Next up from the Krakow-based Mind The Wax label – a full-length collaboration between a well-established Los Angeles DJ/ Producer and an equally well-established Los Angeles emcee that, it so transpires, is something of a homage to legendary Canadian WWF wrestler Bret Hart. No, really. The duo in question are of course Destruct and DJ Zole and the album is Sharpshooters (named after Hart’s signature hold, naturally), an eleven-tracker featuring a stylised, illustrated cover of a wrestling ring with a base made out of a Technics 1200 deck before which our men posture as (presumably) Hart and manager. Oh – and did I mention the numerous guests who number among them one or two who have previously graced the pages of MB (label mates Irene, BnC and Moka Only) along with a certain Blu (!).
And so to the music. We enter the ring, so to speak, with the a Latin-inflected beat entitled The Hitman (named after Hart’s ring-name? You know it is!) with Destruct laying down a challenge to rivals over vocal samples which seem to refer to the controversial ‘Montreal Screwdown’ incident (yes, the monkey’s done his homework!) in which WWF boss Vince McMahon manipulated the outcome of a match featuring Hart (to Hart’s detriment) in a sport in which outcomes are – er – notoriously not the consequence of skill and chance. The implication is clear – Destruct and Zole ain’t going down like that.
Stylistically we stay in the late 90s/ early 2000s for next cut New Day featuring BnC, lent a bit of R&B crossover with a second guest spot from Irene whose Time2Love LP appeared two years ago and continue in this vein through the title track (featuring Moka Only) and the first interlude, License To Kill. Something a little more newfangled turns up on Wasteland (featuring Jean Clow) which is a decidedly twenty-first century take on hip-hop, tackles America’s divisive approach to immigration and finds Clow deliver his contributions in Portuguese. The beat in Lost In The Arkyve goes heavy on the synths and features no fewer than three guests – Arkyve, Ellay Khule and Acid Reign – while the final third of the LP returns to the true school boom-bap of the first third effecting precisely the ‘sharpshooter’ style ending that was no doubt being aimed at.
(Out now on Mind The Wax)