong correlation between shitty album covers, and the quality of the music therein.

i like the influence of this and can see how this would be seen as “the first taste of hip-hop”. i just feel that the album is fairly messy, i liked some of the songs but it doesn’t really stick to a solid path through the album, just felt a bit everywhere. i also don’t feel like credit was given very fairly as i heard Malcolm McLaren isn’t the best person. music overall was decent just not the best as an album. i think it’s cool that eminem sampled the second track 2.5/5

Not sure I understand what this is. Don't think Malcolm McLaren had anything to do with making the music itself, he just took it and banged it all on an album then took the credit? There was some interesting sounding stuff here I guess. The song that Eminem borrowed that bit from. Some other relatively interesting early hip hop. Nothing blew me away

acid trip

Interesting 80s hip hop. Different I guess.

appropriation issues

intriguing just not really for me

Strange mix of Styles - hey, let us try out this!?

The album of all time

A better promoter than a musician. Those who can do…and those who can’t promote.

Not much here for me at base, then I find out the guy stole most of the album from other artists. I guess +1 for helping to bring hip hop/world music to GB but otherwise, fuck this guy and his record.

Oh nice, this instrumental opener is beautiful. Cool glimpse into what the album is perhaps? Oh a radio show? Okay, I like these guys, and....wait what? What the fuck is this? Weird, a song that sounds like what they play during the dance week of gym class. Oh god there's more? What the fuck is this album? And now it's a spanish varient?!?! What is going on here? This album is just so goddamn weird. Malcolm McLaren was just a manager too, I know his ass did not play on this at all. He once got kicked out of the studio after attempting to sing. I just, I really do not get this at all. Probably the most dated sounding album of all time. World Famous Supreme Team is pretty cool though

Most random album ever made. I can't understand this album, it is so weird.

Two Buffalo girls go around the outside.

This sounds like something my kid could have made on Incredibox, particularly Buffalo Girls.

This shit was lame in the 80’s-ist way possible. Something about it just feels off too. Like it was cobbled together from bits and pieces of songs that were left sitting around a random studio’s cutting room floor.

Really felt like this album was all over the place and incoherent. None of it was bad per se but there was very few standouts for me.

Horrible noise

This album feels like flipping through five radio stations at once and never landing on one long enough to enjoy it. It’s trying real hard to be global and edgy, but ends up sounding like an art student who just discovered world music and a sampler in the same week. There’s no flow, no consistency, just chaos in a bucket hat. I get the ambition, I guess, but ambition alone doesn’t make a good listen. Spins: 1 Playlist Additions: - Obatala

Interesting, happy to have listened to this. I'm not likely to listen to it again.it got worse the longer I listened.

the actual music is interesting but the person taking credit for it has no right to be doing so. you realize it's truly dire once you check out the "influences" (here: the creators of the music that was blatantly stolen) like Mahlathini and the Mahotella Queens or the Boyoyo Boys (who at least received some settlement money but still no credit). "the great rock & roll swindler" is a title well earned

Fine for what it is. Not really my cup of tea other than background noise.

It was time for one of these I guess. “It introduced hip hop to England” — cool I guess something had to. Obviously, it’s not great. It’s better than a 2 hour uk electronic album. My enjoyment is still at a 2.

Didn't really love listening to this album. It had its moments, but it kinda just felt like a collection of songs that you would skip on a GTA radio. I ended up accidentally listening to some of his other music, and I actually enjoyed it a lot more than what was on this album. 2/5

Fun original hip hop album

Before reading the blurb about this album I’d no idea that it was largely responsible for introducing Hip Hop into the UK. Given my loathing of Hip Hop this did not bode well for my feelings towards it. Secondly, in my view Malcolm McLaren is a massive prick. I’m at ease saying this because John Lydon also endorses this and if he says it there is no doubt that he is one. However, I do actually own McLaren’s next album with all the Puccini stuff on it. I did like a lot of this at the time but can’t say I’ve had it out of its sleeve for over 30 years or more. But that it is not this album. Listening to this and putting to one side the Hip Hop crap I did find myself liking the African music. Must have been groundbreaking at the time as this album predates Peter Gabriel and Paul Simon getting their hands on African tunes. So for that reason I understand why it is on this list. Arriving at a final score for this album presents a bit of a dilemma. If it was an album of African music I would be scoring it 3 to 4 stars. But and this is a big but, I cannot forgive the inference that this album unleashed the horrors of hip hop onto the UK and me in particular. It might be hip hop you could play to your Granny because it goes on about fluffy ducks instead of the usual gangster violence, but I am not prepared to show any liking whatsoever to hip hop. 1.6/5 7/5/25

It didn't capture me

Maso

Meh and apparently they're thieves too?

4/10 - this was the most all over the place album I have ever heard. Every song was a different genre. Some of them were fine others were bad

How much of this album is original and how much is plagiarism is an interesting question, because it's a strange mix of World Music (mainly African, but also some Latin American) and Hip-Hop (mainly in the form of faux radio broadcasts), with the odd Hoedown thrown in for good measure. On the whole I prefer the World Music parts of this album. I'm not sure if this album would have received as much attention if it wasn't made by Malcolm McLaren.

