OthaSoul The Sickness Cover Square
Out of Camden, London comes OthaSoul, arguably the smoothest-sounding British rap collective we've heard in recent memory. Comprised of MCs Dozer Carter and Jungle VIP, alongside producer & DMobbs, the group has recently shared new single "The Sickness." Built over an incredibly simple yet effective jazz sample and perhaps the driest drums we've heard all year (respect to Dozer, who produced this number), the track is the kind of late-night jazz-hop joint that slowly drifts across the room as it plays. In the low cymbal crashes that come and go, it's easy to imagine cars driving down dark roads, streetlamps flickering up above.
In an email with Okayplayer, OthaSoul shared some extended insight on the new single:
"'The Sickness" was probably the most challenging song on the album to make. As soon as Dozer brought the beat to the table, we knew what it was about. It had to describe London in a truthful, un-candy coated way that nobody has really done before. The hook came quick and the verses came pretty instantaneously too but we really wanted to capture the bittersweet feeling we, and so many born and raised here have towards the city. We had to write and re-write it again a few times until we got it. It showed the deep love for our home town juxtaposed with the melancholy of living here. It's the truth of a place. We ended up recording it in a booth we built in Jungle's flat from two huge cardboard boxes we found outside a bike repair shop which has since become known as "the ghetto booth". Filled with soundproofing it sounded so much doper than any studio we've been in so we ended up using it for the rest of the album. More than any of the other tracks, it's a wash of feeling. It's a shower of subtleties that could only come from us both going back to back on the verses; describing the diseased city as 'The Sickness', hopefully shedding light on a truth to the city that those that visit don't get to experience. Expect to hear solutions to ‘The Sickness’ on our debut album ‘The Remedy’ coming later this summer”.
For anyone longing for the thought-provoking days of Guru's Jazzmatazz, eager to hear some great new British hip-hop, or simply in need of some dope sounds to smoke to, "The Sickness" is surely the right kind of medicine.
