Bonafide Magazine @ MSN: Review: Doppelgangaz – Peace Kehd

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Review: Doppelgangaz – Peace Kehd Posted: 04 Mar 2014 01:02 PM PST   For those unfamiliar with them from previous releases, Doppelgangagaz are a pair of MC/producers from Orange County, New York – Matter ov Fact and EP, whose Lone Sharks album broke water last year to some critical acclaim. The album is book-ended by Peace In and Peace Out and starts promisingly enough with squealing moog set against muted piano chord reminiscent of RZA or Jonwayne but after that the production settles into an unsurprising series of vaguely late-90s sounding beats; solid, neck-snapping but rarely memorable. Shit Rock brings some of the wooziness and triplet flows we've seen on the new Mac Miller album over phased breaks and sparse crunchy drums. Nice runs of compound rhymes show EP and Matter Ov Fact flexing some definite skills and is likely the first time "armoire" has been used in a verse to rhyme with "Con-Air" and "armchair". Overall themes don't deviate much from documenting their wayward, 'live rugged' lifestyles and casual misogyny but the album works well as an introduction to an interesting pair of characters. As with all culture, context is everything. Falling somewhere between tribute and pastiche, this feels like it's arrived 15 years too late at a party that's already finished. That being said, as much as it could be criticised for being backward looking, Peace Kehd could also be a comfort blanket for boom-bap fans that never wanted rap music to go any further than whatever their particular golden age was. Words: Kieran Hadley