Major Lazer – Guns Don’t Kill People... Lazers do

[Inertia: 2009]
Upon first listen, Guns Don’t Kill People scared the shit out of me. It sounds as if Electro, Reggae and Dancehall got together at a rave one night and ended up going back to the future to have some kind of marijuana-fuelled three-way. As much as that concept makes me quake with fright, I have to admit that it also kind of makes me more than a little bit enlivened.
The masterminds behind Major Lazer (Diplo and Switch) decided that if they were going to create a marijuana-fuelled musical orgy where better to record it than at Tuff Gong studios in Kingston, Jamaica - home of Bob Marley’s rebel mavericks, The Wailers. Every track on the record reads like a who’s who of Jamaican vocalists – Turbulence, Ms Thing, T.O.K. and Mr Vegas, and the result is the most progressive-sounding version of dancehall available to your ears. Quite frankly, Guns Don’t Kill People has a touch of hyperactive cut-and-paste sample overload, but remember these kinds of tunes are geared toward the dance floor where it works its erratic charms to perfection.

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