live music

Live review: Dan Le Sac vs Scroobius Pip

Editor's rating

Venue: British Library, London
Gig played: 14 December 2008

A Sunday afternoon in a library isn't the most immediately obvious setting for a righteous UK hip-hop gig, but little about Pip and Sac is.

Since storming onto the scene with the genius, arch, 2006 anti-hit, 'Thou Shalt Always Kill', the pair may not have sold a great number of records but they have produced one of 2008's greatest albums, Angles.

Both the portly, mischievous Sac and lank, impressively bearded Pip are charismatic and amusing chaps who exchange witty banter with the auditorium audience and each other in between incisive, thoughtful tunes like 'A Letter From God To Man', which wears its sample of Radiohead's 'Planet Telex' lightly.

The smart lyrics, spat by Pip, are free of pretension and gel with Sac's often dark, brooding samples. During Angles' title track - a harrowing tale of teen suicide and revenge murder - the increasing fury of Pip's vocal attack mirrors the malevolence of scary waves of synths.

There are times when the seated crowd would clearly be happier moshing to the often lairy beats and post-Mike Skinner vocals, but this is the only notable problem with the show.

Quite how many of this afternoon's listeners will be encouraged to visit libraries more - the raison d'être of the Get It Loud In Libraries tour, of which this gig is part - is unclear, but it's impossible not to be cheered by a gig that begins with a drum'n'bass remix of the Antiques Roadshow theme tune and, as in 'Development', includes a rap about the periodic table.

Lou Thomas