It’s like Graceland without the wit and charm. The rampant cultural (mis)appropriation here is breathtaking, trampling over huge amounts of African and Afro-American musical styles with little seeming acknowledgement, all over-ridden by (what I’m presuming to be, but I’m struggling for confirmation) Malcolm McLaren and a horrid cod-American accent. Having said all that, it’s not as horrible as it could be - whatever else you can say about McLaren he had an incredible ear for what people wanted to hear, and this is … ok. It’s not great at all, and the largely uncredited appropriation leaves a bad taste, but I didn’t hate it completely.

Nope. Not good. Not quite a 1 star though.

Think the best part of this album was realizing this dude was the manager of the Sex Pistols and Bow Wow Wow. And now I know where Eminem got his "two trailer parks girls go round the outside" line. I also know he sampled UTFO's, Roxanne, Roxanne in the opening of El San Juanera. Btw, I love old San Juan, Puerto Rico. It sounds like he sampled a lot of some old rap some from the early 80's too. Back when rap was fun and enjoyable. Highly recommend checking out the Roxanne song by UTFO and some of the follow up Roxanne rap battle songs. Ha, the good ole days of rap music. Think I heard some old Run D.M.C. in there too. Liked Merengue. Reminded me of the Thursday night town dance party in Rincon Puerto Rico. This was ok, definitely different. A lot of interesting side notes about this album and some of his samples. Can't say I will return to this album, but there were some pretty cool moments and sounds. 2.5

confused how this is funk (but I know nothing about funk)

Didn’t hit it much of a shot, but didn’t like what I heard.

A lot of variety, some good, some bad. I generally don’t care for skits on albums and this was no exception. Such a wide range of styles and genres made this feel discordant and a bit like a compilation album.

Hip-Hop, 28eme album + World, 7eme album. J'étais prêt à mettre 1/5, je n'apprécie vraiment pas le hip-hop. En fait les morceaux sont plus world que hip-hop, donc avec du chant plutôt que du rap, voire des instrumentaux. Certains travers de ce style sont présents (répétitions, morceaux interminables), mais l'album est bien plus varié (+1). Je ne l'écouterais pas une seconde fois, mais ... je suis allé jusqu'au bout. =>2/5

"Stealing Music From Around The World - The Album" was the working title for this album but they went with Duck Rock at the last minute. Well that's what I heard. Almost all of the music here sounds well done and parts are genuinely good. Now how all this good music got on the album, who's to say? I'm sure everyone was properly credited and paid for their work. Hate McLaren or hate McLaren, this is an album that probably should be on the 1001 list in case it might spur some interest in the original artists. -1 for not having one duck on the entire album and for McLaren's legacy of screwing over the Sex Pistols and other artists.

Oh look, the guy who fleeced the Sex Pistols tried to claim he brought hip-hop to the UK. Look this isn’t as terrible as I expected but it’s also not good. Maybe it’s an inspiration, but for fuck’s sake Malcolm, you’re so white. The Avalanches did it way better and the beats actually worked.

A whole-ass culture I know nothing about. Sorta fun but what a weird clash in tones, especially that ending

A little too all over the place for me

Another sub-par effort here. Enjoyed the uncredited African music but the overall package was bleh.

some of these songs were super fun but overall I felt like i was getting whiplash from this lol

I was not feeling this. 2.5/5

A couple of songs weren’t bad.

Yeah, just didn't do it for me. The album couldn't settle on a sound, and the songs that are meant to stand out just come off as experimental noise.

Huh

This is the most exhausting album I've every heard

white british guy in the 80s does proto hip hop that’s all stolen and is only really notable for the much better music it would inspire later on

A very UK-centric pick. Maybe the album was more important in the UK and I do believe that a case can be made for Double Dutch or/and Buffalo Gals being on a list of singles to hear before you die. They were "important" enough 12" singles that I remember selling them when I worked at a record store several years after they came out, but I don't recall ever carrying or special ordering the album. I do like the cover art, though.

Never much cared for him, and this hasn't aged well.

Les petits bouts de hip-hop sont cools, mais le reste aïe aïe aïe quel enfer.

Not great

This was a poor imitation of Paul Simon's Graceland, but at least Simon gave his contributing musicians credit. One positive was that it was nice to hear the origins of The Art Of Noise. Like the cover, this was a jumbled mess.

Interesting that Eminem sampled this. But otherwise it was just meh.

Oh dear :(

Only ever heard Double-Dutch which is still a catchy tune, but not bothered with the rest of it.

I don’t know. Some of the music was good, but the man seems like a sleaze. Just go listen to the original artists.

