Review: Brous One – Un Momento En El Tiempo

Brous One is a young beatmaker from Santiago, Chile inspired by 90s boom bap and jazzy styled beats. I like to think of him as the Chilean Pete Rock, and listening to his debut album, the reasoning for that comparison becomes clear. 

Brous resuscitates golden era hip hop and reanimates its carcass with new modern cybernetic limbs. Gritty drums meld with dusty horn and piano samples to breathe life into bygone era.  Each track on this album captures a distinct, nostalgic and irrefutably dope sound. The record was made through collaborations between Chile and Germany with many great artists like Hulk Hodn, Retrogott, Niko Soprano, Dennis Da Menace, Victor Frayz, Fleur Earth and more.

The instrumental joints on here are masterpieces of jazz hop. Songs like “A Moment In Time”, “Waitin’… Searchin'”, and “Siempre el Mismo” would be perfectly at home next to tracks by the likes of Large Professor, Pete Rock, Freddie Joachim or Damu The Fudgemunk. The deep sax samples on several of those beats cut through your mind like a knife through microwaved butter and coax your soul towards a state of deep relaxation. I can’t decide which of the instros I like most on this album but some could be considered as some of the best jazzy beats of the year. The beats really make this whole album unmissable for fans of jazz fusion hip hop and boom bap style.

Vocals on this LP appear in only Spanish and German from several emcees as well as the singer Fleur Earth on a slow futuristic soul jam. While I can’t comment on the lyrical content of the German raps, the sound is definitely really tight and smooth. The two tracks with Spanish raps are really great and each emcee brings a deep and thoughtful perspective to the beats which perfectly compliments the style of the record. “Zufall oder Fügung” with Fleur Earth is an unexpected yet fantastic surprise halfway through the album featuring spacey synths and an off kilter beat reminiscent of the experimental beat scene.

All in all, this is one of the best albums of the year so far. There are plenty of golden era inspired cats making music these days, but nobody does it with quite the style that Brous One does. His emulation of an older sound is simply sublime, and while it is certainly inspired by the past, the sound remains fresh and never feels outdated. For any fans of artists like Damu The Fudgemunk, Pete Rock, Hocus Pocus, Hulk Hodn, Freddie Joachim and so on.

Digital // Vinyl