One of the Dj's who I have much respect for and also I'm privileged to know personally is my "Pare", the west coast homeboy, Dj Rhettmatic. Rhett forwarded me this dope ass live session with his world famous crew the Beat Junkies. I'll let him get thorough on y'all about the details...
Peace Everyone,
Happy New Years! I thought I share some old live recordings of the Beat Junkies to start off the new year.....
This particular recording was a recorded live in Japan in the August of 2002. We were celebrating our 10 Year Anniversary of the Beat Junkies throughout the whole year.....the crew was founded in 1992 and we are probably the last of the remaining 3 major Turntabist crews that came out in the early 90's during the Turntablists/Battle Djs Golden Era. The Invisibl Skratch Piklz broke up and the X-Ecutioners no longer have the original member line up and went thru a couple of line up changes before they took a break (the X-Ecutioners later came back together with original members Rob Swift, Roc Raida, Total Eclipse with new members Precision & Boogie Blind....Mr. Sinister left the group after their 2nd album dropped).
Also during that time, alot of stuff was going on with the crew. We officially started our label, Beat Junkie Sound, as well as making that transition into a small business corporation. We dropped a few vinyl singles as well as releasing the 1st Turntable Instrumental album by our fellow Beat Junkie, D-Styles. The breakthrough album was called "Phantsmagoria". J.Rocc, Melo-D, & myself were special guests on Dilated Peoples' "Expansion Team" album, recording a song with Babu called "Dilated Junkies". We were doing productions, dropping mixtapes left and right, & doing scratches for Hip Hop records. We dropped our 1st ever DVD called "Private Stash" and half of the crew (Babu, J.Rocc, Melo-D, Mr. Choc, Icy Ice, Curse, & myself) were on the airwaves, both on 2 major Radio stations in LA: Power 106 & 92.3 The Beat. We were still doing our monthly event, "Nightlife", at the Knitting Factory in Hollywood (we started NIGHTLIFE around 2001). Babu was pretty much involved with Dilated and myself with the Visionaries.....and for the most part, this was time when all four of us (Babu, Melo-D, J.Rocc, & myself or sometimes the combo would interchange with either Shortkut and/or D-Styles in the line-up as well) would still tour & perform heavily as a group.
So fast forward to August 2002, Dilated Peoples & the Beat Junkies were asked to perform at the Technics' 30 Yr Anniversary to commemorate the 30 years that the Technics 1200 Turntable has been around in the business. Dilated & ourselves were the headliners, but we were also sharing the stage with Japan's very own Heavyweights: Dj Muro, Dj Krush, & Mighty Crown (Japan's top Reggae Soundsystem & the 1st Japanese crew to win the Reggae World Soundclash). We were able to extend our trip to throw a "NIGHTLIFE" event in Japan and to celebrate the Junkies' 10 Yr. Anniversary. My main man Koreishi (he used to work for a import company called "Metrolounge") helped to coordinate our 10 Yr Anniversary.......At the our Anniversary show, we had Dj Tashi (92 DMC Japan Champ) do an opening party rocking set and of course we had Rakaa Iriscience handling the mic duties. This was a 2 Hour performance/party rocking set; 5 turntables, 4 mixers, 2 Pioneer EFX500 boxes, & the real kicker.....RECORDS! Yes people, this was waay before the Serato explosion. Anyways, the first 5 minutes is basically us rocking a Turntable band set (basically all of us on one turntable each: Babu = Lead Vocals, Melo-D = Lead Guitars, J-Rocc = Percussion & Rhythm Section, & me = The Drummer). The rest of the mix is pretty much our individual party rocking sets gettin down, "Beat Junkie Style". Evidence (Dilated Peoples), Dj Muro, GM Yoshi, & Key-Kool (Visionaries) were in the crowd.
So yeah, a little blast from the past for all you turntable junkies/dj afficinados...giving you a taste what we were doing in 2002. Just in case you're not familar with what the Beat Junkies were pretty known for or don't have a grasp what we were doing in the first 5 minutes of this recording, here's a youtube footage of us of our last Dj battle before we retired from the Dj battle competition circuit:
THE BEAT JUNKIES - 1998 ITF WORLD CHAMPIONS: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5WwqTUq6--g
Happy New Year again...enjoy folks.
Rhettmatic
Beat Junkies
Visionaries
http://www.myspace.com/rhettmatic
PS. Don't forget to check out my man J.Rocc's music blog: http://www.stoneyjackson.blogspot.com
DOWNLOAD LINK: http://www.zshare.net/audio/53538674de8db3c5/
FILE NAME: THE BEAT JUNKIES - LIVE IN JAPAN-10 YR ANNIVERSARY.mp3
1. The Beat Junkies: Babu, J.Rocc, Melo-D, & Rhettmatic (4 man Turntable Band)
BABU -
2. 1, 2 Check It - Maestro Fresh Wes ft. Showbiz
3. Stress Rmx - Organized Konfusion ft. Large Professor
4. Can't Stop The Prophet - Jeru The Damaja
5. R.A.G.U. - Ghostface Killah
RHETTMATIC -
6. Eric B Is President - Eric B & Rakim
7. I Got It Made - Special Ed
8. Definition - Blackstarr
9. Oh My God - A Tribe Called Quest
MELO-D -
10. My World Premiere - Charizma & Peanut Butter Wolf
11. KnickKnack 2002 - Wildchild
12. WhenImOnDaMic - Lootpack
13. Return Of The Boom Bap - Krs One
14. Rebel Without A Pause - Public Enemy
J.ROCC -
15. Who's Gonna Take The Weight? (Inst) - Gangstarr
16. The Next Movement (Inst) - The Roots
17. Lump Lump (Inst) - Sadat X
18. Pick Up The Pieces (Inst) - Muro ft. Bumpy Knuckles (Prod. by Pete Rock)
