The Scotsman, who has carried the title of a ‘Wunderkind’ for more than 10 years now and whose actual name is Ross Birchard, is now seamlessly tying in with his debut Butter of 2009. A few signature-sounds seem to be somewhat familiar from the album, like the screaming synths-breaks and trimmed vocal-samples. Just the guest singers are missing. Hence, due to the missing vocals, the five new tracks on Satin Panthers leave lots of room for the way of production, so that it all clatters, clanks, beeps, buzzes, wonks and glitches to its utmost brilliance. Even so much that HipHop-Heavyweight Just Blaze can’t stop twittering about Hudson’s sound. About the almost literal banger Thunder Bay, he twitters that he’s jumping around his house, banging on walls and stomping – whether driven by jealously or just out of pure joy for going wild is yet to be found out. Still, the EP is not essentially new ground for Hudson Mohawke, and once again leads to the realization that artistic development doesn’t automatically need to imply change. But when someone is so far ahead of his time, and always has been, as it’s the case with the 25-year-old rapper, it’s alright to lean back and allow the competitors to catch up – and at the same time, he still defends his grounds, like with this little EP.
Satin Panthers
