White Rappers from Colorado

I think my roommate hates me now. He's too passive to speak up, and I don't have earphones (they broke), so when I need to finish a paper - or just don't feel like going to sleep - he has to put up with 3OH!3's Want playing ad nauseum. I like to think that he's soothed to sleep by the fast paced electronica of Sean Foreman and Nathaniel Motte. They bring all the irreverence of white rappers with a sound that gives them the legitimacy to make a lasting impression on the music community.

It's so tempting to label 3OH!3 as hip-hop, electronica, or some combination of the two but they dont really fit the image of either. First, I suggest you listen to "Holler til You Pass Out". It's gritty, harsh, deliciousness. But you say, "Johnny! That song is all kinds of hip-hop electronica!" And I would have to agree with you politely and ask you to watch the music video. It's two white guys, nay, two scrawny white guys, playing basketball against a bunch of little kids. By turning the idea of a hip-hop artists on its head, 3OH!3 manages to take all the awkward white kid of a Computer Science dorm, an amazing amount of arrogance, and combine the two in a such a way that's not only entertaining, but kind of funny too.

It's like when you went to a highschool dance and saw the tiny little freshmen freak-dancing to "Fantasy" by Ludacris; you cant help but chuckle, and dance along. Take, for example, this gem their eigth track "Rich Man," "Drinks are on the house,/ Whiskey's on the rocks/ while your sister's on my mouth." Vulgar? Yes. But coming from two scrawny white guys that met in physics class, you can't help but chuckle.

But even then, when you have them play them off as a tongue in cheek jab at hip-hop, "Still Around" starts playing, all soft and slow-like. It leaves you with the feeling you get when, not to beat this metaphor to death, switches to a slow song, "for all the couples out there." The change of pace in the album is nice and helps to define the band as more than gimmick. "Still Around" drops the lanky white rapper image, and lets us know that this band is much much more than their poppy, tongue-in-cheek sound lets on.

They are currently touring around the states, enjoying sold out shows all along the way.

www.myspace.com/3oh3

3OH!3: Don't Trust Me
3OH!3: Rich Man
3OH!3: Still Around