# 400 : More style than substance, This album is just a jumbled mish-mash of musical concepts. Nothing really works and it never really comes together into anything worth listening to. I kind of liked - Duck For The Oyster

This album is insufferable for reasons Im not sure I completely understand. It feels like "world music" but done in a kind of white savior-ish way. But maybe I'm just primed to think things like this are problematic -- apparently it did bring hip-hop to new audiences in Britain, which is great

Is this a concept album?

First track was ok, the rest was annoying and obnoxious. No thanks.

A Keith Haring background with a heavily modified boombox with horns and feathers and a cheetah print handle adorns "Duck Rock." Malcolm McLaren the fashion designer and music manager who strategically aligned himself with the nascent UK punk scene, dubbing John Lydon "Johnny Rotten" and encouraging the Slits to wear nothing but mud on the cover of their Cut album. A sleazy misanthropic opportunist. Creates a sample based New Wave/hip-hop hybrid, global amalgam of spoken word Afro-pop ("Double Dutch") and Square dancing ("Buffalo Gals"). Hearing "When they do the Double Dutch, that's them dancing," and realize that Liz Phair was winkingly appropriating it for her, much better, song "Whip-Smart." The entire album is cultural appropriation by an cynical provocateur and may have influenced such post-colonial experiments by Lizzy Mercier Descloux and M.I.A. but at least those third-world rhythms felt honest and collaborative. "Punk It Up" and "Jive My Baby" sounds like the Indestructible Beat of Soweto, unsurprisingly McLaren did not credit any of the South African musicians on this record. If I hadn't grown up with the Talking Heads and Paul Simon's "Graceland" (which is not without controversy) and felt compelled to seek out original South African music, "Duck Rock" might have been a revolutionary exposure to global pop. Instead it just feels like exploitation from a misanthrope who courted controversy his entire life. "Song For Chango" in title has a smug condescension for the political conditions and revolutionary aspirations of African music. The Brit-centric slant of this list of essential records is quite obvious.

This felt a little all over the place, but I dug some of it. Soweto sounds like a Dave Matthews Band song. The biggest wtf is the last track turning into a hoe down though.

Song 1: quite weird, hippy, not bad but not something i'd listen to standalone Song 2: very hip hoppy, very good intro, producer tag/sample ive heard @ 48 seconds in ish?, too hip hoppy actually, repetitive, not for me, to many randmo sounds and record scratches song 3: funky i like it, but still bit weird for me

Yet another attempt to create a “youth culture movement” out of a much community, this time with cultural appropriation! It’s not good…

Not enjoyable but admirable for being so Americansounding for a clothing retailier off the Kings Rd./

I can see this being influential for it's time but parts sound dated to my ears. McLaren is also insufferable. 2.5

Huh. Well, that was an album. After getting an album from M.I.A. yesterday, I wasn't exactly in the mood for a British album that combines world music and hip-hop, but here we are, I guess. I mean, I didn't hate the M.I.A. album. I quite liked it actually. I just didn't want two semi-similar albums in a row, you know? However, the two album couldn't be more different in the other ways. This album's weird. Would I call it bad? Not objectively. Would I say I liked it? I don't know. The style just isn't really my thing. None of the songs really interested me that much. I guess the most interesting thing that I gained from this album was learning that the opening lines of Eminem's "Without Me" were interpolated from something. That's neat. I guess this album does have influence. However, I'm not sure all of it is for the better. The "artist" credited for this album, Malcolm McLaren, apparently did not credit many of the musicians responsible for this album's existence. That sucks. The rapping is pretty rudimentary. Overall, Duck Rock is fine. I'm not entirely opposed to this album's inclusion on the list, but I'm also not exactly a fan of it. At least it's interesting! High 2/5.

Never heared of him before. Nice change from the recent albums but overall not exactly my jam.

Feels like listening to "Radio Limbo" while waiting to be assigned a hell. You know that it could be worse, but can't help to feel relieve when the music finally stops.

Sampling in music has long been a controversial topic that many have very strong feelings towards. And often the practice can put people off to certain kinds of music entirely. I’ve always been an advocate for it, because I’ve heard more than enough music in my life, mainly in hip-hop, to know how powerful of a tool it can really be. Endtroducing is one of the most impressive records I’ve ever heard in my life. But in the wrong hands, it is very easy to mess up sampling. It’s not as simple as just ripping large pieces of music from other people and putting them over a different beat or instrumental. It’s more about your interpretation of where those pieces can be split up and fit in to complete the puzzle. It doesn’t seem Malcolm McLaren understood that before creating this album. I don’t necessarily blame him, because sampling was still very new when this released. Albums like Paul’s Boutique, 3 Feet High and Rising, or The Low End Theory wouldn’t come out for quite a few years, and I consider these the most important records in terms of the evolution of sampling. Malcolm himself is a pretty interesting character. Not only was he a fashion designer, but he was also a music manager. Specifically for punk bands, including the Sex Pistols. So to the dismay of many, including myself, he is partially responsible for punk’s presence in the mainstream, even if you don’t like that band. But this also makes it even weirder that he would create an album like this. And the only thing I can think is that all of this feels very disingenuous. If this was the only evidence that ever existed to support sampling in music, there would be basically no argument. Because this is not good. There are times where this doesn’t even feel like music. These pieces are so beyond disjointed that I can’t imagine what you could ever do to make them sound good together. At one moment you’re getting Latin music, then hip-hop, then new wave, and then West African music in the next. It’s just confusing, and not even remotely enjoyable. I think I have to score this as such just out of principle. I don’t really care how influential this was to bringing hip-hop to the mainstream in the UK. No one else should ever have to experience something as jarring and odd as this. Rating: 3/10

The fake radio show bit is incredibly annoying. The hip hop is so dated it's hard to take seriously - like the wholesome interstitial music of a nineties educational children's show. I don't understand why the last track was suddenly a hoe-down.

