Artist
Shanks & Bigfoot
Why we feature this artist The light-footed garage record with a chocolate chorus Sweet Like Chocolate made a particularly cheerful entrance for UK garage into the British mainstream. Shanks & Bigfoot put a soft, memorable vocal over a rhythm with enough movem…
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The artist, in context
The story of Shanks & Bigfoot
Why we feature this artist
The light-footed garage record with a chocolate chorus
Sweet Like Chocolate made a particularly cheerful entrance for UK garage into the British mainstream. Shanks & Bigfoot put a soft, memorable vocal over a rhythm with enough movement to feel slightly off-balance, then gave it a chorus almost impossible to miss. The sweetness was obvious; the rhythmic craft beneath it was doing just as much work.
The producers behind the name
Daniel Langsman and Stephen Meade had also recorded as Doolally, with Straight from the Heart preceding the best-known Shanks & Bigfoot release. Their work belonged to the late-nineties garage environment in which a vocal record could travel from specialist DJs to a much wider pop audience without needing to abandon its distinctive rhythmic language.
Sweet Like Chocolate reached number one in Britain in 1999, with Sharon Woolf supplying the vocal. The performance sounds relaxed, but its fit with the production is carefully judged. The bass and percussion create motion around the sung line, leaving the central phrase simple enough to remain audible over a busy dancefloor. The animated video gave the record another immediately recognisable public identity.
Swings & Roundabouts
Sing-A-Long followed in 2000, again placing a plainly stated vocal invitation inside a rhythmically active setting. The album Swings & Roundabouts appeared the same year, giving the partnership a broader collection of songs around the hit. Its existence is a useful corrective to the way a single enormous chorus can reduce a production duo's history to one remembered moment.
The best-known record also captures a particular route through British pop: a specialist club rhythm, a singer outside the principal artist credit and a hook that could become familiar far beyond the original scene. Shanks & Bigfoot did not make the groove disappear when they made the chorus accessible. The small spaces and unexpected accents beneath the vocal remain the reason the song feels so light on its feet.
Essential releases
Sweet Like Chocolate
Sharon Woolf's vocal and a highly mobile garage rhythm meet in the duo's British number-one single.
Sing-A-Long
The follow-up keeps the emphasis on a direct vocal hook and an active rhythmic foundation.
Swings & Roundabouts
The album gives the production partnership a larger setting around its familiar singles.