polaroids of androids

Kid Kenobi - Sessions

When Ministry of Sound issued the press release for Kid Kenobi's latest Sessions CD, it literally came with the words - 'Warning: This Is Not A Breaks CD' as its first line. Which is quite possibly the most offensive thing they could have said, short of 'Warning: This Is Not A Breaks CD, PS - I Gave Your Grandma Syphilis'.

It's no secret that Kid Kenobi has been eschewing breaks for different flavors of electro, house, dub etc, and a huge deal has been made of it across the land of local dance. I mean here is the prime mover in Australian breaks, the guy who championed the sound and put Aussie breaks on the world stage by making a conscious effort to play Australian artists as much as possible in his overseas tours. I'll stop right there. I can blah blah on about him for a decade, but the point is that he embodied the sound for so many people, then he summarily dumped it like a clingy one night stand. It was like he rolled over in bed one morning, saw his ugly break beat wife and started sleeping around with the mistresses of house and electro. It's hard to place blame on him, after all, the Lady of Breaks had really let herself go. Production quality was down due to a ridiculous amount of bootlegs flooding the scene - there was hardly a popular song that didn't have a breaks mix floating around somewhere. As a result a lot of top breaks producers went elsewhere to slut it up with the house whores and electro skanks, taking their party starting anthems with them. But again, it's hard to blame them for the decline of the sound - after all, they took their talents elsewhere and applied them with due diligence. Thus now there are a bazillion electro tracks out there of varying quality, but enough top notch tracks to make the scene feel fresh and healthy.

The relevance of all this soap boxing to the CD itself is that there are quite a few tracks on the CD that ARE in fact breaks tunes. So when the hell did breaks become a dirty word only to be whispered behind closed doors the way one speaks of a romantic tryst? When did the Lady Breaks become that loser friend with the bad breath that feel sorry for enough that you have to drag her to the party but no-one hangs out with her anyway? I say shes still got some sass in her, and Ministry of Sound should stop bagging on the poor girl and give her more of an opportunity to strut her stuff around.

On that note CD one opens with a breaks track, a remix of Soul of Man's 'The Drum', and while it is a cracking tune it was unfortunately created for the sole purpose of flogging a Soul of Man remix CD since the artists in question can't seem to get around to releasing their own artist album, which sadly has been delayed about as long as Gunner's Chinese Democracy. But I digress. The CD as a whole works well not because it's not afraid to mash up various styles, but because it does it with a measure of continuity and flow that has been lacking from recent MOS releases. There is a real musical sensibility and obvious thought that has gone into mashing Sinden's 'Organ Grinder' - a wobbling tech assault on DJ Shadow's Organ Donor - with the new Basement Jaxx 'Make Me Sweat' and making it all work together. The CD ends with a smattering of electro meets rock tunes including Kenobi's first solo remix effort - a decent little tune - and the Boys Noize remix of Bloc Party's Banquet, which is an absolute screamer.

Throughout the CD MC Shureshock appears from time to time to drop a stuttering, processed rap over the beats, but his appearances are so infrequent it's like he was never really there, which is a shame because he's a guy with some real talent I think. Hell, he didn't even rate a mention on the CD cover. Ouch. You'd think a guy with the real name Cameron James Brown would get a bit more respect in a year when the godfather himself passed on. But then again, you'd probably be wrong.

The Second CD is different to anything Kenobi has attempted before, and is a roaring success. The mashing up of styles and tempos is the big thing here - it's like the Future House guru's invited the electro porn stars to hang out with the lads from Hip Hop for a massive orgy while Lady Breaks holds the camera and passes around more whipped cream. It's funky, spacy, chin stroky, commercial, underground and a million other things all wrapped into one. A real winner.

My liberal over usage of 'Styles of Music as People' aside, this is a strong release from MOS, which is nice after a couple of clunkers (Sessions 4 not included - that was hot). Plug it and turn it up, but remember: it is not a breaks CD.