This is one of the great contemporary London songs for me, one of the small cross-genre epics the city throws out sometimes, like “Weekender” or “Avenue” in the early 90s – not through any particular lyric but something in the unstructure of the track reminds me of the city’s maziness, the way the song seems to keep turning corners and ducking down sidestreets to reveal something else fresh. “Nu Style” is nothing but hooks, a hawkers’ suitcase full of them – I mean, I guess the “Don’t you want a taste?” bit from the guy is a… chorus of sorts? But it also feels like a rest spot on a tour.
Your guide is Shystie, whose voice is full of beckons and secrets even if her lyrics aren’t anything astonishing. But your map is Dee Kline’s wobbling little low-end riffs (prefaced in the string samples and then recurrent as proper bass) – so much so that when Shystie drops out of the song with three minutes to run you feel happy to wander around by yourself, following a will-o-wisp Spanish guitar along the walkways and alleys.
(The video, putting a rather more sinister spin on the track, is for the shorter single edit – hunt out the 7-minute full thing.)