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How do Matasuna Records do it? The time between vinyl 7″ releases shrinks again yet they put out their best release so far – why it’s against all natural law! Not that anyone will be complaining about this brace of Latin bangers from serial editors and former Resense and GAMM suspects Dubben, you understand. A-side Jesus Boogie is a re-version of a seventies Brazilian
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DUBBEN: Jesus Boogie b/w Cachaça (Vinyl 7″)
MADISON WASHINGTON feat. THE ABOLITIONISTS: Plantation Earth/ Divine Frankensteins
It’s posse cut time as Paris/ Brooklyn/ Oakland trio The Abolitionists join Madison Washington’s Malik Ameer to lay it down on the mic for Plantation Earth. And what better way to lyrically explore the idea that the entire planet is no better than a giant version of an ante-bellum cotton plantation than over funky drum breaks drenched in jazzy
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THE LEBRON BROTHERS ORCHESTRA: Psychedelic Goes Latin
If you were only ever going to get yourself one Latin soul record – it would probably have to be this one – 1967 classic Psychedelic Goes Latin by Puerto Rican outfit The Lebron Brothers Orchestra. The very epitome of the Latin boogaloo melting pot of salsa, mambo, soul and funk, it’s a bare eight tracks deep – every one of which could have
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THE ALLERGIES: Keep It Moving EP
You’re going the distance, going for speed, carefully clambering up the greasy pole of the music business but what to do in the lull between albums? Why – keep things moving of course! And so it is that Bristol’s funky sons The Allergies drop new four track EP Keep It Moving. The title track, naturally, is the Skunkadelic-featuring number
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LORDS OF THE UNDERGROUND feat. REDMAN: What I’m After (TOY BEATS REMIX) Free download
Rating: It’s been a while since MB has done a free download, hasn’t it? I know what you’re thinking though – you’re thinking ‘What am I after?’ And the answer my friends is is ‘a funked-up chunk of old school hip-hop.’ Luckily for you Toy Beats has been busy with Lords Of The Underground’s Redman-featuring What I’m After from ’94 album Keepers of The Funk. Happily TB is
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BRONX SLANG: Ladies & Gentlemen
That Bronx Slang LP has been a minute coming hasn’t it? And – er – it’s still not out. Close though. But if Ladies & Gentlemen isn’t the long-awaited full-length effort from Bronx emcees Jerry Beeks and Shootyz Groove’s Ollie Miggs, it does at least follow Well Well Well and Run Away Suckas to become the third single off it. So – while you await the album’s early March release why not sit back
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TRDMRK: Hands Up (Vinyl 7″) + video
Rating: Anyone for a quick Q&A? Hands up who used to dj and produce for Jurassic 5 aside from Cut Chemist? Well done, yes, it was DJ Nu-Mark. Now, hands up who can name the person missing from this list of original Pharcyde members: Fatlip, Booty Brown and Imani. That’s right – Slimkid3. And a slightly harder one – hands up if you know the name of that guy who got the
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VARIOUS: Take Us Home: Boston Roots Reggae From 1979 To 1988
Most people probably won’t have pegged Boston, Mass. as a locus of quality roots reggae but for at least a decade from the late seventies onwards, it certainly was – as new Cultures Of Soul compilation, Take Us Home: Boston Roots Reggae From 1979 To 1988, decisively reveals. Turns out that not only was Boston digging reggae before 1979, it was digging it before Exodus boosted Bob
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SMOOVE & TURRELL: Mount Pleasant Remixed Vol. 2
Mount Pleasant Remixed Vol. 2 follows Vol. 1 as Smoove & Turrell once more make free with the stems from their latest LP. Perhaps they launched them over their heads to remixers like a pair of coy northern brides tossing flowers to a baying pit of single ladies at a wedding – we’ll never know. What is certain is that the ones who got lucky are Flevans, The Allergies and once again Valique –
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DJ MOYA: II305
Long-time MB readers will know that while the greater proportion of what gets featured on the site is aimed squarely at the dancefloor, occasionally something a little more chin-stroky makes it past MB’s strict door policy. That of which we speak goes by many names of course – instrumental hip-hop, downtempo breaks, trip-hop and (if you’re James
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