records

Themselves - The No Muisc [lp] Anticon The Anticon hip-hop scene (cLoudead) etc has provided some of the admittedly few arguments that white fellows can indeed make hip hop without it sucking like MC Hammer's worst b-side abortion. However those expecting, Bling Bling, Ho's and rhymes about putting cap's in peoples asses are not in the right place. Doseone, also of cLOUDEAD, spouts lines more along the lines of "your lover's at yoga breaking a sweat, while you shoot mid-morning coffee nerved on the front steps" and "the more I think, the more I think about suicide" whilst his cohort Jel beams down funky but muffled beats, oddball Casio bleeps, and jazzy sounding double bass breaks and noise from some undoubtedly fuggy smoked up home studio. Musically it reminds me a lot of groups like New Kingdoms heavy ass approach to hip-hop, and tracks like ‘Mouthful’ and the delayed drum lines on the super fast rapped ‘Like Trap’ are definitely a direction that bears exploration. It does suffer a little from the banged together unfinished feel of many "home studio projects." No budget problems too often means chuck all the stuff you made at 4am ‘cos you couldn't sleep and the cable channels were broken, but most of it feels considered and constructed enough to work very effectively. I would like to have seen these guys on their recent tour but was too busy, as I gather the cLoudead shows were something of an event. Ian Unpeeled (the zine that covers the John Peel shows, info from shane@unpeeled.freeserve.co.uk)

Anticon