Maybe we were looking for different things from that album. At the time I saw Wiley as one of the best spitters in the scene and was expecting the album to at least be on par with, if not better than ‘boy in the corner’. I didn’t want an album of good instrumentals, I wanted good songs. Granted ‘Ice rink’ and ‘eskimo’ are killer, but what if dizzee had put a 44 second snippet of I luv U with no vocals on his debut? It wouldn’t make sense.
I don’t think the rest of the album worked as well as What do you call it’ - same sound or not. As for my contradictions : The Smiths and Blondie always had the same sound, but are all their songs as good as ‘There is a light that never..’ or ‘Heart of Glass’. Don’t think so…