Beware, Jack Harlow!
Louis Theroux, the British documentarian of BBC fame, might not ever have imagined himself to be an MC, much less an infamous one. However, thanks to some unique lyrics he recorded for a 20-year-old documentary — as well as two DJs who are savvy from Manchester who was named Duke and Jones Theroux Theroux has turned into a very unlikely TikTok music celebrity.
The 51-year-old son and the travel writer and novelist Paul Theroux performed the rap “My Money Don’t Jiggle, Jiggle, It Folds” rapper in the episode of his docu-series “Weird Weekends.” In the episode, Theroux traveled across New Orleans to interview Southern rappers such as Mello T, Master P, and Q-T – Pie. The trio then competed in an actual rap battle on the city’s legendary hip-hop radio station Q93 FM. The station was supervised by Local DJ Wild Wayne.
Smiling from a crumpled page, Theroux rhymed with a distinctly English voice: “My money doesn’t jiggle, jiggle, it folds / I like to see you wiggle, wiggle, for sure.”
Twenty-two years ago the mix of rap lyrics led to an edgy dance scene on TikTok -which is in which everyone all the way from Snoop Dogg to Rita Ora can be seen dancing with “Jiggle Jiggle.”
Theroux’s original rap gained a new audience following an episode in February 2022 of the YouTube show ” Chicken Shop Date,” where the vlogger, Amelia Dimoldenberg, asked Theroux to sing his first performance with a singing. On March 16 Manchester DJs Duke and Jones created an elegant remix of the track and uploaded it to TikTok.
Since it was released it has since been featured in 1.2 million videos through the site.
Theroux has not been contacted to discuss the matter. However, 26-year-olds Duke and Jones with real names that include Luke Conibear and Isaac McKelvey said to The Times that the documentarian is a “national treasure in the U.K.”
“We didn’t watch [‘Weird Weekends’] when it came out because we were about three years old,” said the DJs in an email, “but the series went on Netflix for a while when we were in high school and it became quite the phenomenon in our friend group.”
“Jiggle Jiggle,” the “Jiggle Jiggle” remix has not only raised the two’s popularity on TikTok but also helped them sign a record contract with Sony Music UK. Sony Music UK imprint Robots + Humans.
When they were kids, Duke and Jones shared an interest in playing FIFA as well as consuming barbecued cheeses and playing around with beats in Logic. After they had mastered the built-in pitch correction feature of Logic They gained a reputation through the TikTok series that was titled “adding autotune to random videos.” The U.K. analogs to American comedians the Gregory Brothers who were the creators of”Auto-Tune the News” gag ” Auto-Tune the News” gag. Duke as well as Jones would search through old TV interviews for clips to play with.
“A lot of our early videos were of children or angry people,” said Duke and Jones, “because we found both of these groups spoke quite rhythmically, and hit a much wider range of notes in their speech than normal talking, so it gives the autotune more to work with.”
Theroux’s orderly, slow flow is the perfect model for remixes, they claimed. The duo then created an extended version of the song from a video they found, with Theroux’s rapping on the U.K. late-night program “The Russell Howard Hour” in the year 2018. “I sit bruised from chalices / holding my palaces,” rhymed Theroux, “Crib is so crampy / suckers suffer from paralysis.”
The show was also a hit. Theroux was also on the show, but Theroux made a statement about his raps: “If you take hip-hop quite seriously, making a comedy rap is quite sacrilegious.”
But, as Theroux, Duke and Jones consider themselves hip-hop enthusiasts They cite Manchester rapper Aitch and also Denzel Curry, and Kendrick Lamar among their top rappers. In addition to their fun remixes, the duo create their own original music and in 2020, they released an EP that was dubstep-infused titled “Solace.” They can be found in DJ booths in clubs around Manchester and Manchester or composing beats for artists such as English grime artist Flowdan.
Could it be that Theroux may be interested in furthering his career in hip-hop? If this is the case, Duke and Jones remain available.
“We haven’t yet played the autotune remixes at clubs,” they added. “But we might have to make an exception for King Louis and stick him in the set somewhere.”
