The Lost Archives Surfacing the reviews of our forgotten youth
    Back to The Lost Archives
    Opus 2004/The Kleptones
    The Kleptones — A Night at the Hip-Hopera cover

    The Kleptones

    A Night at the Hip-Hopera

    (2004)

    Reviewed by Jason Morehead

    DiscogsBandcamp
    Label independentOpus2004
    electronichip hoprap

    Originally published at Opus →

    First came DJ Danger Mouse and The Grey Album, which mashed together The Beatles' White Album with Jay-Z's Black Album, much to the delight of listeners and to the chagrin of record label EMI.

    And now along come The Kleptones and A Night at the Hip-Hopera, which takes all of your favorite Queen songs and mashes them together with the likes of Ol' Dirty Bastard, Eminem, Vanilla Ice (of course!), Belinda Carlisle, The Beastie Boys, Neon Genesis Evangelion, The Big Lebowski, Fight Club, and a buttload of samples concerning copyright and free communications, to name but a few. And lest you think it all sounds like a total mess, it's pretty uncanny how well much of this stuff fits together, be it "Bicycle Race" and "The Real Slim Shady" or "I Want to Break Free" and "Shake Your Rump".

    All in all, A Night at the Hip-Hopera is an amazing display of mashup skills, and works brilliantly as both a commentary on the current state of music and copyright and as a musical piece. (In other words, it's got a funky beat and I definitely can bug out to tracks like "Break" and "Listen.")

    Unfortunately, the original site's bandwidth has been overwhelmed, but several other sites have stepped in to pick up the slack (or just listen to it below). Waxy even has a comprehensive list of all of the primary sources used in the remix.

    Similar sounding releases

    1994Paul AldrichThe History Of God And Man2002Ed EnglerthLittle Bit of Me Everywhere1998DanielsonTri-Danielson!!! (Alpha)2003Flaming FireSongs From the Shining Temple1992Hokus PickPick It Up1995DC TalkJesus Freak The Single

    Also in Opus 2004

    2004Craig ArmstrongPiano Works2003FitzgeraldLight a Match and Burn It Slowly2004Starflyer 59I Am the Portuguese Blues2004Kat JonesLa Rosa, La Calavera2004Various ArtistsFeedback to the Future: A Compilation of Eleven Shoegazing Songs From 1990-19921991Stina NordenstamMemories of a Color