Dizzee Rascal and Armand Van Helden: "Bonkers"

On this, his second straight UK number one single, Dizzee Rascal seems to have found a new groove that allows his style to be as universally engaging as it was back on Boy In Da Corner (2003), presenting a new direction for British superstar rap that doesn’t involve becoming a motivational poster (ahem, Mike Skinner). It’s telling that Dizzee’s debut is still, by far, his biggest hit in the States; I bought it because a pissed-off, vaguely incomprehensible British teen rapping over glitchy beats was ominous and difficult but still relatable to any kid not incomprehensible or vaguely British. But no matter how adept and “relevant” his music remained post-Da Corner, it became less convincing after acclaim and success, less compelling as both me and Dizzee exited our teens. Apparently, the same held for the rest of America.

Though Dizzee’s still caught up in the same street-life conundrums that have dominated his attention from the beginning, by getting to the essence of their attraction and refusing to let them get him down, he’s at once more profound and more listenable. Van Helden’s production is, even more than last year’s “Dance Wiv Me,” a funhouse mirror of Benassi-style Eurohouse, a bouncy excuse for a bass line that is basically two variations on itself, allowing Dizzee to repeat his concise verses without getting boring. He’s discovered “a heavy bass line is my kind of silence”—that maybe going bonkers isn’t just a better way to figure stuff out, maybe it’s the whole point to walking the line between sincerity and cinematic fantasy in the first place.