Berhane Snoop Lion La La La 7" Green Vinyl Limited Edition a.k.a.Snoop Dogg NEW

$

19

August 6, 2012 marked the 50th anniversary of Jamaica’s independence, and, on a related note, one of the more unexpected pieces of musical snail mail we’ve received in the past month. Few labels or artists still send out physical promos, and an even smaller percentage of those send out unsolicited vinyl. But here it was: one of 1962 (get it?) limited-edition 7-inches by none other than the newly minted Snoop Lion.

As he announced last week, the rapper-actor-filmmaker-pump-hustler-whatever formerly known as Snoop Dogg has, supposedly, turned over a new (hemp?) leaf. Claiming he’s Bob Marley reincarnated — why not aim high, right? — he’s turned to Rastafarianism and taken his new name from the lion that appears on the Imperial Ethiopian flag.

That means, of course, a new reggae album, dubbed, well, Reincarnated, is forthcoming. And why not? While Snoop Dogg remains a beloved entertainer, try to name an actual rap song hit of his from the last few years and you’ll probably come up short. So for this project, he’s tapped the coolest of the cool for production duties: Major Lazer, the only production team/fictional character to make dirty dancehall cool to awkward white people.

With that in mind, though, the track on this limited 7-inch, “La La La,” works as a surprise from both Snoop himself and Major Lazer. The track’s been floating all over the Internet, but if you haven’t heard it, don’t expect the usual Major Lazer berserk, electrified dance riddims. Instead, this goes back — way back to the days of late ’60s Jamaican rocksteady and proto-reggae, cribbing almost the entire riddim of “Artibella,” a song made most popular by Ken Boothe. (Side nerd note, Boothe recorded the song both in the early ska years and then again a few years later in the evolved style, and it’s from this later version that Snoop’s riddim is cribbed.)

Snoop’s actual singing is kind of inconsequential — as in hip-hop, a good beat/riddim can carry an entire song as long as the singer doesn’t distract from it too much. He more or less ably imitates a Jamaican accent, and mostly follows Boothe’s original vocal melody. That’s about it — there aren’t any more clues about Reincarnation because the B-side of this 7-inch is exactly the same as the A-side. Not even a vocal-less dub in the true tradition!

That said, the direction is promising. If anything, that’s because, if Major Lazer continues to dig into the crates for the rest of the album’s production, it’ll serve as a bit of Jamaican music history education for those who think millennial dancehall is reggae. (It isn’t.) Is Snoop serious? Uh, supposedly, he’s serious enough to have released this single under his Rastafarian name, Berhane — it means “Light of the World.” It’s a far cry from his old loveable-pimp-lite steez, but if Reincarnationis all an epic troll, it seems poised to at least go down melodically.

CONDITION: NEW. Not sealed.

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