What a hot jumbled mess

*uck Duck Rock. Ok, only the second and last songs deserve that response. It's not all intolerable. But it is all confusing. When the British producer who was influential in shaping early punk rock made a solo album, this is what came out? An early hip-hop/world music hybrid? Another point in favor of “Duck Rock” comes from my esteemed group member pretentious-ass, who remembered what I had blocked out - that “Duck Rock” is at least far better than “Duck Stab.”

There are moments that are good. But this may be the least cohesive album I have ever heard?

I don’t get the whole radio show interspersed with African beats motif. I also don’t think the music was terribly entertaining.

An impressively eclectic and creative mix of tunes. I didn't find it super enjoyable, but I appreciate it.

I actually do like the World Fusion aspect of this, it makes for some interesting listening. The radio-show framing device for it got old fast though.

..

Pretty interesting tbf. Not what I was expecting.

Beautiful 2st track, glimpses of quality. Too many skits.

I get the importance, but screw this dude for taking all the credit.

I have no clue what this is, it was all over the place. Crazy party hip-hop. I only liked one song. Stand-out: Punk It Up

The first song I was just waiting for something to happen. It never did, not for the whole album. The second seemed like it had promise, but it all promises of something exciting for the whole song without ever actually getting to the excitement. I knew what I was in for by the third. Boring, nothing new. I was also getting annoyed by how he kept calling women females. Not a phan. Great production, though. 2/5

Thoughts before listening: Is this the Sex Pistols manager guy? I guess he put out hir own music in the 80s? Anyway I've never heard of this, but I'm going to guess its some sort of over the top new wave. Review: So I guess this is like a hip hop/world music hybrid. I recognize "Buffalo Girls" which I am adding to my playlist. This album is all over the place and I'm not really sure if Malcolm McLaren is actually involved in the music here...maybe he is essentially a curator? There are some good tracks, but overall this is pretty uneven. 2-stars

I’ve had a distaste for McLaren for so long I forgot why. Seems like maybe he’s surrounded by controversy, like stealing the limelight by being around much more talented people than himself? This album doesn’t convince me otherwise.

I am not a fan but it was certainly something different.

OK.

2-3

Why does this album have radio announcer excerpts throughout. Fuck I hate skits. All it does is detract from the flow of the rest of the album. Favourite songs: Double Dutch, Buffalo Gals, Merengue, World Famous Least favourite songs: El San Juanera (fuck skits), Obatala 2/5

If I were an old school DJ i'd definitely used this record. Too scattered to be a really good listening experience, but some of these guitar licks would still sound good on a Vampire Weekend record in 2024.

weird I must've zoned out because of the nice first song because the first sentence I actually heard was about high school girls

Local man gets keyboard. No one stopped him, why?

ew. this guy really just plagiarized a bunch of south African music. bro you could've just sampled it wtf. no royalties or credit given to the original musicians too. knowing the context behind this album is making it hard for me to enjoy. Ignoring it the music is alright i guess. (source: https://www.timeslive.co.za/sunday-times/lifestyle/2021-03-28-criminal-record-how-malcolm-mcclaren-ripped-off-sa-musicians/ )

I haven't really listened to anything like this album before but that doesn't make it worth listening to. Anything interesting the album presents is overshadowed by its unevenness and inability to not be all over the damn place.

Pretty sauceless.

Nope Started off fine with 1st song... than crashed.

I had no idea what was going on, I felt like I dropped acid

The concept of hip hop mixed with world is very interesting, too bad the execution is lacking

I understand this is experimental, but there is next to no cohesion across this album. It just feels like a lot of shit thrown at a wall and only a minuscule amount sticks.

\"When you talk like an asshole and look like an asshole, you're an asshole\" -John Lydon on Malcom McClaren

Weirdly brilliant in places, very cringe in others. But it's undone by the way this is a rich white English bloke adopting hip-hop, rapping, and scratching, which feels cynical and disingenuous.

Bland

He seems to be at his best when appropriating (stealing) from other cultures. Pretty sad really. A couple of the tracks were pretty cool, but I'd rather listen to the originals than a copy. The rest seemed to be crappy square dances (the final track in particular seemed to be aimed at toddlers, with cartoon sound effects and voices for good measure). Most of the creativity was stolen.

