SICKER THAN YOUR AVERAGE.

Props to our friends at Transparent for getting the word out on Dan Black way back when, but despite garnering Radio 1 Single of the Week honors in August and a Perez Hilton shout out shortly thereafter, Mr. Black continues to remain criminally unheralded on the blog scene. A Londoner now living in Paris, Black turned all kinds of heads with his genre-mashing cover of Biggie's "Hypnotize", which reinterpreted the classic with a pop vocal spin and laid it over the triumphant percussion of "Umbrella", all backed up by a cathedral-style choral backing vocal allegedly sampled from some lost 80's sci-fi soundtrack. There's no questioning the brilliance of the white-label cover, but I was hesitant to hype the upstart pop star-in-waiting until he backed it up with some original material, but a couple spins through "Yours" and "Wonder" (recently upped to his MySpace) establish him as the real deal. Attenton British pop charts: there's a new sheriff in town.

MP3: "HYPNTZ" - Dan Black