Fully Fitted EP

Eavvon checks in with us by letting us know all about this dancey EP.

I’ve been over what makes a good DJ track, but have you ever asked yourself what makes a good dance track? It’s a lot more than the beat, sadly (because it’s harder for me to make a great dance track to shake it to in the privacy of my own home). If you get a chance to listen to the Fully Fitted EP, which was released this summer to very little fanfare, you may realize some interesting methods displayed by DJ/ Producers XXXchange, DJClass, and Chipset & Devin.

The EP is short and opens with “Roll It,” in which DJ Class is working from a catalog of horns borrowed from Jay-Z’s “Show Me What You Got” and Spank Rock’s “Touch Me”. DJ Class spits spiritedly over the volcanic drums and plows into the walls of horns with more force then a 15 year-old at his or her first basement party. “100 Million” works with the same volatile force, draping the intro with Justice’s “Phantom” ripping open the party. The beat is constant, danceable, and its tempo has been doing bumps since sunrise, with no signs of stopping. The lyrics are not really important, but they mirror the intensity of the track, and break down into a simple sing- along chorus that we can all shout out while wiping the sweat from our various...umm…bodies.

As a pleasant change, “He Not In” moves over a less hectic beat with an almost spooky and plucking snyth. If the ghost house board from Super Mario World could be melted down and restructured, its end result would be this song. The reference from Crystal Castles’ “Crimewave” only adds to its eerie power and hypes it even more. The reference thing is in fact an interesting catch point (?), and it’s something more prevalent in dance music then anything else today. While DJ Culture has made us dependent on linking musical elements we often don’t think to combine, does dance music depend on sampling to keep pace with our tastes? Would I still like Kanye West if he didn’t use a sampler? Would we even want to live in a world without Diplo’s and Girl Talk’s? I shudder to think of it, but dance music without clever referencing is just popped up Top 40, without any of the attitude.

That said, the Fully Fitted EP, in all of its glory, does excellent things for dance music and the defined lines of how samples move. Each track works like a compressed DJ set, with hints, peaks and dramatic pulls, and would be an asset to any turntablist. It’s getting cold out kids; what better way to stay warm?