Friday 24 February 2017

Oliver!: Yami Bolo - It's Not Surprising (8 March 1992)



Video courtesy of GuyFromTheSouth1976 and it replaces the original video which was taken down. This clip also includes the instumental dub version.

Sometime in the late 90s, an electro record, whose name escapes me, was released which opened with the second most irritating sample I've ever heard.  Over a Safehouse-like atmospheric synth opening, a voice  sang the nonsense phrase, "Cha-de-ding-cha-da-ding-cha-de-dingdawyu", very quickly and repeatedly.  I can't elaborate on why I found this phrase so irritating - there was a sense of po-faced seriousness about it (or maybe that was just me that was being po-faced), as if the track was trying to say, "Listen!  Feel the seriousness of these African(?) words and the weight they give to this tune.  Feel the quality, won't you?" and I'd invariably go, "No thanks" and turn the radio off, reflecting that the only sample in a record that more irritating was the "ging ging" woman on Remember Me by Blue Boy.  No wonder he walked out on her and the kids...
So having established this piece of aural prejudice, you can imagine my surprise sometime in late 2016 when I listened to Peel's 8/3/92 show, and concentrated on the ironing while Yami Bolo droned on with his dancehall update of Within You Without You - plenty of talk about gaining the world and losing your soul, though it pushes this further by talking about how ambition can be a killer, as the bus robber found out.  Some interesting concepts but I was decidedly neutral about it until at 2:50, Yami starts singing the hated phrase and I discover that it stands for "Dynamic-dynamic-dynamic-boy". Heard in context though, it pushed It's Not Surprising over the line and guaranteed its inclusion.    It's plausible that as the years go on, Peel will shed similar light and rehabilitation on the "ging ging" woman.  And if you know which track featured the "Dynamic-dynamic-dynamic-boy" sample as its opening, please leave a comment.  I'm happy to go back for a re-evaluation, if I know what it's called.

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