Breakbeat has a new home in the Hub: Wednesdays at the Phoenix Landing. Allied with BostonBreaks.com and Satellite Records, the weekly “TENSION” night has been hosting ripping, b-boy-style sets for the dance massive. Breakbeat is a techno offshoot that speeds up hip-hop to create a frenetic, syncopated rhythm upward of 140 beats per minute. Slower than jungle or trance, breakbeat is easier to dance to, and poppers and lockers consider it the music of choice. You need only peep at the YouTube.com links at b-boy sites to see how it can energize a dance floor — entire crews battle with exquisitely complex breakdancing moves that make Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo look like Sesame Street.
“Tension” is the night of DJ MELEE (a/ka Jay Giacoppo; see Q&A, below); by day he’s the general manager of Satellite Records on Mass Ave, and by night (surprise) he’s a DJ. (He recently opened for MISSTRESS BARBARA at Avalon, and he opens for JAMES ZABELIA at Axis next Thursday, February 23.) A fixture in Boston club culture, he’s repped the scene from Miami’s Winter Music Conference to the Nevada desert during Burning Man. Giacoppo’s midweek throwdown has already hosted DJs from Great Britain’s thriving breaks scene, as well as DJs from LA (Brian Thomas) and NYC (Reid Speed) and New England kids from Vermont and Portland. This Wednesday, “Tension” hosts DEEP IMPACT – a disciple of the “nu skool” Brit scene and by all accounts the biggest name the night has brought in yet. Look for more Brit love with 30HZ on March 8 and CUT & RUN on March 15.
On deck for the next MARINATE , at the Milky Way in JP on February 24: an evening of indie hip-hop featuring AWKWARD LANDING and MC EXPOSITION , both students of the Def Jux/Freestyle Fellowship independent axis. “I think Awkward’s starting to grow beyond the local scene’s borders,” says Marinate resident DJ KNIFE , “and I think they will start seeing more of a national recognition.” The trio ( J-RING , NOTHING NORMAL, and PETE PRODUCTIONS ) released a full-length, What’s Eating Awkward Landing? , last summer on Semantics Records. MC Expo, on the other hand, has a mellow cadence like Bubba Sparxxx or Digital Underground’s Shock-G. On the jazzified “50 Million Pictures,” Expo makes no bones about repping Boston: “Early in the morning waking up I go to class/Take a train to JFK/UMass/In B-B-B-Boston.” His album The Metro came out in 2003 on Marxminship Records and is available at www.cdbaby.com. “His new material is fire,” says Knife. “And what I appreciate most about Awkward and Expo are their attitudes. From the day I met them they are just chill cats that haven’t copped an attitude from acquiring some local and national fame.” . . . UTOPIA BOSTON always throws great birthday parties and this Sunday will be no different. Celebrating Aquarius style are DJ KC HALLETT and BOB DIESEL . Diesel, who co-hosts WMBR’s Progressive Black , began DJing at 13 and learned the trade under such figures as Arthur Baker and Eddie Rivera in NYC before moving to Boston in 1987. . . . If you see the UNLOCKEDGROOVE crew out and about anytime soon, chances are you’ll hear the latest EP from SCORCHIO (a/k/a HEEMIN YANG and CAMERON MARLOW ), which just got back from the plant. Titled En Fuego , it’s four cuts of luscious, fire-lick techno. The slicing lead track, “Hate Me Not,” gets a disciplined rework from Boston godfather FRED GIANNELLI on the A-side and the B gets two gems, “Inverted Burning People” and “Nervous?”
