Low-Life | UK Hip Hop Story | Def Tex

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Def Tex - Dancehaul 12" [Son Records]

This came out a couple of months ago (April), but I though it deserved a mention as the latest salvo fired out of East Anglia, topping of one of the longest careers of any UK crew out there. Def Tex formed in 1987 and have regularly been putting out material since then on a variety of labels. Now it seems they are at home on the Son records label, especially after the rapturously acclaimed Serene Bug LP. This release sees the crew demonstrate their vast reserve of music making knowledge and sees them regurgitate it across some quite diverse tracks.

Dancehaul, as the press explains is all about hauling your ass to dance and if any track can do it it should be this one. Anthropologist and Chrome flip a load of styles, mostly about music being their lives and what it means to them, as well as the importance of making people jump up. The Def Tex MC's show their depth by quoting other MCs like Positive K, someone who many younger heads will not have heard of! There is a Dancehall bassline that should get everyone Bogleing or whatever today's equivalent is. Produced by Anthropologist and R-Kay it is a heavy pumping track and every 16 bars or so the pattern flips up to give a double pace feel the switches between the two sequences just keep the track rocking. Heavy digital rhythms as championed by Wil Ashon abound, this is the old ragga sound and rhythms, but it still sounds fresh.

Postcard From Norwich immediately returns us to a purely Hip Hop vibe with the big break beat. The sampled drums are about as heavy as you could desire and when mixed in with the shimmery bleeps and high pitched spacey synth elctronica provided by Japanees producer Azzurro make for a modern Hip Hop classic. The track features the high vocal tones of fellow East Anglian MC DPF who gets busy for the final verse. Many of the lyrics in true old skool fashion big up and pay homage to the producer, and much is made of this international collaboration with many Japanese references including things like Samurai and Saki as well as geographical references to Tokyo etc. Azzurro even gets a Japanese zither going briefly in the outro.

The final track Motivate produced by Sure Delight has a bit of a retro feel with its big snare a la Fresh Gordon and well placed funk guitar samples. A proper bouncy track, and what might seem on the surface to be superficial lyrics are actually pretty deep looking into people's motivations. Could you be a bin man? Do you need garms with fashion labels in them? What is important to you? And in wider society, why do people choose to build people up only to choose to destroy them?

The 12" finishes up with the instrumentals to Motivate and Dancehaul. Again a very nice 12" from Son records who keep dropping the niceness. Most people should have come across Def Tex in one form or another over the years, but this release is definitely up to par and shows that even after all this time the crew can still mix it up with the best and have a hunger and desire to try new things.

Check the Def Tex Website: www.deftex.com
Son Records Discography
Visit Son Records on the web: www.sonrecords.com :: Email:[email protected]
PO Box 4296, London, SE11 4WW