Jansport J – MoveMeants II: The Reprise [Album Stream]

Covina, Calif.’s Jansport J has been making beats for ten years now, and he’s spent that time honing a fantastically distinctive, singular sound. His sprawling new album (“epic” is the most criminally overused word across the whole internet, but you can make a pretty good case that it’s the correct word here) Movemeants II: The Reprise, lays out thirty tracks of his signature heavy-duty, bass-y Dilla-worshipping boom-bap, but what makes it an unmistakably Jansport J tape is the aesthetic consistency- these are beats for dark places.

Basements, warehouses and run-down clubs in the wrong part of town are all well represented here, with thick bass slapping hard throughout the album and atmospheric Rhodes flourishes and string samples doing very little to lighten things up. J manages to keep it funky, throughout, though- don’t think for a minute that just because these beats are tough, dark and foreboding that Movemeants II: The Reprise isn’t any fun. It’s just the kind of fun you can only have late at night, which is typically the best kind anyway.

Purchase: Jansport J – MoveMeants II: The Reprise [Bandcamp]