B-boying is generally accepted as one of the four elements of hip-hop (along with DJing, MCing and graffiti), and Benson Lee’s 2007 documentary Planet B-Boy, is a mad insight into one of dance’s least understood subcultures. Following several different b-boy crews as they attempt to win the prestigious Battle of the Year competition, human struggle meshes with awe-inspiring physical insanity to spawn a mesmerizing hour and a half of rhythmic viewing. At times, admittedly, it does stray into sentimental territory but I managed to dispel comparisons to the woeful world of X-Factor and spent God knows how long trying to lift myself off the ground with one arm and spin in a circle. It didn’t work and I think I’ve broken my neck. I’m writing this with my tongue. Please get help.

Stop! Trailer time.

Here’s a video of Emalkay being interviewed at “And Here it is, The Return of Fall Massive” in Baltimore a couple of weeks back. He chats a bit about how the UK and US dubstep scenes differ and mentions a few producers he’s currently hot for, it’s all very civil.

The best part, however, is the fact that he’s from Birmingham and doesn’t even mention the Bullring once. I swear to God I’m telling the truth…

Here’s a recent interview of Benga by the folks over at Raw Juice Records. It’s just a standard bunch of questions, but it’s pretty interesting to see where he is in regard to producing, DJing and the whole dubstep scene right now. In 10 years, he reckons he’s going to be on a yacht banging some ladies whilst dubstep makes it large on the gay scene. Why the hell not? In 10 years I could be lying in a hammock in the middle of the jungle or suiting up to fly to the moon, it’s going to be 2020 for fuck’s sake.

Head over to Raw Juice to give them some love. They can’t spell ‘necklace’ but hey, they’re Norwegian. I can’t spell anything in Norwegian. I can’t even say anything in Norwegian. Maybe I should learn Norwegian.

This post isn’t to do with music, so I’ve placed it in our seldom used and fairly enigmatic “Lifestyle” category. Taxonomy aside, I am now proudly addicted to CurrentTV’s Vanguard series and it’s all because they love to investigate guns, gangs, drugs and injustice. Anything remotely dangerous or controversial, for some unknown reason, tends to float my boat. If you were a television producer trying to specifically target me, then you’d create a show called: ‘Brutal Gangs: The Guns, The Drugs, The Bitches’. Perfect.

I’ve attached a new episode of Vanguard after the jump. Entitled ‘Forest of Ecstasy’, this instalment is presented by Adam Yamaguchi and investigates the recent proliferation of illegal safrole oil factories in the forests of Cambodia. Safrole oil, for those of you who don’t know, is the main ingredient used to make ecstasy, so it’s a bit of a big deal in South America. I have no idea why I find this shit so interesting.

Hold tight, there is more to read »

How long has it been since we last saw you? A fair while, I imagine. We’d be sorry for not providing you with the hordes of musical goodness you’re used to, but we’re quite selfish, so instead we’ll just return to doing what we do best and post some stuff about how we like babybels and beer far more than auto-tune.

On a serious note, we are switching things up here a bit and have streamlined everything, with less categories and some periodical articles which will hopefully have you coming back for more. We also have plans for a weekly radio show in the works, but don’t tell the man because he’ll just try to keep us down with his fiery stick.

We’ve also entered the social domain and would appreciate it if you got your fat little fingers over to Twitter, Last.fm, Technorati and Facebook and decided to support us. Whilst you’re at it, you may as well subscribe to our RSS too, because who wouldn’t want to get daily updates?

Oh and you can comment again! Do let us know what you think of the new design. Peace.