With each passing day, Dillon Francis and his many personae, including DJ Hanzel and DJ Rich As Fuck, seem to become bigger and bigger. Dropping some of the biggest Electro and Moombahton tunes of recent times, Francis exploded onto the scene with his 2011 release on Mad Decent Records, ‘IDGAFOS‘ (standing for I Don’t Give A F**k Or S**t… Or, if you read the recent HTF interview with Mr Francis, possibly, I Don’t Give A F**k OK Sister).
Now, 2014 sees the release of his début album ‘Money Sucks, Friends Rule‘, a 12 track romp through all things Electro, with a colossal guest list including names such as Martin Garrix, DJ Snake, Major Lazer and more! However, does the album itself suck or rule? There’s only one way to find out… Let’s load it up and take a listen!
Straight off the bat, opener ‘All That‘ is a smashingly addictive piece of Moombahton, topped off with furious lyrical work from Twista and The Rejectz. It’s a fiery and potentially risky way to open an album, but it’s too good not to work. Followed up with the albums first lead single ‘Get Low‘, the Moombahton is still burning on, combined with a beautifully eastern sounding melody line. A wise choice of lead single indeed, and maybe a hint to EDM producers that a change of style is due? David Guetta take note.
Second single ‘When We We Were Young‘ comes in next and brings a surprisingly poppy element to the mix. Featuring The Chain Gang Of 1974, it’s a track that wouldn’t sound out of place on a Swedish House Mafia album. Floating synths, ‘sing-along’ lyrics with plenty of singer/songwriter cover potential and a huge dollop of top 40 dance. Yet for all it’s pop sensibility, it’s still a well produced and oddly mature sounding track.
After such a strong opening, some of the album can become a very marmite affair though switching between filthy Moombahton, ‘I Can’t Take It’, truly brain-crushing Electro, ‘Set Me Free Feat. Martin Garrix‘ and occasional glitchy moments, ‘Not Butter’, into some disappointingly generic EDM/pop-dance such as ‘Hurricane’. It’s clear to see that Francis is trying to ensure he has plenty of potential single material and enough commercial viability to sell, but the best material is still made up of the tracks where genre cliche is ditched in favour of fresher sounds.
Back to our original question on whether the album sucked or ruled… to tell the truth, it leans far more towards the latter, made up of mostly excellent tracks which have cemented Dillon Francis’ sound into the ground, leaving a huge amount of excitement for what the future holds. The occasional moments of pop-dance fodder were inevitable in making sure the album had commercial potential, but this could well be the album that shakes up EDM and brings a new game to the table.
