Bop Alloy - “Step Into Cipher” ft. Cise Starr
~Zumi Underground
Bop Alloy is the duo of emcee, Substantial, and producer Marcus D though the duo do-oh collaborate quite a bit with other artists. In fact, just over half of this album features another artist to complement Bop Alloy’s masterful input.
“Step Into the Cipher” is definitely my favorite track under the Bop Alloy name. If you’ve ever seen Afro Samurai and have appreciated how it perfectly blends anime/feudal Japan tropes and hip hop, “Step Into the Cipher” is a lot like that for me with wonderfully geeky bars from Cise Starr like:
Lyrics hit hard like the boy in the Omen
Made you jump like my name was Shonen
If you don’t get those lyrics, don’t worry. It just means you probably have more of a life than the rest of us who do.
And as a long time fan of Substantial (starting from way back when I learned about him on a Nujabes remix of “Ain’t No Happy Endings”), this is definitely my favorite flow I’ve ever heard from him. His cadence on “Step Into the Cipher” is super smooth while keeping those geeky bars coming like:
Keep my weapons sharp and dance without a care
My arsenal is raw ‘cause I gotta be prepared
No katanas, nunchucks and such
Hand to hand combat is rough enough
All these bars are laid over Marcus D’s bombastic bouncy beat. I learned of him listening to his mellow jazz-hop beats again, from exploring more of the sub genre after listening to Nujabes, and he’s amazing at that, but he’s got a vast production range and sounds good doing any genre I’ve heard him try (check out some of his 8-bit inspired stuff and other game score samples he does in his Retro’d 2 project). As for “Step Into the Cipher”, the percussion is solid and I love the violin chords but if you’re a regular reader of RIBM you know I’m a sucker for a funky bass line and that’s exactly what we get on this track. It’s a little more subtle than some of the other tracks we’ve talked about on here so listen up for it so you can get your Pharrell stink-face on.
That’s my favorite, but the whole album is dope. Be sure to check out more Bop Alloy as well as Substantial and Marcus D’s solo works and featured artist Cise Starr on Spotify.
Follow RIBM on Twitter and Instagram to stay up to date on new music.
