DJ Step One - Bagleys Flex [96-99 drum n bass mix]

Some more non-rap stuff. About once or twice a year I pull out my drum & bass records and bounce around mixing them for an hour. This is the stuff I learned to mix with, and the soundtrack to my first years of clubs and raves so there's a lot of memories attached to some of these tracks. That jump-up style of the late 90s had a certain energy to it and although like any dance music it could be a bit formulaic at times, 18 year old me was perfectly happy with a half speed intro, hip hop samples, a big ol' snare roll and some hoover bass.

tracklist

Shy FX - The Message (Ebony)

Special K - Knowledge (Proper Talent)

DJ Die - Special Treat (V Recordings)

EPS & 2Vibe - Hype The Funk (Urban Takeover)

Omni Trio - Trippin On Broken Beats (Moving Shadow)

DJ Hype & MC Fats - Peace Love & Unity (True Playaz)

Peshay - Miles From Home (Mo Wax)

Firefox & Suvivor - Back Out Of Dis (Philly Blunt)

DJ Zinc - On Fire Tonight (Ganja)

DJ Rap - Hardstep (Proper Talent)

Evil II - Cops Ain't Shit (Evil)

Origin Unknown -Valley Of The Shadows (awake 96 mix) (Ram)

Roni Size - Brut Force (Full Cycle)

Love Nation - Positive (Cru L T remix) (JAL)

Shimon & Andy C - Nightflight (Ram)

Step One & Mystery - Verbal Assault (Direct Drive)

Ray Keith - Do It (V Recordings)

Mystical Influence - Dub Plate Pressure (Vinyl Syndicate)

Swoosh - Ya Rockin (Back2Basics)

Trend - Tune Your Bass (Live)

Jungle Brothers - Jungle Brothers (Urban Takeover remix) (Gee St)

Adam F - Circles (remix) (Section 5)

DJ Vadim on XFM (2004)

If you have family round over the next week, you might need some non-rap stuff to play in the background while they babble on about whatever it is they do. There's definitely some jazz in this mix, and some funky breakbeat type stuff, but I'm not sure about the rest. Psych-rock perhaps? I don't really know what that is. Sounds decent anyway.

Radio 1 Rap Exchange with Funkmaster Flex (21.01.95)

This was a tape I played to death but hadn't ripped until now. I've actually already posted a different recording of the show that Diablo gave me, which had the segments with Mobb Deep, Nas, Raekwon and Lil Dap in the studio. This new rip has the interviews cut out (I think I saved the freestyles on a separate tape) and is just Flex in the mix for 90 minutes. It's been pause buttoned here and there but this is how I remember it...

Here's the rip of Diablo's tape which picks up about 30 mins in


and here's the Mobb Deep and Nas freestyle

at some point I'll edit the 2 together and get that up on the Hip Hop Radio Archive

DJ Skully & Sasha D - Summer 2003 mix

This is a full on exclusive as it was never actually released at the time, so thanks to Skully for excavating this one from his hard drive and sharing it with us. It's a nice mix of mostly US indie joints with a couple of UK bits including a Klashnekoff & Skriblah freestyle that I don't think you'll find anywhere else.

Tracklist

Louis Logic - Idiot Gear

Dilated Peoples - Bullet Train

MF Doom - The Mic Sound Nice

Ugly Duckling - Rio De Janeiro

Madlib - unknown

Klashnekoff & Skriblah - Freestyle

Smiley The Ghetto Child - Wake Up Call

Mr Voodoo - Regulation Time

Roc Marciano - Game Of Death

Madvillain - Money Folder

Kyza - Harsh Reality

C Ray Walz - Camouflage

Jus Biz - Straight From '95

De La Soul - Much More

Louis Logic - Dos Factotum

Defari - For The Love

Quest - Freestyle

previously: DJ Skully - 1Xtra All- Star mix (2007)

DJ 279 on Choice FM 12.05.95

The Number Man doing it up with the new releases on Choice FM's Friday Night Flavas from May '95. Quality is a tad muddy but listenable. This one includes that unreleased Bomdigi remix I posted recently. Shout to Diablo for the tape.

