In hip hop circles, Peanut Butter Wolf is revered as both producer and DJ, and the home for his beats is Stones Throw, a label whose logo is a quality-assuring stamp of approval. Their side project label Basement Digs is just as sure an indicator of firing funk flavours, although it is an outlet for older material. In the case of this album (as with its Vol. 1) that means previously unreleased and not necessarily brand spanking new productions from the, by now familiar, roster of the mother label. We’re talking the likes of Madlib, Oh No, and Aloe Blacc plus, if you flit through the production credits, other names familiar to the beats underground including Dabrye and Four Tet. The result is what you’d expect from this collection of names – tasty, soulful hip hop styles with some real grit and character thrown in.

Two short tracks of rumbling bass, echoing atmospherics and stripped back hip hop beats gets things under way before the immaculate melding of soul song with thoughtful rhymes, and a vibes-laden dreamy instrumental with reverb-heavy walking pace beats, produces a close your eyes, blissful piece of heavenly hip hop on Living For The City by Roc C, which is one of the album’s highlights.

The fairly trippy, almost 60s feel of Chocolate Star’s Stay With Me gives way to the breakdance-speed beats and electro synth lines of Reverse Part Two, a tune bound to get you nodding, at the very least.

Things get dark with Gitback by Oh No, who brings haunting strings and synth effects as well as slow, menacing drums and throbbing bass together with a forcefully delivered flow. It’s a formula that pops up on a good half of the tracks here, with the extra killer bass of Baron Zen’s Theme, together with its kiddish yell, giving that vibe an extra dancefloor dimension too.

The last third of the tracks take something of a trip back to 70s soundtrack territory with some seriously funky band action and a little Latin thrown. The Jazzistics give that something of an avant-garde jazz slant, although James Pants then gives us an almost Moodymann style slow groove with rolling drums and insistent percussion together with crowd woops and a repetitive deep voiced command and Arabian Prince rounds things off with some genuine 80s sounding electro.

It’s an interesting journey through a few decades of hip hop influences as they sound now, and one that will be a treat for anyone into that genre’s non-chart excursions.

Rating: 8.5/10

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Tracklist:
1.   Chrome Dreams
2.   Rhymes With An L
3.   Living For The City
4.   Stay With Me
5.   Reverse Part 2
6.   Gitback
7.   Money Motivated Movements
8.   Selah's Children
9.   BZ Theme (Danny Breaks Remix)
10.   Happy Now?
11.   Bubbha's Dance
12.   Soul Traveling
13.   Keep Running Away (Egon's Edit)
14.   Marcus, Martin and Malcolm
15.   Murder
16.   Strange Life

This was a RTRFM Full Frequency album feature.

Label: Basement Digs/Creative Vibes