You cant put her in a box...if you try she'll escape like Howard Moon

Greetings to all and sundry,

This week were going to switch the style up a little bit. I was so tempted to cover the new Taio Cruz track 'Break your heart' this week, as its been receiving massive play from Ras Kwame, Trevor Nelson and my i-pod over the last few weeks, but I decided that it was my duty, as a seeker of new music, to find something utterly different for you guys. See the sacrifices I make? I love my work, what can I say?

Well ,this week's track is from South-African-born-but-Brixton-raised Diva in the making Mpho. Pronounced 'Umm'pa' I am reliably informed by her website. So, what's all the fuss about the girl with the difficult name? Box n Locks is a simply beautiful song, lyrically, musically and with regards to what it does and says about british 'Urban music' on the whole. This is the kind of track that could as easily be played by Nelson as it could be by Zane Lowe or even Moyles,it is truely a genre spanner (as opposed to Dizzee last week, who proved for all his success that he was just a 'spanner'). From the outset we have a track in the cast of, I dont know, vocally think the sound of the ting tings but lyrically slighty deeper. We open with the infamous strings from Echo beach by Martha and the Muffins.
What?!?! You've never heard of them?!?!

Don't worry, neither had I. They were a Canadian new wave band from the eighties and produced the song Echo Beach, which to be honest, apart from the opening strings, which are hauntingly beautiful, is a rather standard song. Flash forward twenty years, and Mpho has stripped the strings, looped them and strengthened them with a catch hook and slick verses dealing her own identity as an immigrant but also a die hard Brixtonian, The fickle nature of the british music indstry and the north south divide in Britain....and this is in her first few bars.

Surprisning, her politically fuelled lyrics dont drag, she paces herself beautifully around her bassline, racing through her lyrics with a speedy swagger that usually Mariah Carey can only pull off (listen to allllllll the mumbling in 'Touch my body'). The result is upbeat, a dance track and an instant indie-dance-urban fusion. I saw one of her concerts, Lovebox, and her fanbase looked like a bag of skittles, it was beatiful I tell you; there was every colour of the rainbow. She attracted all races and ages; appealing to the Louis Vuitton dons and the acoustic set alike. When this song lifts off, she is going to be huge.

Well, to wrap things up, I would give my word that this is a song worth listening to. I was hooked in the first few seconds and it only got better, and I would wager most of you out there would be too. This imaginative, great sounding debut from the exciting young star Mpho is a tune that manages to 'please everyone', though her lyrics say otherwise. A brilliant new addition to British music. Mpho, the Beatsmith salutes you.

Beatsmith rating- 5/5


Playlist

Taio Cruz- Break your heart

Serani- No games

Livvi Frank feat Pitbull- Now Im that chick

Pitbull- Hotel Room service

Mimms- One last kiss (feat Soler mesh)

Major Lazer feat Ricky Blaze and Nina Sky- Keep it going Louder

LMFAO feat Little John- Shots