Brokin English Klik – Brokin English Klik LP

Wild Pitch (1993)

Every Wednesday, in honor of Ed Lover Dance Day from Yo! MTV Raps, I take a break from rock and roll to write a little bit about hip hop. In the late 80s and early 90s hip hop ruled my musical life. During this often called 'Golden Era' I discovered so much incredible music. As I am slowly replacing the CDs I've had for thirty plus years with vinyl copies, I'm going to talk about some albums that had a really important impact on me during some very formative years.

If you look at some of the labels releasing music during the golden era of hip hop, you'd be hard pressed to find a label with more of a murderer's row of great albums than Wild Pitch.  At various points they had Gang Starr, Ultramagnetic MC's, O.C., The Coup, The U.M.C.'s and Main Source among others.Another group they had maybe wasn't as renowned then or remembered now was Brokin English Klik.

I certainly wasn't aware of these guys when they were originally out and releasing records.  But having discovered them later, I can't really understand why they didn't break through more.  I'm positive I would have loved it back then and this probably would have been one of those records that I had on repeat pretty non stop.  The album was produced by one of the members, Da Mad Scientist Phase.  

Digging around, I can't see that he ever worked on any other albums, but his production on this album is just tremendous.  It's rugged with tons of low end bass.  From song to song, the bpms change, with some tracks being fast and others slowing things down.  It has all of the hallmarks of my favorite albums of that era and shows just how much hip hop can be elevated when a song's production is more robust than one beat just repeated ad nausea with someone rapping with no chorus or hook.  The beats ebb and flow, dynamically changing within a track to further highlight the lyrics.  It feels like a lost art to me and it's why I tend to find most hip hop production boring these days (that and so much of it today is just so slow).

As far as how the microphones are handled, I'd put this up against most records records that came out in 1993 and I think it holds up just fine.  Is it lyrically among the most elite of that year?  No, but it's good and is enhanced by how great the beats are.  Sadly, the only vinyl of this album that was released was the bare bones Wild pitch generic sleeve with a sticker gimmick.  I'm glad to have it period, but if there's an album that is looking for a delux 90s Tapes style treatment, I would definitely nominate Brokin English Klik.

Brokin English Klik – Brokin English Klik:
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