![]() ![]() "I would take White Horse and Fresh Is the Word – 12in singles that were on 45rpm – and play those at 33rpm, and mix them in with regular songs at regular speed, and it blew a lot of people's minds," Scott says. There, he encountered Daryl Scott, a local DJ and record store owner who would play uptempo dance records at reduced speed to blend them more seamlessly with hip-hop and R&B's slower tempos. After a brief spell living in California, he moved to Houston's hardscrabble south side to live with his father. ![]() His life began in the appropriately sleepy rural town of Smithville, Texas (or, according to some reports, neighboring Bastrop), two hours west of Houston. He gave few interviews, and many biographical details – the source of his nickname, for instance – remain sketchy and subject to conflicting accounts. ![]() Like a G6, a No 1 song in the US by LA pop rappers Far East Movement, contains a reference to "sippin' sizzurp".ĭespite the growing interest in his music, Davis himself remains something of an enigma. Sweden's Karin Dreijer Andersson, of the Knife fame, cited chopped-and-screwed mixes as an inspiration for her recent solo project, Fever Ray. It can be heard in the R&B/hip-hop hybrids of T-Pain (see 2008's cheeky homage Chopped and Screwed) and Drake (whose Nov 18 is an update of Screw's June 27 ) and in the arty, haunted sounds of so-called "witch house" acts such as the ascendant Michigan trio Salem. It's not that everyone who listened to Screw sipped syrup."ĭavis was confined to regional success in his lifetime, but today his influence has spread more widely. "That's just the culture down here and a way of life. "The first thing think of when they hear Screw's name, or Screw music in general, is the syrup sippin'," says Cedric "ESG" Hill, a Houston rapper affiliated with the Screwed Up Click. When Screw, just 29 at the time, died on November 16, 2000, from what medical examiners said was an overdose of codeine – drank's active ingredient – that connection was forged for good. He and the Screwed Up Click (SUC), the loose-knit collective of Houston rappers who freestyled on his mixtapes, referenced the purple-hued concoction so often that their music and their drug of choice become as closely associated with one another as acid rock and LSD. Screw's emergence in his native Houston, Texas coincided with a surge there in the popularity of drank (otherwise known as "lean," "syrup" or "barre"), a mixture of prescription-strength cough syrup and soda that can create a feeling of sedated euphoria when taken in large quantities. Davis, better known as DJ Screw, wasn't the first DJ or producer to purposely pitch down music for effect, but he preserved the glacial pace throughout his 100-minute mixtapes, developing a uniquely psychedelic, ethereal sound that would come to be known as chopped and screwed, or, simply, Screw music. Using the pitch controls on his turntables, he began slowing records to preternaturally slow speeds, augmenting his mixes with smooth cuts and slurred commentary that sounded as if delivered from beyond the grave.
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