|
|
|
|
Why does it seem that every release nowadays has to have a roll call associated with its review? Since this is an Hombre release it's no surprise that the guests are from the 'South West region'. Rola (Numskullz), Retna, The Aspects and Felix (who that?) accompany Risky Bizniz, Masterchef and Reds across 18 tracks on this double album. Jamie Hombre recently said that the Hombre roster consists of the hiphop thing (Numskullz, Aspects, Beans, Binary Bros) and the breakbeat/triphop thing (Men From Atlantis, 2 Amigos, Ming). One Cut exist somewhere between the two. There's 'beat' tracks that wouldn't sound out of place at the Big Beat Boutique alongside those Wall Of Sound and Skint types, but equally there's plenty of 'hiphop' in here. It's interesting to try and spot the divide and it becomes obvious by the end of this album that the genre's aren't far removed. Is it 'bigbeat' or just instrumental hiphop? A common problem with these sorts of albums is to view the instrumental tracks as fillers, waiting for the next vocal lead track to come along. This could be a long wait as only 6 of the tracks feature MC's. It's all well crafted, well produced, and the instrumental cuts sometimes come off better than some of the vocal tracks. 'Allstar Collective' crams in Rola, The Aspects and Retna all on the same track and I can't help but feeling it would have been better to give Rola his own track and let the other MC's breathe a bit. One Cut's own MC Red is the suprise here as I havent really noticed his contributions to previous releases. The excellent downtempo 'Beginning To End' being a case in point, where Red goes all David Attenborough on us and forecasts the end of the world, extinction of species and all that. 'Mr X' has a fuck-off big bass drum while the unknown (to me anyway) Felix chats about the mysterious Mr X. Don't steal kids, cos you end up in jail is the moral. It's hard to see where this release is going because the pure hiphop heads will probably sleep on it and I'm not sure of Hombre's appeal to the 'bigbeat' crowd yet. It's a shame because this albums does have some good qualities. It's very diverse taking in funk, 'triphop' and hiphop influences into the beats and in the most part it's all well done. And it's infinitely better than the disappointing 'Out For Fame' compilation. If you're up for something a bit different then track this down - look for the Banksy artwork which is done in his own inimitable style and you couldn't miss. Now bring on the Aspects LP!!!
 Related
Links:
© ukhh.com 1999 - 2000 |
One Cut Grand Theft Audio
LP