Silvertooth’s cover of Gil Scott-Heron & Brian Jackson’s Shut Um Down is set to be a dance floor smash. Readied for a summer release I reckon it’ll be getting spins all year round. The song’s lifted from the album, 1980, and was written by Scott-Heron in the wake of the partial meltdown of Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania. The original is a brass-blasted funk protest song. 

Reimagined and repurposed by Silvertooth it becomes a pumped up anti-corporate, anti-The Man anthem. Concerned with the climate, concerned with our planet – fuck the greedy frackers! – it’s a righteous piece of pounding, pitched down acid house. Complete with fat, flatulent TB-303 flexing. Premiered by Sean Johnston at A Love From Outer Space back in February, Sean says it’s one of his biggest hits of 2024 so far. Sliced by sharp, metal shards of guitar, while its piano plays on Balearic classics, such as Jesus On The Payroll, it’s the vocals that really make the track. The gospel girls in the background, and the brilliant, big, soulful lead. It’s like TV On The Radio meeting Come Together-era Primal Scream. The package includes two extended dubs. One from “Outer” the other from “Deeper” space. The former rides tumbling tom toms, that rumble like Kate Bush’s Running Up That Hill  burundi, rattling timbales and filtered electro percussion, a la Kraftwerk via Special Request. It has a huge acapella breakdown, and by that point I, personally, had time travelled 30 odd years and was back banging a tambourine at the Soho Theatre Club, in the middle of the mad, “up for it” crowd at Flying. The latter loses the vocal and drops more acid. 

A set of remixes will soon follow. Chewy Rubs builds a 4 / 4-ed house version, full of flying cymbals and rolling keys. Sentre’s shake is dynamic and dramatic and fractures and stutters the backing singers over percussive programmed percolations. The guitars and rat-tat-tat fills like guns in a fight returning fire. Pop Up 2 Get Down though, for me, produce the winner. Turning in a terrific take that transforms the electronic monster into an organic rare groove. They ditch the machines and seem to have a “proper” band playing. Beatnik bongos, congas, and congregation hand claps. Wicked rhythm guitar, slapped bass, and opullent orchestral strings. Pizzicato patterns from these replacing the OG’s frantic fractal frequencies. Creating an epic, emotional 8 minutes. It may lack the immediacy of its bionic brothers but for my money this is the one with longevity. Packing less of a punch, perhaps, but nodding back to Brian and Gil, and taking time with its message, as opposed to a colossal clubland call to arms. 

https://youtube.com/watch?v=eXz8B0fsAQY%3Fsi%3DAs5ZeZCJgohjSRBb

The Silvertooth mixes of Shut Um Down are out on August 26th. The remixes are due September 9th. Juno have more details.