Beat Assailant (aka US rapper Adam Turner) and Danny Wild (aka Maxime Lebidois) have been working on together since BA’s arrival in France in 2003. A couple of years later they released the album Hard Twelve and now the ‘difficult’ follow up preceeds some high profile live gigs.

Already building on 200 plus gigs including supporting Kanye West at the Nice Jazz Festival (wow! that sounds good), this is proper big-band of Stanislas Augris, Nicolas Gueguen, Thbault Renard, Maxime Pinto, Bertrand Luzignant, Janice Leca, Dj Pfel, Gaye Sidibe, Danny Wild and Beat Assailant! Think of Earth Wind & Fire/Kool & The Gang/Prince goes hip-hop, it’s that type of old skool.

I don’t pick these past masters lightly as they were/are all massive in their day and apart from the music, the recently releasedImperial Pressure is a full-on 17 tracks long and it’s potentially a big album.

‘The Good News’, ‘Beter Than Us’, ‘Crash The Party’, ‘Payback’ can cross-over the hip-hop soul funk, the laidback, ‘Don’t Call’ and I like the 007 string arrangement of the ‘Charlie White’. Other highlights include ‘Play By The Rulez’ and ‘Be Still’; in fact, any tracks with the added vocals of Janice Leca on them.

And if there is a down side to the album, I think the principle ‘less is more’ would have helped keep the focus as 17 tracks is about five too many. Like whee the trumpet gets faded out on ‘Don’t Call’ or the last track ‘The Bad News’ or ‘4080 Part II’, ‘Jump Out Boyz’ and the jam ‘Interlude’; all these tracks deserve to be longer. Hopeflly they’d get extended ‘live’ versions as these guys must rock on stage; err..jazz, err. funk. BA’s back in London town on 21st November and elsewhere (see below), definitely worth checking out.

Forthcoming Live Dates
01 Nov 2008 - VIP St Nazaire (44)
07 Nov 2008 - Centre Culturel TORCY (77)
09 Nov 2008 - Festival Jazz E Beijing
15 Nov 2008 - Concert Shanghai
21 Nov 2008 - JAZZ CAFE, London
22 Nov 2008 - Le Grand Mix Tourcoing
28 Nov 2008 - Bataclan, PARIS
29 Nov 2008 - CC Paul Baillart Massy, Palaiseau (91)
05 Dec 2008 - la presqu’île Annonay, Annonay

Reviewed: Beat Assailant - Imperial Pressure (Dirty Dozen Records/Notre P’tite Entreprise) Cat. No.: 6100505 Release date: 13th October 2008
Tracklisting:
1 The Good News (3:32)
2 Better Than Us feat. JRF & Mani Hoffman (4:49)
3 Trust (Part I) (3:10)
4 Trust (Part II) (1:31)
5 Crash The Party (3:28)
6 Interlude (1:23)
7 Payback (4:10)
8 Charlie White (Album Version) (4:10)
9 Haterz (4:13)
10 4080 (Part I) (2:34)
11 Didn’t Call (3:26)
12 BA’s Back (In Town) (4:00)
13 4080 (Part II) (1:31)
14 Jump Out Boyz (3:17)
15 Play By The Rulez (4:02)
16 Be Still (3:15)
17 The Bad News (Outro) (2:26)

Links
www.myspace.com/hardtwelve
www.myspace.com/dannywildbeatassailant
www.dirtydozenrecords.com
www.jazzcafe.co.uk