THE LADY TIGRA
Please Mr. BoomBox
(High Score)
Never dismiss a one-hit wonder. Tigra enjoyed Top-40 success in 1988 as half of L'Trimm, the duo who rapped "Cars With the Boom" -- a repetitive, maddeningly catchy single either monumentally annoying or charged with happy nostalgia, depending on the listener's age mostly.
The woman known to her parents as Rachel de Rougemont, calls herself The Lady Tigra now. She has returned to music with a producer/beatmaker called Mr. Sandwiches (aka Jacob Bercovici) and a debut solo record on a small independent label.
Boombox achieves a good balance between picking up where L'Trimm left off and acknowledging that the worlds of hip-hop and party music have kept moving, though not necessarily forward. "I'm Back" opens the record with enough schoolyard sass to make Fannypack -- the heiresses to the L'Trimm legacy -- step aside like the Pink Ladies when Rizzo walks in.
"Bass on the Bottom" is a fun recreation of the Miami-bass style Tigra grew up on. She also tosses off a couple electro numbers ("Swithblade Kitty" and "The Fall of Tchitchi from (So High)") and pulls off a convincing mid-1980s r&b jam ("DNA/Love to Me").
But amongst the kicky dance numbers are a couple tracks that show Tigra's been taking notes on modern music. "They Stole My Radio," her duet with the underrated pioneer of women in hip-hop, MC Lyte, has the deceptively downbeat vibe of a Gnarls Barkley number. It's the catchiest chorus on the record, but the two icons (and they are icons) aren't thinking happy thoughts about the state of radio, rap and music in general. Plus, Lyte name-checks her own brilliant single "Paper Thin" as a told-you-so reference point.
Then when The Lady Tigra shows off her fluency in French on the baroque-lifting "Cauchemars" -- all harpsichord samples and cheerleader shouts -- it's clear that Boombox came from genuine inspiration, collaboration and enthusiasm. What more could you want?
Reference materials: Want to know who helped make Fannypack and MIA possible? Her name is The Lady Tigra.
[Please note that Fannypack is essentially defunct, which their site reflects, and MIA's MySpace page could induce seizures. The Typing Monkey apologizes.]
