Few outside of the Midwest took notice back in 1991 when
MC Breed debuted with
da Flint Crew (
DFC). At the time he was mostly a local phenomenon, stressing the word "phenomenon" because the Midwest didn't have many rappers to call its own at the time, let alone any as talented as
Breed. Furthermore, few Midwest rappers had hits as big as
"Ain't No Future in Yo' Frontin'," the song that put
Breed on the map for years to follow and kept this album on the
Billboard R&B charts for a year. With time, however, the Flint, MI, native would become one of the more impressive rappers to emerge in the '90s, eventually moving first to L.A. to hook up with
D.O.C. and then Atlanta to hook up with
Too $hort. And it's those later efforts with
D.O.C. and
Too $hort that generally garner the most attention among those who have familiarized themselves with
Breed's
funk-laced
rap. However, it's a shame that so many listeners overlook
Breed's debut, which eventually went out of print for many years before finally being remastered and re-released by
Warlock in 2002. Yes, it's a relatively lo-fi effort, an independently released album during a time when few
rap albums were. But there is a certain sense of novelty that makes
MC Breed & DFC sound even more special with time. As mentioned, it's one of the first
rap albums to come out of the Midwest, merging the then-opposing East and West Coast sounds of the time. For example,
"Ain't No Future in Yo' Frontin'" samples
Flavor Flav's trademark "to the beat ch'all" for its intro,
Zapp's
"More Bounce to the Ounce" for its bassline, and uses the whining synth melodies
Dr. Dre made famous a year later on his
Chronic album for its hook (and a snippet of this synth hook would be sampled a year later for
Ice Cube's
"Wicked").
Breed drew equally from East and West for his sound, being as much influenced by
Too $hort and
MC Eiht as
Chuck D and
EPMD. His later albums are no doubt more polished, but none of them are as pure as this, one of the few albums to vividly document the embryonic
Midwest rap scene of the time. ~ Jason Birchmeier
