Just-Ice - Put That Record Back On / Latoya

This was easily one of the best Hip Hop 12"'s of '86. One of the rawest slabs of Hip Hop from that year too with 'This Girl Is A Slut' being one of the nastiest raps of all time. As a 13 year old this was just pure Hip Hop on wax with the human beatbox from DMX (the original DMX, not the one who's rapping/acting now) and Just-Ice recounting a tale of...Well, a girl he had an encounter with who did stuff while she was 'standing on her head' amongst other things. I remember playing this a lot on loud at home and my mum knocking on the wall telling me it was obscene.

'Put That Record Back On' was an anthem produced by man of the moment in '86, Mantronik, and made all the more exciting by the fact that Just-Ice and Mantronix were due to be playing over here in England at UK Fresh '86. Although there were technical difficulties during his performance at the evening show, when he came on with DMX this was an incredible moment for a kid like myself who had been listening to that 12" in the preceding weeks and seeing them doing these tunes in the flesh (I don't think they did 'This Girl', but they did 'Latoya', another classic with DMX on the beatbox). This 12" remains a concrete pillar in my Hip Hop collection and Just Ice at his best, no holds barred raw rhymin' from the original gangster of Hip Hop. He follwed this with the bonafied classic LP that is 'Back To the Old School'.