Ghetto Blaster: Street Sweeper Social Club

While slightly slow in tracking down this piece of info –blame it on the mundane atrocities faced with a 9-5- the other day I stumbled across live footage of the Street Sweeper Social Club performing their new song ‘Ghetto Blaster‘. For those of you unfamiliar with this rock-rap combo, the group is primarily made up of The Coup’s emcee Boots Riley and Rage Against the Machines’ guitar wizard Tom Morello. Releasing their self-titled debut album sometime last year, the duo linked political consciousness material with an overall playful, party vibe. Whilst awesome at times, the CD did occasionally let itself down most notably as a consequence of it’s cheesy, tacky and clearly rushed choruses. Holding the potential ammunition to construct a modern-day version of Rage, the album’s occasional soft, generic material drained the vigour from an otherwise lethal cast of modern-day quasi-revolutionists.

Given the resulting lacklustre sales and minimal media attention, it looked highly probable that the duo would eventually disband in order to focus on more pressing, profitable commitments. Thankfully while Morello seems to have at least momentarily put the Nightwatchman project on the back-burner by involving himself once again in the momentum-gaining Rage comeback project, it seems that Boots Riley meanwhile has remained on standby. With the emcee himself affirming via his recent Twitter update that “The Ghetto Blaster EP” is set to drop next month, any rumours of disbandment can at least for the moment be firmly put to bed.

Regrettably the audio quality of the aforementioned video is of a poor quality, emphasising the energy and funky riffs of Morello and the instrumental arsenal while simultaneously drowning out Riley’s voice. That said regardless of the current audio quality the overall feeling from my part is one of utmost positivity. Clinging onto the hope that the talented duo can build upon the flaws of their debut, I will attentively be keeping a close eye on developments as well as sharing with you the clip that has ultimately reinvigorated my enthusiasm toward the Street Sweeper Social Club project.