Monday, July 24, 2006

Das EFX - "They Want EFX"

I don't think it would be hyperbolic to say (and boys you can disagree with me if you like) that this song had a profound direct effect on hip-hop lyrical styles for about 2-3 years.

The lyrics themselves are essentially meaningless, a hodgepodge of various nursery rhymes, cartoon characters and children's games. But they are constructed in such a skillful way that it all makes a strange sort of logical sense. Hard to understand? Yes, but after repeated listenings I find myself still catching references I didn't catch the first time.

Also it has an awesome KRS-ONE vocal sample ("They want effects...") and the amazing "[Crack] Snap a neck for some live effects" sample from Erick Sermon.

But the way Das actually changed hip-hop was by popularizing the "diggidy-diggidy" style of rapping, where you could simply add a few syllables to a line by siggidy-saying whatever you wiggidy-want. Now, Das was very skillful, and this song was essentially the first of its kind, given that it was nonsense, but conceptual nonsense; there is a definite theme. And Das was smart by not overusing the "diggidy" style. Did they use it a lot? Well yes, but they rarely seemed too gratuitous. But after this song came out, everyone from Kris Kross to Ice Cube was adding a diggidy to their lyrics. It became annoying after a while, but for a brief period it was actually a lot of fun.



Well Ill be darned, shiver me timbers, yo head for the hills
I picked a weeping willow, and a daffodil
So back up bucko or Ill pulverize McGruff
Cause this little piggy gets busy and stuff
Arrivederci, heavens to mercy, honky tonk I get swift
I caught a Snuffleufapus and smoked a boogaloo spliff
I got the nooks, the crannies, the nitty gritty fodey-doe
All aboard, cast away, hey wheres my boogaloo?
Ooooh Im steaming, a-go-ny
Why's everybody always picking on me?
They call me puddin tane, and raps my game
You ask me again and Ill t-tell you the same
cause Im the vulgar vegemintarian, so stick em up freeze
So no pork sausages, mom, please
A-blitz shoots the breeze, Twiddly-Dee shoots his lip
Crazy Drayzy shot the sheriff, yup and I shot the gift
And thats pret-ty sneak-y, sis oh yep
I got my socks off, my rocks off, my Nestle's cup of cocoa
Holly Hobby tried to slob me, tried to rob me silly stunt
Diggedy-dun dun dun dun dun, dun dun

1 comment:

'Don' Cialini said...

I was down with the EFX when they first dropped although I only really liked the first 3 songs off their premier album. Yeah their style is kinda hokey. Yeah it gets old. Yeah it spawned a lot of crap rappers but it was still alright back in the day. And I still get down with Backspin 43 will drop one of their songs. I have no problem giving a group or rapper props for being fresh and creative. When these guys dropped they were def. original and they didn't completely suck. That was good enough in my book.