What's happened to DJ Shadow? He's gone back to his roots, that's what, and he seems to have changed the whole way he approaches making music. Sure, hip hop still plays a big part, as it would do for someone who was into the style well before Public Enemy, but there's no hint of the dreaminess of Entroducing here, as the beatsmith goes for a far more direct approach.
Enuff employs Q-Tip and Lateef the Truth Speaker on vocal duties and strips the production right down - pretty much keyboard, bass and drum track throughout, with a few clever clapping syncopations driving the music on through the second verse. Melodic material is conspicuous by its absence until the chorus, with block keyboard chords doing the job the rest of the time.
The vocalists are ideal - especially Q-Tip, who proves a subtle, no-nonsense interpreter of a track that moves DJ Shadow to a slightly faster dancefloor, and presents an interesting taster ahead of third album The Outsider.
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