Mr B The Gentleman Rhymer

The Jive monkey is one of those innocuous little clubs that make you feel like you’ve earned your music and beer just by finding it. Tonight’s benefit (raising money for the musicians performing) has been organised by the illustrious philanthropist and outspoken crack addict, the Gentleman Rhymer Mr B. His new long-player record The Tweed Album comes out in June and in anticipation he’s been re-enforcing some of the tunnels carved out in the underground scene by his controversial first release, December 2010’s I Say!

In case you haven’t had your ear to the ground, there’s a hot new movement bubbling under the UK Acid House scene and come June it’s going to boil over: Chap-hop is coming straight out of Surrey, on a quest to reclaim Dance and Hip Hop for the Queen’s English and the name of the Empire.

If Mr B is General Kitchener in the war against Westwood, then tonight’s support act, We Are Goose, are the Chap-hop cavalry: Lieutenants Timothy Goose and Mr Richard Blackbeard, looking like they had to fight their way through a Dickens novel to get here, lift the lid off the seedier side of Victoriana.

Their adventures of scientific discovery lead them to clone Tim so that he can sleep with himself, and steal 15 monkeys and 12 typewriters to see how far they could get on a Shakespearian sonnet. It harkens back to the simpler, more graceful age of the gentleman scientist, who might at the end of the day pick up his opium pipe and write a song of the day’s discoveries without fear of reprise from a scientific community. In August the duo is producing a musical for the Camden Fringe about 18^th Century anatomist John Hunter featuring their only ballad, “I know I smell like the inside of dead people but can I hold your hand?”

Mr B keeps the audience spinning by rotating a few vinyl acetate pressings of the latest dance music. He introduces himself with as the Master of Ceremonies to cheers from the gaily dressed throng, most of whom, this being Brighton, met one another at the Secret Garden Party.

With the banjolele as his sword, his crusade to restore rap to the sovereignty of the Crown is one of many campaigns that this indefatigable political campaigner has undertaken. 'Let Me Smoke My Pipe' shakes an aggrieved fist at government policy and doesn’t pull any punches: “I’ll abide by the laws of your watering holes, but I won’t stand in the rain with a pack of ruddy proles”.

If you like Hip Hop but you also like Lapsang Suchong, devilled Kidneys and the comic songs of Billy Cotton, then don’t sachet awkwardly into the back of a Wu-Tang concert only to be elbowed in the face by a hoodie: join the Chap Hop movement now, HE NEEDS YOU.  

#Brighton, The Jive Monkey #Chap-hop #Hip-Hop #Mr B The Gentleman Rhymer #The Chap-Hop Business Concern #Gigs #Pete Hughes