Not really my type. Some songs are a bit annoying, but some songs are quite interesting. I liked "Song For Chango".

Okay

he's no jah wobble

That last song. Wow

The worst part of this album is Malcolm McLaren.

1.75. Interesting hearing the early rap but the rest is just strange.

I didn't know what was going on at any point during my listen of this one. Confused.

Just a weird mix of music that doesn’t really make sense. Can’t see how this was a hit.

Very occasional moment of quality but overall should stick to management and being dead

Well, now I know where the opening of "Without Me" by Eminem came from. This brings forth the question of whether an artist who is influential in bringing a genre more to the public light, but the album isn't that great, needs to be heard. Duck Rock brought Caribbean music to a wider audience, yet I don't think I would listen to this album if I wanted to hear that sound. Buffalo Girls, Double Dutch aren't bad songs but I felt like I was listening to the theme from an 80's kid show at times. Perhaps I have failed to sufficiently embrace the craziness.

Ei kosketa ja tämä kokonaisuus tuntuu väkisin kasatulta eri palapelien paloilta jotka ei oikein sovi yhteen. Kuunteli kertaalleen läpi ja se riitti.

Tästä ei saanu otetta erkkikään. Mieleen jäi kohta, jota Eminem käyttänyt samplena ja levyn viimeinen loppuläppälaulu

Not sure if this is even an album, felt like it was just radio play

I loved the first track, so got excited for the rest, but the rest was just so-so. Knew Malcolm as a manager of The Sex Pistols but had no idea he was a fairly prolific musician as well. The cowriter on most of the tracks, Trevor Horn, was familiar to me as a producer as well as a short lived vocalist for Yes. 2.5 rounded down.

It’s not some great classic, and I’m not likely to listen to it again, but I do appreciate that it’s on the list. And I guess it was probably a bit ahead of its time? Or that’s just being generous and we’ll never know? Definitely British!

did not liked it not in the mood maybe.. 80s rap/hip hop, with world music (afican percission etc). not timelles IMHO.

Not for me

other than some popular samples, complete uhh? NNN

Some parts feeling more like Samba music some like HipHop I just didn't get into it.

- w t f ? -

As a fan of hip hop and sample culture, it might sound a bit rich to criticise this sample heavy record which has some engaging tunes and fun ideas. But there’s a difference between sampling and appropriating and McLaren fails to acknowledge the contribution of the originators and tries to pass this off as his. Plus his dubious character takes the shine off this, which is a shame because it brought hip hop and world music to a wider audience. It’s just the price isn’t worth the admission.

Quirky is the best way to describe this album. Still kinda fun. 2.5

Not really a fan of this. African, hip hop, Caribbean montage crazy ass mix.

Nice to hear two Eminem hooks. Otherwise, this was a bit of a slog.

Lots of international sounds. Lots of blending of genres. Hoky at times, especially the ending. Nothing special.

Ehhhh

The instrumental intro was cool, the rest of the album was silly.

An eclectic mix of music genres for sure. I think Malcolm was having fun creating blends. Not for me.

Mal ganz nett. Teilweise bekannte Samples. Aber krasse Wechsel.

May 11, 2024 HL: “Double Dutch”, “Merengue”, “Punk it Up” If I, a white man, made an album of traditionally black music, and it still sounded too white, can I copy/paste black American radio hosts between the songs to give myself further cred? No, now that I say it out loud, it sounds like a really stupid idea. “Buffalo Gals” deserves credit for being turned into better songs by Neneh Cherry & Eminem. 2.5

Groovy, but this album has no idea what genre it wants to be. The hip-hop tracks were good, but unimaginative for a time when hip-hop was the wild west. It's also jarring going from hip-hop to latin music so quickly and without any transition.

oh you want me to review this album? this one? this one specifically? you pulled this one for me? you generated this specific album particularly for little ol judy? out of all the albums that there are and that you listen to on the thing, you want me to listen and then review and rate this one in particular? well its ok i guess

First song good then he reverted to RAP crap.

SO confused. This is where some of our music as kids come from? More so after listening and reading about it. It felt fake to play double Dutch In white Perth but now, I question everything. Its alike a musical lies or a grotest charade where you find out years later all this stuff is just stolen from other cultures and sold to you as original. WHo the F is Malcolm McLaren (not a good stage name) and Duck Rock (typo?) and why does it sound So Familiar? Track 1 is Gamelan/PiPhat Thai beats. Im in a touristy restaurant. btu then - wait forit Track2 beatboxing? was sampled to hell by everyone from Max Headroom or George Michael for 'get funky' - and so EMINEM was really *really* taking the music history piss . rack 3 Double Dutch - 1983, (Perth WA) that meant was skip rope craze. Catchy to watch but thin poly rope stings... and ... boys cant jump! We had no idea how urben/getto/NYC music got as far as us. This is a bizaar to hear now. Then stealing music from the townships of South Africa and claiming it as yours? Bemused and annoyed and its a musical word salad.

