Peanut Butter Wolf

Self-confessed 7" obsessive Peanut Butter Wolf has almost every hip-hop 45 ever recorded, and by 1998, he began issuing new ones as well, on his own Stones Throw label. Drafting a host of friends -- including Madlib, Karizma, Breakestra, and A-Trak -- plus a few original rare grooves from the '70s, his series got the CD compilation treatment here, and it's one of the tightest, most invigorating breakbeat releases of the year, literally packed with excellent productions, hilarious one-offs, and truly obscure funk. Madlib has some of the best tracks here (under various guises), like a remix of Quasimoto's "Microphone Mathematics" -- basically a freestyle treatment over a cut-up De La Soul sample -- and a dark track called "The Ox (Fantastic Four)." For another big highlight, "My 2600," Jeff Jank's Captain Funkaho project, turns in the meanest groove ever tied to an Atari tribute, calling off cartridges like Debbie Harry name-checks Fab 5 Freddie in "Rapture." The five tracks of older material are excellent as well, including a spaced-out children's record called "Rocket Ship," performed by the Stark Reality and apparently produced by Hoagy Carmichael, Jr. Old and new, funk and hip-hop and acid rock, it all flows together perfectly on this collection of rare grooves, with more attitude than Big in Wigan and better productions than a dozen Irv Gottis. ~ John Bush, All Music Guide