The South London Collective have been pushing their brand of funk, hip hop and anything in between since they started a club night in a pub in Brixton in 1998.
The crew headed by Skeg and Rob Life are still running the club and have set up a record label and released numerous 7"s, 12"s, CD's and LP's to critical acclaim.
This is their second compilation, the first "The Deadly 7" Sins" was released in 2001 and went on to sell over 10,000 copies worldwide. This release brings together the best of the single releases since 2001 plus a few brand new tracks. This is the first time that any of these releases have been featured on a CD and shows the vibe that the Breakin Bread Crew take to the jams they play all over the world.
The CD kicks off with DJ IQ, an incredible young DJ who has scratched on a number of the Breakin Bread releases and been around the UK scene for the last 5 or so years. A dope little intro
Color Climax take us into the full tunes with our best selling 7" "Batidas Latinas". A nice funky latinesque number. They also pop up towards the end of the album with "Jigsaw" their ode to library music.
The next artists are Keno 1 and the Hermit aka Natural Self and Nostalgia 77 who give us "Heavy Heavy". This tune has so far only been available on 7" and it's been a constant seller cos it's just so f***ing hard. This was the first record released by Natural Self on Breakin Bread and he's gone to prove he's a very special Beatsmith as shown by the variety of the other two tracks he's contributed to this album. The remix of "To The Sun" (from his debut album "Let Peace Be The Ruler") is an amazing club record and "Foundation Pt 2" rounds off the album nicely in a chilled headnodding way.
Next up we've got superproducer, Ghost. This guy is one of the hardest working guys in the UK hip hop game but he's got a broader musical palette than you would imagine as his 3 tracks here show. First up you've got "Flip It" off his first 12", a straight up hip hop banger, then you've got his remix of "Basic Instinct" where he shows that he's not restricted to that old boom bap sound and finally "Vices Verses" shows his smoother side.
Tufkut the force behind Beats in Progress has practically retired to family life now but we managed to entice one more track out him and what a belter it is! "Trouble" shows his mischievous side as Kashmere and DPF trade tales.
The Breakin Bread club night represent all elements of hip hop and breakdancers turn up wherever the crew play around the world, so they had to have a b-boy track up on here and Ill Boogs of the Sinstars and Born To Rock B-boy crews did it for them. "Gypsy Rock" is an uptempo disco drums workout that never fails to rock the circle.
All the Breakin Bread DJ sets and radio shows constantly change styles with decent beats being the key factor and this compilation is no different as our next group shows. The Abdominal Showmen are a tight little band from Edinburgh who play an amazing live set but have yet to release anything on vinyl. Check the story and music on "Organic" for a real quirky interesting tale.
Tom Caruana contributes a dope little skit followed by a full blown hip hop headnodder as Arch Co comes in to take duties on "It's Arch".
The crew have met loads of really cool people on their travels around the funkier side of the world funk and hip hop scenes in France they met DJ Boogaloo & Lotari who contributed the sublime "Sweat Side".
Going back over to hip hop we have one of the UK's dopest MC's Cappo. "Last Remaining" shows Caps at his illest whilst Zero Theory comes with a different take on the beats.
Finally, for a completely different take on hip hop period we've got a real interesting short track from Londoners Darwin & The Phoenix. This just dropped into the office as a demo on CD and it made our heads turn. We hope you're feeling the bossa vibe and offkey lyrics in the same way we are!
All in all it's an interesting ride and not one that many labels could take you on. British music made for the dancefloor and walkman (sorry, MP3 player!) Enjoy!