Hmm, this is a tricky one. Was this a prescient postmodern collage of world music, hip-hop, and sampling? Well, yes. Was it also a case of egregious cultural appropriation and exploitation of musicians by a talentless grifter? Absolutely also true. Malcolm McLaren had eclectic taste and the ability to spot interesting cultural movements at an early stage, which, here, gave him a first-mover advantage. Malcolm McLaren did not invent hip hop or world music or postmodernism, but he was the first to package them and bring them to market. This was particularly influential in exposing Great Britain to hip hop culture. He was also smart enough to identify collaborators (musical and visual) to realize and execute his wild ADHD-inflected ideas; Trevor Horn, Anne Dudley and the Art of Noise crew, Thomas Dolby, Keith Haring, Viviene Westwood, the Mahotella Queens, the Boyoyo Boys, and a host of other uncredited musicians and collaborators who did the actual work. In a few cases, their work was just stolen and included pretty much intact (sometimes with some additional vocal stylings from the tone-deaf and arrhythmic Malcolm). Malcom has good taste, but he wasn't shy about claiming credit for everything. It was Keith Haring who suggested that “perhaps it wouldn’t be a Malcolm McLaren project if it didn’t have a distinctly queasy underside”. So, what's it like to actually listen to? Well, there is some fun world music on there, but you would be better off tracking down real examples that didn't include Malcolm's annoying interjections. And the hip hop is not great, although influential and widely sampled subsequently. The singles were fun at the time, but I don't feel like they have a lot of legs. They certainly were novel at the time, but plenty of better songs have been released in that time. It is a weird and influential mix of styles and approaches, and introduced lots of ideas into the mainstream where they hadn't been heard before, but would all of these things have happened without him? Yeah, I'm pretty sure they would. And, secretly, this isn't that great to listen to.

This was over the place. Interesting that Keith Haring contributed to the album illustrations.

never heard of this. pretty good. i have questions though.

Genuine question: Is Malcolm trying to profit off of cultures he’s not part of while making mockeries of them? It doesn’t sound like he’s taking any of this seriously.

World music made by a British man in the 1980s.

I get where this could be influential, and some of it is pretty cool, but most of it is stolen, ripped off, or otherwise not made by the guy who's name is on the cover in any way, shape or form. It doesn't flow well either. Its the best 2/5 I've gotten in this project so far, but something about it is just off since it's stolen.

This feels like a soulless version of Sandinista, just a pop grab rather than an homage as the Clash did. It’s a fun collage that darkens when you hear how this was just another white dude not paying tribute.

Interesting…

Well that album was a mess. I guess I appreciate the artist approach and enjoy the variety of genres, but it really felt like an absolute disaster. The cool ideas hold it up a bit, but not too impressed. 2/5.

This album is incredibly influential, but there are some problems with the authorship and credit.

Novel. Very progressive new world music

Wederom behoorlijk vreemde tonen van tijd tot tijd

World music meets hip hop and helps introduce the UK to the genre. Put together in a way that sounds like listening to the radio with a DJ and call-ins. Interesting that there are so many different sounds/genres but apparently he seems to have ripped off original artists without crediting them. Standout is "Double Dutch" while the last track "Duck For The Oyster" is super annoying.

Two Buffalo Gals go around the outside.... is that where Eminem got that line from holy shit?? I don't have much to say about this one 🤷‍♀️

Hmmmm not sure to make of Malcolm McLaren being the "impresario" of this album. I liked a few of the tracks but didn't understand the whole endeavour – is this not just a white man appropriating black artists' work and putting his name on it?

Interesting, but felt all over the place

I understand why this is on the list, introducing the UK to hip hop, etc. but it had really worn out it's welcome by about the half way point. Double Dutch is a good song, and there are a few other interesting ideas. But overall its just bland. The interludes are annoying also. The last song should be considered a crime against humanity

Felt dated and all over the place - not sure what to make of it but I did not enjoy it.

It felt like listening to a video game car radio. Except video games give credits to the artist. Apparently this guy didn't and just straight up stole all songs and packaged them in a funky hiphop package

A poor attempt at trying jump onto the hip hop/ rap scene with some resemblance of afro instruments and sounds... bit aside from mediocre chart entries from Double Dutch and Buffalo Girl, I don't think there was ever much impact from Mr McClarens little experiment. The tracks prick memories from that time, but there's absolutely nothing on the album I would want to listen to again.

Took me about two years to finally listen to. Not worth the wait.

The song's on this record are a weird mix of genres and I love that. The interludes with the radio show are lame, and I can't shake the feeling they were then as well. I remember rolling my eyes in the early 90's at those types of skits. This came a little earlier, but in any case, they were a low point.

