ROAST BEATZ & MC MANIC: Consolidation EP (2014)

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RACKABEAT & BAR-LOW: Step Out/ Air Tight (2013)

Hey everybody, let’s pull the lever on the Riddim Fruit machine and see what turns up for the start of 2014. Here we go – all the reels are spinning – hey – hold on a second – looks like someone’s been having a tinker with the workings – only two tracks have turned up instead of the normal four! There’s a punchy, paranoid bass-heavy bunch of cherries augmented with a little bit of Biggie 101 called Step Out and funky, glitchy lil peach called Air Tight. Oh …READ FULL POST @ MONKEYBOXING.COM

VARIOUS: Cloud Watching Volume 3 (Riddim Fruit) (2013)

Google ‘cloud watching’ (like I just did) and you’ll probably find that the first search result is the Cloud Appreciation Society (‘Uniting cloud lovers around the world’) who are, “fighting the banality of blue sky thinking.” Unsure whether this was some sort of joke or whether there really are people apart from meteorologists out there that interested in clouds I had a quick tour around the site and frankly, results were inconclusive. Not so with Cloud Watching Volume 3, the usually dancefloor-oriented Riddim Fruit label’s annual attempt to fight the banality of downtempo compilations. Billa …READ FULL POST @ MONKEYBOXING.COM

DJ ROAST BEATZ: Heavy Ear Play EP (2013)

Roast Beatz garners some impressive allies to drop verbals on his Heavy Ear Play EP in the form of Action Bronson and Stig Of The Dump. NY rapper Bronson appears on no fewer than two cuts – the first (and title) track along with Stig and Brotherman and closer 5 Star General in the company of Phoenix Da Icefire. Just as well our man’s up to the job right? Evidence of this can be found in the beats of course, which Beatz has …READ FULL POST @ MONKEYBOXING.COM

DEPHICIT: Duality EP (2013)

He might be called Dephicit but he’s got no shortage of what sound like Star Wars samples. He’s practically made an EP out of them. Listening to this is a bit like a having a job at Mos Eisley spaceport – albeit within earshot of the cantina. Lightsabers, podracers, droid squeaks and beeps. Loads of ‘em. Well, them and some beats obviously. And some basslines. And some vocalists. Got soul…READ FULL POST @ MONKEYBOXING.COM

RIDDIM FRUIT: Bristol Fashion EP (2013)

As the Riddim Fruit label are well aware, Bristol has a reputation of being something of a world centre of bass music. The Wild Bunch, Massive Attack, Smith & Mighty, Portishead, Roni Size and Full Cycle, a constant Jamaican dancehall presence since the sixties – indeed you might imagine that life in the monkey’s hometown permanently chugs along to a seismic rumble. That’s all bollocks of course, I definitely remember a…READ FULL POST @ MONKEYBOXING.COM

VARIOUS: Cloud Watching Volume 2 (Riddim Fruit) (2013) Free download

Cloud watching. Lie on your back and make two collide. Disperse one with your mind. Find ones that look like animals. Fucking hippies! They’re everywhere and now they’ve invaded the Riddim Fruit label a second time and forced ten artists on its roster to make ‘upbeat downtempo’ breaks. It’s outrageous. All that lying about in peaceful harmony, smoking dope and being nice to each other and not washing. Actually, it doesn’t sound too bad, apart from the not washing bit. I can …READ FULL POST @ MONKEYBOXING.COM

MR 50: The City Of Sin EP (2013)

Let’s see now – where could The City Of Sin EP from Bristol-based Mr 50 be paying homage too? The big bucks corruption of Moscow? The fleshpots of Bangkok? The drug-soaked streets of Miami? Actually, my money’s on Bristol. Far-fetched? I don’t think so. Ask anyone who’s braved the walk down the slapper-choked alley that Corn Street becomes on any given Friday or Saturday night. And while that’s a thoroughfare that actually throbs along to the sound of David Guetta, the queasy off-…READ FULL POST @ MONKEYBOXING.COM

THE ALLERGIES: Heartbreaker EP (2013)

No post Christmas/ NYE lying low for either the Riddim Fruit label (who released the reliably heavyweight DJ Alias EP yesterday) or for Djs Moneyshot & Rackabeat team-up project The Allergies – who dropped massive old school freebie The Pick Up Line the other week. Why? Because The Allergies Heartbreaker EP is cued for release in the middle of this month. The boys pillage…READ FULL POST @ MONKEYBOXING.COM

DJ ALIAS: Low & Rising EP (2012)

“So what’s your dj alias then?” “DJ Alias.” “Yes, your dj alias?” “DJ Alias” “Stop repeating me.” “I’m not.” “Well, what’s your dj alias then.” “DJ Alias.” Hours of fun. Anyway, the Low & Rising EP is the current sound of Kiwi dj/producer DJ Alias and mainly involves a deep-wobble, glitch monster punching through the hull of your skull-ship and spreading it’s bass tentacles throughout the corridors of your mind partly digesting what it finds …READ FULL POST @ MONKEYBOXING.COM

B VISIBLE: Disko Chop EP (2012)

The Riddim Fruit label deliver something a little different from their usual fare here in the shape of Austrian B Visible who ensures he’ll make an appearance on musical radars with his new journey into sound, Disko Chops. When I say ‘journey into sound’ however, I’m not referring to some Coldcut-style sampledelic trip along the audio highway so much as a well-organised four-track get together from a few neighbours on Instrumental Breaks Avenue – to wit, hip-hop, glitch-hop and Disco – …READ FULL POST @ MONKEYBOXING.COM

VARIOUS: Cloud Watching (Riddim Fruit) (2012) – Free download

VARIOUS: Cloud Watching (Riddim Fruit) (2012) – Free download
Known for its adventures in the realm of bass music, the Riddim Fruit label crosses the threshold of the chill-out room with Cloud Watching – as if you’d expect anything else from a cover depicting a bloke stood on a hill staring at a paisley-ish sky or a hippy title like that, anyway. If this leads you feeling like we’ve entered nineties downtempo breaks territory you’d be right. And wrong. Firstly, unlike the majority of nineties …READ FULL POST @ MONKEYBOXING.COM