“We’re New Here”: a post-dubstep interpretation of Gil Scott-Heron’s last masterpiece

Jamie Smith is the birth name of the British producer who’s been able to bound indie-pop and post-dubstep genres, captivating both the English scenes and meeting an amplified success in every corner of the world.

We are talking about Jamie XX, producer and percussionist of the British group XX, moniker hiding behind some unforgettable remix of Glasser, Jack Penate and Yacht. The latest Jamie XX’s venture, perhaps the most ingenious and diabolical, was to remix the last and thirteenth Gil Scott-Heron’s album: “I’m New Here”, published in 2010 by the XL Recordings. It had been 16 years since the Afro genius of spoken word did not publish new original material and it has happened just over a year before his death, which did not fail to move and impress anyone who still can not forget the lyrics of “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised. ” If, then, all the lights were already focused on waiting the return of Gil Scott-Heron, Jamie XX has shown a great deal of cleverness by taking the hype with his personal signature made of refined and irresistible beats and mash-ups. The result is “We’re New Here,” the 12 track album published by XL, which cleverly runs an endless list of subgenres and manages to bring to the collective memory the genius of Gil Scott-Heron through fluid and cinematic atmospheres. Of all the tracks of “I’m New Here”, the absence of “Me and the Devil” seems to be due to an act of reverence to the great poet that no one will be able to forget.