He was an odious sneering prick back when I was reading smash hits. Never listened to anything he did that wasn't forced on me by the radio. The hip hop here is cool, but it isn't McLaren's doing

Not crediting the people who actually made most of the music on the album is a scummy move, and drags it down. There are some cool beats and interesting bits, as well as parts that drag a bit and the interludes could have been better instead of just making it messy. It felt like a concept album without a concept...or maybe exploitation was the concept? Mahlathini and the Mahotella Queens and the other uncredited musicians get a 4 on this album, Malcolm McLaren gets a 1, so I'm left at a 2.5 and rounding down. Highlights: Obatala, Buffalo Girls, Double Dutch, Soweto

Well, that was interesting… I spent a good bit of time giggling about what you would be thinking listening through that album… Did you get through all of it? You skip through some songs after the first 45 seconds? That one might be interesting from a historical perspective in someway, but I don’t really get it…

I liked the first song. it gave me high hopes for something to add to my instrumental playlist, but the rest of the album was a bit of a slog to get through.

Best Song: Punk It Up. The strength of this song lies entirely in the female vocals, so it begs the question how much this can be considered one of Malcolm's successes. Worst Song: Legba. When I was a kid, we had a shitty electronic keyboard. I would put the keyboard on my bed, put on whatever atrocious backing rhythm tracks came preloaded on the thing, and play random notes over top while fiddling with different audio settings. This feels like it came from my "space" era. Overall: I didn't like it. Scattered ideas, no clear delineation between skits, radio DJs, and music. And the worst part is: I bet this inspired a lot of terrible music that came later. This gave us the Beastie Boys, didn't it?

Not bad but stinks of cultural appropriation.

Started off fun in a corny off beat kinda way. Then never evolved

Who are the artists singing on these tracks? Couldn't know from the song credits. 2 for white nonsense.

If the people who wrote the music and performed the music were given credit for it, I would rate this album much higher. I'm getting tired of all of these British records stealing music from people of color.

Ach, das fängt ja schön an. Angenehm zu hören.

wild and weird, but kinda cool

What a boring album, you can hear the lack of passion echoing around it.

2.5 probs

I vaguely remember buffalo gal from way back, wasn't taken with it then and not enthused by this album now. Not for me

Strange album. Felt more like a bunch of indivual experiments that got combined into one album. None of the songs jumped out to me as something I need to come back to.

Yeah, Duck Rock wasn't the easiest album for me to enjoy. It had quite a lot of interesting ideas with all of its influences from multiple countries (Not Britain surprisingly even though the artist is from there) However, with so many of these influences, they made the album feel incredibly directionless. I was hoping for a better album since all of the ideas were quite cool but that unfortunately refused to happen. Best Song: World's Famous Worst Song: Duck For The Oyster

Lost a star cause of the final track. Wtf was that?!

This was weird, but a bit cool, I guess

Sounds like someone mixed a bunch sounds together...not my favorite album

Very weird album. From the manager of the sex pistols this is the last thing I expected. It seems to be an almost random combination of different genres and instruments, and it just doesn’t do anything for me, not awful but certainly not good. 2/5

I can't help but contrast this to Paul Simon's Graceland, that was given to me two days ago. While Graceland seems like a genuine effort of collaboration between western and South African musicians, this feels much more... exploitative. Given the nature of Malcolm McLaren and the legal issues levied at him by the musicians on this record, it looks like my gut feeling is justified. It is an interesting blend at least, and the music really does try to shine, but the end product is unfortunately tarnished.

Never heard of these. I have no idea what this is trying to do. Afrobeat, 80s hip hop, rock all over the place

I liked the radio programme concept but a) why is this so childish? b) not sure why it's classified as hip hop? c) it was nice to hear African musical styles, but on further research it just appears to be a white British guy?

Can see why this would have been an important album for British Hip Hop, but don’t think it makes for an enjoyable listen, all a bit all over the place, not one I’ll rush back too.

Sorry dude. You tried, sampled world music and that may have been am eye-opening experience in Britian. But full, better versions of all of these styles exist elsewhere. Fits with McLaren's aesthetician, doesn't work for me.

Lame. Actually, I kind of liked the first song Obatala for its worldly beats (ditto some of the other songs when they went that way - Soweto). But I found the hip hop (if that's what we're calling it) boring and/or tiring in all of its repetitiveness. I especially disliked all the radio DJ snippets that acted as interludes. If McLaren was the first to pioneer hip hop interludes - thanks for nothing. At least now I know where Eminem's "two trailer park girls go round the outside" comes from (Buffalo Gals). Also, 80's hip hop is kind of trash in my opinion - same weak ass rapping style. And there it was on World's Famous. Barf. The wikipedia description made it sound like this album was going to be super cool. I was disappointed. Maybe it's worth a 3 but I can't stop focusing on the negatives.

Meh. 2.5

4/10

Another Brit getting more respect because of this list than American hip hop artists. At this points it’s almost comical to have this album of doing, radio call ins, and improv on this list over things such as madvillainy, Eminem, Kendrick Lamar, members of the wu tang, Jay-z. Having just one of their albums doesn’t encapsulate the changes and styles they’ve brought to modern hip hop. And having this album on here doesn’t do much either. Brit’s are not known for rapping. It’s okay to say other countries are good at something else. 4.2/10

Buffalo galissa on sampleja, jotka oon kuullut... jossain?? Onko ne ekaa kertaa siinä? Se jäi askarruttamaan. Muuten hyvin helposti pureksittavaksi tehtyjä etnojuttuja. Kohdeyleisön kuulee liian selvästi.

