Arabesque

Given the mounds of good press heaped upon his 2005 debut offering, Frenzy Of The Renown, now would seem as good a time as any for Toronto MC Arabesque to stoke those initial embers until his next hot full-length is ready for release. Hang You Heroes is ’Besque’s latest tease, a 17-cut EP that could have been a pretty decent full-length with just a little fine-tuning to its more striking ideas and the complete removal of a few pointless missteps. Things start off strong with the rambunctious "Marlboro Man,” a clever, tongue-in-cheek crack on the cowboy-headed nations running roughshod through the Arab world, while the spacious keyboard soul of "Politics Of The Blaow” and the dance floor beckoning house rhythms of "Nature’s Phone” offer two other stand-up sound beds for ’Besque’s investigative insights. Things slip up a bit on "In a Bottle,” a take on the Gil Scott Heron classic that suffers from a noticeably out-of-step beat, sampling so much of the original that the track simply falls apart by comparison. Drop that cut and the entirely pointless inclusion of Rah Digga as the disc’s "host” and you’re left with a pretty solid appetiser to warm the table until Arabesque’s inevitable next main course.