Funki Porcini

by Sean Cooper Funki Porcini is artist and DJ James Braddell, whose swirling mixtures of downtempo breaks, smooth ambiance, and disjointed drumnbass helped put the Coldcut-owned, South London-based Ninja Tune label on the map. The first single from his 1995 Ninja debut, Hed Phone Sex, Long Road (with a B-side, Poseathon, littered with Bongwater samples) was featured on a number of compilations cashing in on the fashionability of trip-hop, but Porcinis brand of laidback, atmospheric breakbeat is less gimmicky than that connection suggests. His follow-up to Hed Phone Sex, Love, Pussycats, and Carwrecks, is filled with jittery, jazz-laden drumnbass with a good dose of usually quite twisted humor. Braddell played North America with the Coldcut conglomerate DJ Food as part of the 1996 Unexploded Bomb tour, and has grown increasingly in-demand as a remixer, disorganizing tracks by everyone from Journeyman to the Mike Flowers Pops. His third album in total, Ultimately Empty Million Pounds, launched in 1999 and was soon followed by an EP, Zombie. Fans waited several years for more material from Braddell, though Fast Asleep finally appeared (after a lengthy delay) in late 2002.