Lethal Bizzle – Go Hard

Lethal Bizzle is back with a follow-up to Back To Bizznizz, but just how successful it turns it out to be is open to question. The title track reached the dizzying heights of Number 79 back in June.

That lowly chart position was something of a surprise, featuring as it did Donaeo, to whose hit Party Hard it bears a more than passing resemblance. Yet MOBO winner Bizzle has, since his debut at least, not stuck too close to grime. On his last album he duetted with Kate Nash, while this time he’s roped in Mark Ronson for some characteristic brassy horn play on Lost My Mind.

Rockstar is another track that makes the case for wider audience recognition with help from – of all people – Gallows. It’s unlikely to make him more popular with anyone who attended Download 2008, however.

Second single Going Out Tonight, Crazy Nightmare and the dancefloor filler So Addictive are the highlights. Skullz On My Hoodie is also worth a listen, if only for some intriguing synths and Bizzle claiming to be, all in one song, Barack Obama and a Power Ranger. And it’s difficult to go wrong with Salt-n-Pepa‘s Push It.

But the last three standard tracks lose the plot, and his version of House Of Pain‘s classic Jump Around should be taken outside and shot. Luckily it’s only available on the download. Throw in some dreadful slowed-down vocals that recur throughout the album, and you end up with something to file under ‘what might have been’. A look at Dizzee Rascal‘s handling of Dirtee Cash flags up how to cover a classic.

Go Hard is worth a listen, if only to laugh at all the bravado. Big up for attempting to break the world record for largest number of junk food references since the Fast Food Rockers, though.