The massive second album by PE – and the one where where the hit their full creative stride, and their politics and philosphy hit at full force – moving Public Enemy from an imposing threat to both the hip hop and pop music status quo to a straight up cultural phenomenon! There's little we can add to canon of critical regard this unimpeachable classic – just know that it's as essential as any hip hop album of the era. Includes "Bring The Noise", "Don't Believe The Hype", "Prophets Of Rage" and "Rebel Without A Pause", "Cold Lampin With Flavor", "Terminator X To The Edge Of Panic", "Louder Than A Bomb", "Caught, Can We Get A Witness", "She Watch Channel Zero", "Night Of The Living Baseheads", "Black Steel In The Hour Of Chaos", "Prophets For Right To Fight" and more. LP, Vinyl record album

The massive second album by PE – and the one where where the hit their full creative stride, and their politics and philosphy hit at full force – moving Public Enemy from an imposing threat to both the hip hop and pop music status quo to a straight up cultural phenomenon! There's little we can add to canon of critical regard this unimpeachable classic – just know that it's as essential as any hip hop album of the era. Includes "Bring The Noise", "Don't Believe The Hype", "Prophets Of Rage" and "Rebel Without A Pause", "Cold Lampin With Flavor", "Terminator X To The Edge Of Panic", "Louder Than A Bomb", "Caught, Can We Get A Witness", "She Watch Channel Zero", "Night Of The Living Baseheads", "Black Steel In The Hour Of Chaos", "Prophets For Right To Fight" and more. LP, Vinyl record album

Public Enemy gave us plenty of knowledge and power back in the day – and we maybe need their message more than ever in 2020 – a year that marks their return to their original home at Def Jam! The group have help from plenty of guests here – maybe more so than they would have had back in the day, but very much in keeping with the legacy they inspired – in a lineup that includes Questlove, DJ Premier, Cypress Hill, Impossebulls, Black Thought, Nas, YG, Run DMC, Mike D, Ad Rock, and even George Clinton! The tunes have plenty of old school PE vibes – and titles include "Go At It", "Rest In Beats", "RIP Blackat", "Grid", "State Of The Union", "Toxic", "Yesterday Man", "Fight The Power Remix 2020", "Beat Them All", and "Smash The Crowd". LP, Vinyl record album

... LP, Vinyl record album

... 7-inch, Vinyl record

... 12-inch, Vinyl record

... LP, Vinyl record album

... 7-inch, Vinyl record

... 12-inch, Vinyl record

Noisy Sonny from the 80s – very much in a "jazz meets black rock" mode – and featuring a group that includes Melvin Gibbs on bass, plus double drums from Abe Speller and Pheeroan Aklaff! Bill Laswell produced, and plays a bit of guest 6 string bass on the set – and titles include "My Song", "Dick Dogs", "Fourteen", "Past Adventures Of Zydeco Honeycup", and "JD Schaa". LP, Vinyl record album

Later solo guitar free-kout by guitar legend Sonny Sharrock, accompanying himself by way of overdubs. In some ways his most exploratory work, Sonny sprays shards of melody across his patented wall of sound guitar playing. The pieces never lose momentum, even without a rhythm section, perhaps because of the frenetic energy that was the basis of his playing, though there's still the fragile beauty that's evident in all of his work. "Blind Willie" is, as you might expect, a bluesy excursion, while "Broken Toys" is Sharrock going off at his best, and there's also the amazing longer suite on side b: the "Princess Sonata". LP, Vinyl record album

The dawn of millennium classic by Dead Prez – and angry, revolution-minded effort from a period on major label hip hop that sorely lacked such strident players – and if it didn't make any huge waves commercially, that only strengthens its legacy! Sticman & M1 are at the top of their game lyrically, the beats are are exciting to this day, and it all adds up to one of the strongest politically minded hip hop records of its time. Titles include "Wolves", "Hip Hop", "They Schools", "The Pistol", "Discipline", "Enemy Lines", "Mind Sex", "Propaganda", "You'll Find A Way", "Police State", and many more. LP, Vinyl record album

A real classic from the great Fela Kuti – a seminal mid 70s record that not only shows his impeccable sense of rhythm, but also his sense of rage as well! The title track – "Expensive Sh_t" – is Fela's answer to the time that he got busted for dope, and was forced to take a dump for the cops in order to "produce the goods" (which he had cleverly hidden in his stomach). The track has a great choppy funk groove, and is filled with the kind of raw anger you can imagine that the subject matter would produce – rich emotion that not only comes out in the lyrics, but also the sharp instrumental solos! The other track on the album – "Water No Get Enemy" – is another fantastic one, with cool electric piano solos, great tenor work, and a slinkily vamping groove. LP, Vinyl record album

