Edan - Echo Party

As a producer, emcee and turntablist, Boston's Edan sits in the detailed-obsessive corners of hip-hop's grand world. The quirky nerd who knows rap's history better than most spotlighted superstars, Edan Portnoy has built his reputation around crafting beats that pay ode to the boom-bap sound of vintage hip-hop and an oddball eccentric persona that resembles the lampooning nature of early De La Soul. On Echo Party, the request was simply. Take the back catalog of dissolved 80's disco and rap label's like Magic and P&P and create something new. Rather than fashion a generic mix, Edan turns every track inside out, utilizing turntables, tape echo, guitar, moog and kazoos to manipulate every sound into a serious thirty-minute playlist of continuous old-school bliss. Whether playing tracks backwards or filtering them through panning delays, Echo Party is a b-boy's daydreamed soundtrack come alive. And keeping his neurotic front alive, Edan line-lists every knob turning and segue-way in the liner notes, down to the second. For listeners and beat-heads alike.