”Over 15 years neck deep in the dance as an MC, Manchester’s Strategy flips the coin this week with his debut producer EP on Exit: Lanterns.
Five tracks of heavy halftime hurt, without so much as a sniff of his distinctive forked-tongue bars, Lanterns isn’t so much of a step up but rather a whole new playing field. Stepping away from the mic mastery he’s been respected and loved for – be it his barbed social truths alongside DRS and Konny Kon as Broke N English or his devilish double time and wry camaraderie alongside Dub Phizix – this is Strategy articulating an entirely different side to his musical psyche.
Sonically it puts him in the same field as fellow Exit artists and friends such as Skeptical and the bossman dBridge, but also technically and ethically the release reveals sides to Strategy few of us knew existed. Sides he didn’t know existed until a few years ago. Everything from the Lanterns video, which he edited and produced himself, to the fact it’s taken him years of deep studio science to arrive at this point is a whole new side to Strategy… A side we’re about to enjoy a hell of a lot more in the future.”