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London Posse03 June 2008
All that talk of Rodneys reminded me of the UK’s other Rodney, (no, not him, although I love him too,) and his Hip Hop group, London Posse:
In 1986 the UK Beatbox Sipho, (check out this great clip of him here) was asked to support Mick Jones’ brilliant Big Audio Dynamite on tour around the USA. He took Rodney P, Bionic and DJ Biznezz and whilst spending time in New York, (doing things like watching the making of this,) the group often found themselves referred to as ‘London Posse’. The name stuck and the group returned to London, recording one single, produced by Tim Westwood before Sipho and Biznezz left.
Rodney P and Bionic then went onto release a few singles before recording their only album, the classic: ‘Gangster Chronicle’ .
Although very much in debt to New York Hip Hop of the late 80s/early 90s, Gangster Chronicle is still a very British album. The beats maybe a mix found somewhere between a Boogie Down Productions style and a reggae one but the delivery and attitude, with Rodney P especially, could not be more British.
As described pretty well above, times were pretty tough (when haven’t they been?) for UK Hip Hop and although Gangster Chronicle sold reasonably well, the label they were on (Mango, an imprint of Island,) folded and London Posse found themselves without a record contract. The band never got to make a proper second record, but did put out the odd classic single:
Although the lack of a follow up to such a classic can be seen as a bit of travesty, sometimes, I think that maybe its quite good they left on such a high, (take note other Rodney,) and with that only good memories.
I’ll leave your with my favorite track off Gangster Chronicle, ‘Money Mad.’ It was the big single that got them album deal in the first place. Unfortunately their wasn’t a video made for it and i don’t like posting up free mp3s (go and buy the album!) so here’s a youtube that plays the track but only shows the album cover, ENJOY:
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