Malcolm McLaren? The Sex Pistols guy? Yes, that guy. This album is quite the amalgamation of sounds and styles but like, he’s not that good at any of them. If ELO (my Lodestar of Shit) suffers from a well-polished sameness, this album suffers from whatever the opposite of that is. Bonus star for trying something new I guess.

Hmm not sure about this one. It's weird but I'm not sure in a good way? It just seems like a smorgasbord of random influences without its own voice. It's not bad or anything, I'm just not really getting the point of it.

odd duck

c'est le rock n roll des gallinacées .

Weird but not in a good way. Not aggressively bad though.

Buffalo girls goes silly. The rest is silly

malcolm mclaren is a poseur

This shit was ass, but it was not the absolute worst thing I’ve ever heard. I didn’t enjoy any song on the album, but the closest that I came was on World’s Famous. I will never listen to this again.

There are some sick asf beats in here ngl but its brought down by a lot of weird additions and apparently those are the only things this guy added sooo

This was a weird listen. It’s a solid curation of African or Afro-inspired music with some hip hop radio interludes mixed in, and there’s not much else to it. After the first couple songs, I was left wondering how this was McLaren’s album and not a playlist or a DJ set. I did a little googling and found out that McLaren actually just threw all these samples together, slapped his vocals on top, and didn’t credit anyone. I don’t have much experience with the African genres presented here, and I’m hoping to with this 1001 albums project, but if that “Merengue” track is anything to go by, this album is disrespectful. Holy hell. The merengue sample in that song is washed out with reverb, the instrumentals are mixed and panned weirdly, and occasionally there’s some creepy synth strings added to it. And his vocals. Oh lord. They’re disgusting. The lyrics are cheesy at best, but his melodramatic gringo Spanish delivery just makes it outright gross. So I’ll go out on a limb here and assume that this treatment is consistent across all the Afro genres presented here, especially considering how his “rapping” on “Buffalo Gals” also kinda unnerved me. It’s a shame considering how apparently this album is what introduced a lot of Westerners to these genres. Trust me, it’s not this bad. I wish I knew what the original songs were though. They sound very nice. Fav tracks: The sampled songs in Buffalo Gals, Punk It Up, and Song for Chango

No me ha interesado esta mezcla de Paul Simon con Hip Hop o lo que sea. No digo que sea malo, pero no me parece honrado. Prescindible.

I'm not even sure how to rate this... feels like it's all over the place. The word that comes to mind is amusing. I don't love it, I don't hate it, I think I'm just sort of puzzled by it.

Two things stand for this album by this relatively accidental artist: 1. Buffalo Girls 2. Double Dutch Other than that, the music did sound fresh at the time. I do, however, hate all the talk show like tracks; I don't know who was the one that started with this habit, but it's annoying.

Wow, so this is where Eminem got the line "Two ____ girls go round the outside" The songs are a lot worse than that, but I can see the appeal I guess. This is like super early hip hop, and not in a good way. I can tell that this was super experimental for 1983, especially from someone who was apparently from the UK. This is kind of a 2 pack of ass. There are parts of songs that have good sections, but most of these songs are super disjointed and not in a good way. I really can't get into this. A high 2/5

👾

Almost everything on the album is comprised of kind of Afro-Caribbean sounds and influences that were clearly not created by McLaren. 40 years after its release, it just sounds like some massive cultural appropriation. I'm sure in 1983 it was revolutionary, but in historically British fashion, he stole a lot of shit from indigenous people elsewhere in the world and tried to make it his own. Musical colonization, that's what this is. Setting aside the fact that the music was clearly stolen from someone else's work, Double Dutch is a song that no white man should ever have sung. I don't care if it was the 80s, was this dude seriously calling people \"ebonettes\" while highlighting how different Black girls in NYC are from other girls jumping rope around the world? Racism at its finest, folks.

Interesting sounds. some latin sounds that are kind of cool. over all not my style. not sure whats up with the call-ins. very diverse styles in this album. some good, some not so good others in the middle.

Ni Pies ni cabeza con el estilo.

Not my genre, but good!

Hip hop

I wanted to hate this album as I really don't particularly like McLaren as a human, but to be honest, some of this stuff is great. Obatala is an outstanding opener, Buffalo Girls and Double Dutch very good. I'm probably going to regret this, but I'm going to go a very very low 4 on this.

Wacky

It's kind of fun, though I have this constant sense of "what is going on?" It comes off more like a mix tape than a singular album, perhaps due to McLaren's role as more of a curator and from what I read, very limited musical ability. There's nothing inherently bad about what's going on here sonically but it does not get me very excited.

The Sex Pistol’s former manager goes way the fuck out there-and while the results may not always be listenable, they’re never boring. Yeehaw.

Not my sound.