producers: the nextmen

guests: grap luva, mr. thing, unspoken heard, soulson and others.

The UK is said to have the best beatmakers on this planet. And The Nextmen are said to be representatives. And if you have checked this column article, or if you are informed of what gets and keeps the party rocking, you were already introduced to this UK combo. If not: Brad Baloo and Dom Search give us "Amongst The Madness" and they open the album, with said title cut. And this enters our target area with a funky track, that will get your head nodding, your feet tapping, and the party started, rriigghht! Soulson kicks some rhymes over this, but this track mostly belongs to the beat, that in combination with the dope scratching, captures the listener right from the bat, and has to be considered a banging entry to any album. Towards the end of the track, the 'Men flip the script though, with hooking up a smoother beat with a phone conversation.

But that's just a short break in this stream of good vibe music. "Break The Mould" treats us to Grap Luva's rhyming and another bouncy beat, and it's fair to say, that this is what you get here: that type of beats, with changing rhymesmiths, that do more or less obviously brag, make more or less sense, and more or less always appeal. Same can be said for "File Under Truth". This cut actually opens with a nice little Q-Tip scratching, while Penultimate flows over this extra funky beat. Again at the end, the track is switched over again, for a short jazzy, piano heavy outro interlude. And honestly, getting a complete track in that jazzy vibe would have given this album a nice different element. But things remain on the party bouncy, although on "We Originate", the indestructible Mr. Thing and Harry Love dominate the track. They dragged their 1200s in the studio, along with a pile of records, and they slice and cut and scratch, like they are butchers and new dead animals just arrived. The background beat is actually well suited for such heavy scratching, as it's not forcing itself in the foreground, but is content with providing a billboard for those ex-Scratch Perverts to attach their skillfully executed turntable trickery.

The drum gets a special nod on "Step Below The Surface", as well as the percussion, while "My Way" feat. Ken Boogaloo allows itself to slowly build up, and actually stray away from the constant rocking, but doing a confident night travel type vibe beat. The track rolls forward in an effortless motion, before the bass dominated "Thinking Man's Session" picks up the party again, that has Grap Luva goes at it again. With more phone samples, that constantly break the stream of things, mingling between the track, the transition to "We Got" is not abrupt, but also not smoothed. However, the lastly mentioned track features Intellect aka Red Cloud and MC Ty, who are forced to rhyme over an unspectacular beat, that remains too much in the back to impress. Although there isn't much that makes up the beat that could impress anyways, apart from the again lecturing scratching that's ending the track.

By now we have progressed to level three, and Ken Boogaloo returns for "Buck Foolish", that gives us previously mentioned formula of a shaking beat and a braggadocios Ken. Almost acting as in house emcee, Soulson returns first on "Clarity", that appeals with an extra dope parallel piano, and right after that an uptempo "Shine On", that succeeds in it's shyness. Actually, put these two tracks down on your 'highlights' list, in case you are taking notes. On the "Shine On" track, the battling is also left behind, and Soulson is spitting more thoughtful rhymes about the 'cycle of life', what shall not be confused with "The Lion King's" 'circle of life' though. Ha. Just bugging.

The Seven Heads poster children, The Unspoken Heard (or here Asheru of the 'Heard), suddenly enter the show with their "Sex, Lies And Videotape". As we are used to from these folks, their track is musical, with a tight organ and an appealing guitar lick, and the D.C. cat Asheru doesn't hit us over the head with anything crap too, but keeps his commenting tell tale words offering balanced with the quality of the beat. The niceness is even stepped up with the entry into 'level four', as "Mental Alchemy" featuring Intellect aka Red Cloud elevates this party bounce to almost perfection. And what shows extra creativity, is the entrance, as this builds like a wave and only / finally crushes onto you, when it reached its maximum height. Now if there would have been a more enigmatic and charismatic emcee on this track, we'd have an instant favorite in our hands. Going the De La Soul route, "Turn It Up A Little" does sound shamefully native tongue-ish, while "Emergency Broadcast System" digs out Alkaholiks inspirations. Then again it's not fair just throwing comparisons out there, but if a fitting one for "Revitalise" would come to this reviewers mind right now, he sure enough would use it. But the brain is one big blank. Lucky for us, there's only "Simple And Plain" left, another Soulson contribution, that does fall short though to repeat the magic of the other tracks that were praised in this review.

What takes us back to the beginning, where the proclamation was mentioned, that the UK has the best producers. After listening to this record, it's once again obvious that they can hang. At times they can even jump, and every now and then they do a 360 windmill back slam dunk. And although these white dudes probably can't dance to save their lives, they can make us dance, and they give us an album of 73 minutes of good times, good vibes, good limes (aargh, sorry, forget the last one), party hip hop. Get the party started....wwwiiickiiid!