Benga - Diary of an Afro Warrior

  by Maarten Schiethart

published: 5 / 4 / 2008

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South London's best kept secret jumps onto the dance music stage with, to his credit, very little warning. Benga's previous twelve inch singles, recorded for the Big Apple, Planet µ and Tempa record labels, built him a huge in-crowd following and his posse is now offered the choice between buying the CD version or the LP-set of this grand debut album. Provided that you still own a turntable, I'd suggest you buy both items. The two formats differ drastically. The CD album version provides a neat sequence whereas the vinyl set captures exclusively the dancefloor essentials not available to DJ folk before. On CD the slow pumping basses, coming at you from the echo chambers, appear to be quite smooth. On vinyl, the listener does indeed sense the grit and grime of it all. Dazzling dubstep structures here provide the outset for a wild trip through urban sleaze. Benga's modest majesty is shown in how he leaves a scene before it turns sour. Benga sniffs on something exciting, then uses that, before leaving it behind. A vampire, however, Benga is not. He just has this perfect sense of timing. Irony has it that Roni Size is about to release his 'New Forms 2'. Should anyone be old enough to be able to evoke the momentum Roni Size back then shared with us, this debut album from Benga delivers just that same sense of bewilderment. A clear hint is to be found in the opening basslines to both groundbreaking albums. Benga's 'Zero M²' equals Roni Size's 'Brown Paper Bag', if you are still with me. The set of three twelve inch records, which the vinyl version comes packaged in, takes off from where Benga's last smash, underground dancefloor anthem 'Night', left off. The set leaves out the hits on vinyl; as these were released before. On the CD album a couple of these tracks sound substantially different from their original twelve inch release too. Speeded up tremendously, the excellent, original 'Crunked Up' bridged breakbeats and dubstep on vinyl, yet on CD this track now appears to embrace trance or even hardcore. The most loyal DJ type of record buyers will ,however. want to own the CD as well, simply because of the CD exclusive 'Go Tell Them'. The three EP vinyl set is a DJ-friendly LP set as they say. This set smacks grinding dubsteps right in your face. Very much to my enjoyment though; 'E Trips' is the overwhelming opening track on this set. 'E Trips' works like a nail gently hammered yet persistently into your skull to the sound of wonderful dub music. The loungy 'ZeroM2', which opens up the CD, kicks off the second platter from the vinyl set - sweet deafness and eyeblindness still persist as the ultimate goals. Digging and drilling through your earhole, this imaginary commute to South London grooves as if there's no end to it. The one last track featured on both editions of Benga's debut album is the devastatingly gorgeous '26 Basslines'. Ultimately I prefer the tailor-cut vinyl set. The exclusive tracks - 'Out Of Phaze', 'Air', 'Z', 'Twister' and 'Tech Wobbler'- put more emphasis on dancefloor quality whilst the CD introduces Benga as an allround producer. These two editions combined, 'Dairy Of An Afro Warrior' is an absolutely massive debut.

Track Listing:-

1 Zero M2
2 Night
3 B4 The Dual
4 E Trips
5 Someone 20
6 Light Bulb
7 Crunked Up
8 Go Tell Them
9 The Cut
10 Emotions
11 3 Minutes
12 Pleasure
13 26 Basslines
14 Loose Synths
15 Out of Phaze
16 Air
18 Twister
19 Tech Wobbler

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