- I can’t think of the last time I heard a new record with turntablism on it. I’d also say you probably don’t remember the name Briztronix at all. Comprising DJ Bacon, Ben Eltham and RUFFLES, these gents were key players in the electronic and hip hop scene in -you guessed it- Brisbane, in the first decade of the 2000s. If you need some more easily recognisable reference points, Briztronix drink from the font of oldschool, instrumental hiphop, which gushes with the sounds of DJ Shadow, J Dilla, QBert, Cut Chemist, Kid Koala and many more.
I have records by all of them (not least Briztronix), but many are, ironically, as dusty and neglected as the records those crate-diggers snagged and sampled, back in the day. I’m always surprised and then slightly alarmed when a style I’ve loved get revived (it shows how much older I’m getting, if you need to be clued in). I may have looked around a little nervously to see if anyone else was trying to bring back turn of the millenium instrumental boombap and -with relief- I can say it doesn’t appear to be flooding back yet. Rather than kids thieving sounds they’ve never heard before, it’s just some beat dudes picking up where they left off, back in the day.
Before I damn everyone involved with faint praise, one of the best things about producers refusing to stop making the music they loved is how much better they get at it than when they first picked up second-hand sampler. Briztronix weren’t exactly a slouch back in the day, but to hear the expansive IV, it really is a highly polished love letter to (now especially) oldschool beats.
Nostalgia does give an extra-specially warm glow to this record, but can I, earnestly, recommend it above and beyond that, it’s a beatape that stands tall outside of the context of time. Hey and if boombap is coming back -really it has to be someday soon, I can’t stay this young forever- get back in first and get your head nodding before everyone else.
- Chris Cobcroft.