Available on: Sir Lucious Left Foot, Def Jam LP

So, er, Big Boi, you have this solo album coming out which has been discussed and delayed for getting on for half a decade now, you drop a single from it last year, ‘Shine Blockas’, which is basically the best Outkast-related track since ‘Int’l Player’s Anthem’, and then you bring Scott Storch back from the dead on the unstoppable talk box anthem ‘Shutterbugg’. And then you drop this, one of the most colossal, shuddering, angry tracks you’ve ever done.

Just one question: how the fuck is Lucious Left Foot going to live up to these expectations?

Well never mind for now, because ‘General Patton’ is yet more material capturing the half of Outkast who’s benefitted most from their time apart at what might eventually prove to be his creative peak. The first thing that hits you is the balance between grandiose triumph (those swelling opera samples) and untempered aggression (first line: “get the South’s dick up out yo’ mouth”), on a foundation of speaker-shuddering bass hits courtesy of J. Beats.

“Take one for the team / now he bleeding from the spleen / stay so fresh, and oh, so motherfuckin’ clean” – yeah, it doesn’t let up. Why would it, when that bowling alley in the video looks like the sort of place you’d never want to leave?

Tam Gunn