SMOOVE & TURRELL: Antique Soul – 2009 – Album review

SMOOVE & TURRELL: Antique Soul – 2009 – Album review
HIGHLIGHTS: Hammond – I Can’t Give You Up – Beggarman – Don’t Go
SOUNDBITE: “Yeah, yeah, feel the crunch, get to the beggarman’s disco”
RATING: 4/5
Take a couple of blokes who could pass for those two Geordie builders who drink in your local, put them together in a studio and what do you get? If the two in question are Smoove and Turrell the answer isn’t a new stud wall and the faint whiff of battered Mars bars but Antique Soul. In other words a heavyweight northern soul-influenced collaboration with the gritty credibility that other nu-soul pairing Mark Ronson and Daniel Merriweather just can’t seem to muster and more crossover power than Moses at the Red Sea. Because when this is on, it’s really on.

On the one hand you’ve got…READ THE REST AT MONKEYBOXING.COM

THE THIRD DEGREE: Mercy - 2009 - Single review

THE THIRD DEGREE: Mercy – 2009 – Single review
RATING: 2.5/5
Mm. The Third Degree. And doesn’t it just feel like it? In its head this Duffy cover attempts to rectify the outrages perpetrated in the name of soul by the music industry general and someone who thinks there is kudos in advertising Diet Coke in particular. Here, all stops are pulled out to make Mercy sound like it was recorded in 1968 by a male soul vocalist along the lines of Lou Rawls with full horn-accompaniment - and they achieve all that with bells on. But
Out now on …READ THE REST AT MONKEYBOXING.COM

DIZRAELI: Reach Out – 2009 – Single review

DIZRAELI: Reach Out – 2009 – Single review/ Free download
RATING: 4/5
Like his Victorian Prime Minister namesake, Brighton’s Dizraeli isn’t afraid to wax lyrical. This one is called Reach Out and is set to become a seminal folk-hop standard. No. Seriously.
Out now on …READ THE REST AT MONKEYBOXING.COM

FREESTYLE PROFESSORS: Gryme Tyme LP update + Tracklist

FREESTYLE PROFESSORS: Gryme Tyme LP update + Tracklist
Christ! Mountains have visibly eroded in the time elapsed between the first rumours of new Freestyle Professors album Gryme Tyme coming out and the present. Then the original spring release date got put back to February and now it looks like it's actually going to be out on 1 October 2009. You know it’ll be worth the wait though. If you were lucky enough to catch the Confuse A Few EP earlier this year you’ll already be familiar with a couple of tracks off this, including the mighty Luv U. You'll also be aware that Branesparker and Giff both have…FIND TRACKLIST/ READ THE REST AT MONKEYBOXING.COM

BREAKESTRA: 'Dusk Till Dawn' LP Update + Tracklist

BREAKESTRA: 'Dusk Till Dawn' - LP Update + Tracklist
Get ready for L.A. funk massive Breakestra to drop the bomb in late September. Looks like it's going to be a funky autumn as well as a funky summer...

(PRESS RELEASE) After a four-year break from the studio, L.A.'s finest practitioners of gritty soul/jazz, party funk & breaks, BREAKESTRA, return to the fray with a brand new studio album on Strut this September, 'DUSK TILL DAWN'.

The brainchild of producer, engineer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist "Music Man" Miles Tackett, Breakestra was formed from a love of golden era late '80s / early '90s hip hop and a fascination for the dusty samples that
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DIZRAELI: 'Engurland (City Shanties)' – 2009 – LP Update

DIZRAELI: Engurland (City Shanties) – 2009 – LP Update
Having made his name on stages around the world as frontman for the dub-hiphop band Bad Science, and picked up a string of awards as a slam poet (including BBC Radio 4 National Poetry Slam Winner and Farrago UK Slam Champion), rapper, singer and multi-instrumentalist Dizraeli has gone solo to craft his very own album. He says, "Hiphop is folk music for the modern age; real stories of ordinary people, spoken in their own voices. It's music that takes part in our everyday conversations, and…READ THE REST AT MONKEYBOXING.COM

BIG BOSS MAN: Full English Beat Breakfast – 2009 – Album review

BIG BOSS MAN: Full English Beat Breakfast – 2009 – Album review
HIGHLIGHTS: Triumph Of The Olympian – C’est Moi – Clown Face – Pies & Pastiche – The Bloater
SOUNDBITE: “Made you look like a clown/ Got your smile upside down”
RATING: 5/5
‘Difficult third album’ my arse. What’s surprising about mod-funk legends Big Boss Man is that; given the quality of critically acclaimed LPs number one and two (Humanize (2001) and Winner (2005) respectively), and having soundtracked Mighty Boosh film-short “Sweet” and having their track Party 7 used on the 2006 Nike World Cup advert, they don’t have a higher profile in the UK and U.S. After all, here is a band that ranks with the cream of the new funk scene
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MAKO & THE HAWK vs BEASTIE BOYS – Too Many Rappers (Not Enough Funk mix) - 2009 – Free download

MAKO & THE HAWK vs BEASTIE BOYS – Too Many Rappers (Not Enough Funk mix) - 2009 – Free Download
(PRESS RELEASE) When Mako & The Hawk heard the lyrics to current Beastie Boys single Too Many Rappers it occurred to them that, these days, lack of funk was a problem at least as important as a surfeit of rappers.
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BLUE SCHOLARS: OOF! EP release/ Hawaii tour/ HI-808 free download

BLUE SCHOLARS: OOF! EP release/ Hawaii tour/ HI-808 free download
(PRESS RELEASE) Everybody loves Hawaii. Few know better than Blue Scholars’ MC Geologic, having grown up in Honolulu in the 1980’s and returning with the Scholars’ dj/ producer Sabzi last year to rock a sold-out homecoming show at Next Door. Love lingered in the air despite all the changes happening outside the sweaty, crackin'
…GET FREE DOWNLOAD/ READ THE REST AT MONKEYBOXING.COM

THE HEAVY: How Do You Like Me Now? – 2009 – Single review

THE HEAVY: How You Like Me Now? – 2009 – Single review
RATING: 4/5
Bath’s The Heavy are not, apparently, ones to hit a small nail with a small hammer if a pile-driver is available. Here, they live up to their name by pummelling seven percussive shades of shit out of a loop chopped from Dyke & The Blazers’ funk classic, Let A Woman Be A Woman over which singer Swaby…READ THE REST AT MONKEYBOXING.COM

WILL C: Evil In The Mirror – 2009 – Album review

WILL C: Evil In The Mirror – 2009 – Album review
HIGHLIGHTS: Frog Among Queens – Synthetic Genetics (feat. Esoteric) – Trainspotting – Losers
SOUNDBITE: “I wrote the second verse…jailed where rebels lurk/…On a planet where I failed the weapons search”
RATING: 4/5
Anyone ever seen Will C and Edan in the same room together? Alright, they’re not really the same person - Edan has earlobes and Will C doesn’t, but that’s a whole other story. In truth though, there are a number of significant similarities. Both ‘students’ of hip-hop, well-versed in its history, both part of the Boston hip-hop scene, both total sample-magpies gathering shiny nuggets from film and TV snippets plus pretty much any genre of music under the sun and - um – they’ve both got dark hair. And it has to be said that, in the absence of anything like an LP from Edan recently, you might just want to check this out though you'll find
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