A very cool criss-crossing of classic and contemporary jazz cuts – all put together by the same folks who've given us the excellent Jazz Room reissue label in recent years! The vibe here is expanded past the 70s and 80s material reissued by that label – and the right use of more recent cuts really does a lot to open up the music – expanding the palette in really wonderful ways, while still holding onto plenty of the classic jazz dance modes that first started taking over the UK clubs in the early years of Gilles Peterson and some of his contemporaries! Titles include "Niger Mambo" by Chieck Tidiane Seck, "African Flutes" by Clare Fischer, "Water No Get Enemy" by Daniel Crawford, "Sounds" by Eternal Buzz Brass Band, "Don't You Want Me" by Fast 3, "Golden Brown" by Take Vibe, "The Hipster" by Florian Pellissier, "Black & Decker" by Raul Monsalve Y Los Forajidos, "Jazz Carnival" by Cruisic, and "Rebel No 27 (7" edit)" by Chip Wickham. LP, Vinyl record album

If De La Soul took the world by storm with their groundbreaking debut, they definitely pushed hip hop even farther ahead with this killer second album – a record that refines all the best impulses of the first set, and has the trio coming across with an even greater command of the space of a full length set! After a decade or more where most hip hop albums were just a string of singles and other cuts, De La (along with Public Enemy and a select few others) really helped the medium move into the realm of the album – weaving together cuts that are killer enough to be singles with all sorts of skits and album tracks, all with a vibe that has the whole thing flowing together wonderfully! The humor and wit of the group in their youth is still very much on point, as is the production work of Prince Paul – and the album bubbles over with longform imagination and careful execution that many groups could still hope to match! The samples are superb, nice and funky – and titles include "Oodles Of O's", "Talkin Bout Hey Love", "A Roller Skating Jam Named Saturdays", "Millie Pulled A Pistol On Santa", "Ring Ring Ring", "Keepin The Faith", "Bitties In The BK Lounge", "Pass The Plugs", "Pease Porridge", and "Fanatic Of The B Word". LP, Vinyl record album

A dark and murky classic from Prince Far I – a set that has his words of wisdom brewing up amidst a whole host of dubby productions from Joe Gibbs! The Prince takes dub production to fresh territory here – toasting over the tracks, but in a way that's very different than some of the more upbeat modes that you might find when a dee jay was working a crowd – and instead moodier, and more in his mind – with a sinister edge that really makes the album stand out, and which is maybe the blue print for the On-U Sound generation to come! Tracks include "Rain A Fall", "Big Fight", "Show Me Mine Enemy", "Deck Of Cards", "Young Generation", and "Heavy Manners". LP, Vinyl record album

Tracks include "Buffalo Gals" by Malcolm McLaren, "Bring The Noise" and "The Public" by Public Enemy, "You Gots To Chill" by EPMD, "Sally" by Stetsasonic, "Big Mouth" by Whodini, "Top Billin" by Audio Two, "I Got A Good Thing" by Super Lover Cee & Casanova Rud, "Jenifa" by De La Soul, and "Twist & Shout" and "Shake Your Thing" by Salt N Pepa. LP, Vinyl record album

Weird mix of stuff on here, with The Bangles, Aerosmith, Poison, Joan Jett, Roy Orbison, and Slayer – but it was the record that broke Public Enemy's "Bring the Noise" onto the world, and you've got to love it for that. Also includes LL Cool J's great "Goin' Back To Cali", one of the greatest soundtrack cuts of the 80's! LP, Vinyl record album

The dawn of millennium classic by Dead Prez – and angry, revolution-minded effort from a period on major label hip hop that sorely lacked such strident players – and if it didn't make any huge waves commercially, that only strengthens its legacy! Sticman & M1 are at the top of their game lyrically, the beats are are exciting to this day, and it all adds up to one of the strongest politically minded hip hop records of its time. Titles include "Wolves", "Hip Hop", "They Schools", "The Pistol", "Discipline", "Enemy Lines", "Mind Sex", "Propaganda", "You'll Find A Way", "Police State", and many more. LP, Vinyl record album

Livin' the "Bon Bon Vie", with this classic uptempo groover from T.S. Monk! You'd hardly guess that this guy was Thelonious Monk's son – but who cares about his roots when the album grooves so hard? This Monk plays drums, not piano, but the best tracks on the record have a tight keyboard funky soul sound that's virtually a blueprint for 80s groove – lots of jazzy elements that warm things up nicely, and a catchy rhythmic pulse that never quits! The standout cut is the classic "Bon Bon Vie", a dancefloor groover that will never die, and a huge sample for Public Enemy – but the album also includes many other great cuts, like "House Of Music", "Hot Night In The City", and "Last Of The Wicked Romancers". LP, Vinyl record album