Del The Funky Homosapien & Amp Live - Gate 13 [CD]

2018 release. After working together during Amp's Radiohead remix project, Amp Live and Del the Funky Homosapien, these back-when friends from Oakland, embark on 16 tracks filling an electronic melting pot, with guests including Goapele and Eligh. Their chemistry bids to elevate hip-hop through a portal to the progressive, futuristic and fun. "13 represents bad luck", Del says of the title's significance. Amp and Del have previously worked together, with the emcee featuring on Zion I's 2005 'What U Hear' from the duo's True & Livin album. Several years later, when Amp remixed Radiohead's In Rainbows, the producer recruited Del for his rewind of 'Video Tapes'. Both have long bonded over equipment, technique and advancing the sound and style of the tight-knit Bay Area music community. Surging the dancefloor's power source on the opening single 'Wheel of Fortune', Del's signature flow, that has taken him from the tongue-twists of 'Mistadobolina' to the science fact of Deltron 3030 and the sunshinein- a-bag of Gorillaz, squares up to Amp Live's full-bodied basics. "I'm trying to be more concise with my writing and my art in general," says Del, in tune to funk looking to stand for parliament. "Del has been talking about doing more straightforward, aggressive writing", confirms Amp. "Everything that I was messing with kind of had that same theme". On tracks such as 'Wheel of Fortune', 'On the Ball,' and 'Get Some of Dis', Gate 13 brings the noise to scare the mumblers away. 'Humble Pie' goes back to the future to put a bully in his place, and 'Chili Sauce' and 'Sit Ya Ass Down' take control of synth boogie getting the club and daytime airwaves buffed up. Easily commuting to a nearby parallel universe (the Deltron-centric 'The Glow' and 'Help') with star-dusted synths, disco residue, space symphonies and the odd zany skit, Gate 13 has got it locked with the master key.