K-Pop Beyond The Charts is a weekly review column highlighting Korea's modern day musical innovators who have yet to find mainstream success.
Jager, the alcohol, isn't typically associated with classy sophistication.
However, Jager, the rapper, when he teams up with his partner in crime Lucas, produces the kind of sophisticated dance music that is rare in today's lowest-common-denominator pop market.
On Jager & Lucas's latest single "Talk To You," released on Friday, the South Korean rap duo flow over a Fender Rhodes electric piano groove that reels you in and keeps you there.
Combining a jazzy chord progression with a trace of Tribe Called Quest's 1993 track "Lyrics To Go" with the dreamy production of Kendrick Lemar's dreamlike material like "These Walls" from last year's seminal "To Pimp A Butterfly," Jager & Lucas have great musical taste and it shows. There is also a clear nod to pop icons Michael Jackson and Marvin Gaye's '80s material on the K-pop group's recent offering.
These MCs don't feel the need to use bluster or production tricks on "Talk To You." The production is creative sure, but it is centered on the starkly recorded soulful vocal takes of Jager & Lucas.
Sure, they may be saying "I want to talk to you," but going by tone alone, this does not seem like a demand.
It is certainly not to imply this phrase in the way that a high school principal would say it to a troubled student. No, Jager & Lucas seem to be only expressing a deep longing for that first contact with a romantic conquest.
And isn't it always the quiet ones who would probably be the most interesting, if only someone would talk to them?
Listen to the new single "Talk To You" from South Korean hip-hop outfit Jager & Lucas RIGHT HERE