Run DMC live in London (1986)

Taken from this 1995 Radio 1 Rap Show, here's 18 minutes of the mythical night at Peoples Club in Paddington, West London where Run DMC, Whodini, Hurricane and Cut Creator (and possibly even LL Cool J) performed and freestyled for 3 hours at an after party on the Raising Hell tour.

Other snippets of the night have been online before and Westwood even played some of it back in his LWR days, but I don't think we'll ever get to hear the full session. I messaged DMC on twitter hoping to get more info but all he could offer was "I remember that night! Fun as hell!!!"

There was a good interview with Tim a few years ago on the XXL site where he spoke about the club:

"People's Club, that was like one of the first black-owned clubs in this country. It was originally called the Q Club, but then it lost its license. In those days, clubs could operate without a license so it was like an illegal club and that used to go on until 6, 7, 8 o'clock on a Friday morning and it was just crazy. It was a real hood spot; you're talking about the '80s here so there was a lot of guys dressing like pimps and it would be a lot of their girls in there as well. There would be a lot of pimps, a lot of drug dealers. You couldn't use the toilet in there because it was like a drug-dealing [den]. By 6 in the morning, there'd be a smoke cloud in the basement and there'd be people smoking coke and crack and it was just one of those extreme street spots, but that's where I played every Thursday.

And what used to happen was Whodini used to record their albums over in London 'cause they were signed to Jive Records and their studios were only in London so they'd be over. And people like Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince, but they didn't really come to the club like Whodini did. And then when that Raising Hell Tour with Run-D.M.C., Beastie Boys and Whodini came, they all used to just come down there and freestyle for hours and just hang out and get high. Larry Smith, rest in peace, he used to come there every Thursday. You couldn't buy anything by the glass, it was only bottles. You could only buy like a bottle of champagne, a bottle of brandy, a bottle of wine. As a young kid, like 18, 19, 20, just growing up in that environment, it was like the best experience"

State Property - Hot 97 Takeover (2001)

Chances are you've heard this before, or at least some of it, but as it appeared on the second half of a Westwood show I just ripped I thought I'd post it up. Jay Z takes his crew of Philly spitters and Memphis Bleek up to Funk Flex's Hot 97 show and plays hypeman (somewhat annoyingly in hindsight) while they rap their AF1s off for the best part of 90 minutes. This is some legendary early 00s rap radio and no mistake. It's things like this where Spotify and their ilk will always fall short. Jay would make a killing if he could get mixtape shit like this on Tidal.

I'm not sure when this actually went down. Westwood is playing it in September but the time stamp on the camcorder footage on Youtube says January 2001. Anyone confirm?

The Radio 1 Rap Show I linked to above was actually the last one of the huge collection of tapes of shows from '99-'03 that I was given nearly 3 years ago. Can't believe I actually got them all done. The Westwood Archives Mixcloud page is looking pretty good as a result of that and contributions from others and is currently at 360 shows (mostly from myself) from 1987 to 2004. Still on the look out for more tapes so get in touch if you can help.

Other stuff that I meant to mention on the last update and forgot:

Filthy Rich stays busy cranking out the mixes, with his latest drops marking the anniversary releases of Pharoahe Monch's Internal Affairs and Method Man's Tical LPs

DJ Diablo (who's responsible for a good chunk of the Westwood tapes I've posted amongst other things) kicks off his new podcast with an interview with DJ MK. Some more big guests are promised for future episodes.

Random Rap Radio stays doing the most - recent posts include DJ Premier on Hot 97 back in '95, an Evil Dee Tape Kingz breakbeat mixtape and the classic Hobo Junction vs Heiroglyphics battle on the Wake Up Show in '94.

That should keep you busy.