Following 2022’s Cheat Codes, comes Danger Mouses’s next collaborative effort comes with the blending of all flavours.

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< If you live by the knife, then you die by the gun … But if you live every night, then you sleep under the sun. >

Known professionally as a auteur, Danger Mouse (Brian Joseph Burton) has become an all-encompassing composer with a golden-ticket roster of old faithfuls and bonafide lyricists. Where his most memorable is arguably the controversial Beatles-sampling mastery of The Grey Album in 2004, his most treasured is old-school soul landmark of THE MOUSE & THE MASK with late MF DOOM.

The crate-digging samples wrought with lo-fidelity hip-hop jukebox sounds, split-trap beats and lucid electronics in Born Again make you realise it’s cut from the same raw cloth as 2022’s Cheat Codes, Brian’s sparkling collaboration with rapper Black Thought. Which was arguably, one album that fell under the radar amidst the panic of last years’ releases. The mass slow jam join-in of Because and lucrative Belize is met with the off-kilter conformity of All I and funky bop Locked Up. Of course, if you’re familiar with Danger Mouses’ first career chapters, Brian himself submitted beats to one of his favourite rappers, Jemini the Gifted One. That collaboration matured into 2003’s landmark Ghetto Pop Life LP, and another festering took place a year later – Born Again. But for reasons beyond anyone’s control, it was packed up and shelved – until now. 20 years in the making has brought Born Again to the limelight again with Brooklyn MC of Jemini – a verbose artist with enough gusto to upturn hurricanes. And it’s certainly been worth the wait.

The 10-track collection is a conjuring of breezy antidotes and old-school speed beats, as we’re swayed from the untempered frustrations of societal anxieties from Locked Up and Walk the Walk, life-affirming conclusions to upbeat Tyler-esque workings of glitzy synth motifs with Born Again. The jazzy stature of Brooklyn Basquait is a masterful tapestry time-looped in early ’90s hip-hop, while Where You From is a lavishing of rapping hustle, while Jemini credits his astute wordplay to his misguided father in high Dear Poppa. The project ends in a gospel wonderment of World Music – a strengthening of united music: “feel the rush, feel the ride.. of our music and how you feel inside.”

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Danger Mouse is someone who is considered to be a producing powerhouse. His contact book – hard-worn from A-Z – is an audiophile’s Christmas wish list.

An individual who has had a craving for all corners of the industry has ticked his own list this year with the long-awaited promise with one of his favourite rappers. An all-too-perfect transition from one to another, Born Again offers the same addicting acid jazz-rap grooves and injections of crate-digging samples as 2022’s Cheat Codes and amongst hip-hop revellers, it’s truly welcomed. We had Black Thought last year, now we have Jemini the Gifted One – a major climb-up on the ladder rungs. LET’S GET IT.