Shaun J. Wright and Alinka: Face The Truth

Shaun J. Wright and Alinka – together – have been the best story going in Chicago. They’re two artists that have escaped this city’s tiresome gravity and hit new heights, here and – increasingly – abroad.

Showing up on Damian Lazarus’ Crosstown Rebels, Face The Truth represents a new plateau for Shaun & Alinka – it’s their best record yet. “My Heart Is Sincere” is a stripped down raw’az’hell Chicago beatdown, featuring deep, emotional vocals and a ferocious assault of percussion and fat, fat bass. “Pleasure” operates in a similar vein, and it’s easy to see the widespread appeal of two tracks that appear primed and engineered to cause an emotional response in any audience appreciative of any variety of 4/4 House Music. “Face The Truth” is like… say you took some kids that were brought up on Dirtybird or whatever toddlerwear that Mixmag insists you like. Then you kidnapped them, scared them a bit and then locked them in a boiler room (an actual boiler room) with nothing but rusty pipe water, a box of Saltines and a crate of Spencer Kincy and Romanthony records. In six months, if you unlocked the door and brought them back to the level where they could coherently express themselves without drooling… this is what they’d play.

This isn’t the kind of EP that someone makes by accident or by plan: it’s the logical end of several years of doin’ work. All the stars are aligned and, well, here we are. And we couldn’t be more proud of ’em.

Out: April from Juno.