Chances are if you are reading this then you probably already know Ed Solo & Skool Of Thought. If you don’t then let me introduce to you Ed Solo, who co-writes main room breaks tunes with Krafty Kuts and had brief chart success last year with Touch Your Toes on Fatboy Slim’s Southern Fried label and Skool of Thought, who recently created a massive breaks remix of Groove Armada’s Superstylin’ but is best known as the man behind breakbeat label Against the Grain (home of Krafty Kuts and Freestylers). You may have also seen Skool Of Thought at the Chinese Laundry in Sydney earlier this year.

Together, through first-hand trial and error experience, the duo seems to have settled on a production style which works for them both on the dance floor and in the stereo. This, their first LP Random Acts Of Kindness features Darrison on vocal duties on most of the tracks, and whilst the LP is categorised as breaks, it is as various as it is one-themed. The notable breakbeat tracks are mostly that ragga style of breaks which features dub-style wobbly basslines, tight nu-skool breakbeats and ragga-style call and response MCing like the opening track Love Your Life which features Darrison and Babylon Breaks, which doesn’t. If you have trouble trying to imagine what that actually sounds like, think first half of a Krafty Kuts DJ set (with tracks like his famous SCAM collaboration Put Your Hands Up).

While this style of music could become cumbersome quite quickly, it doesn’t here. The LP is successfully broken up with light funky hip hop tracks with upbeat lyrics (like We Play The Music and Life Gets Better, both which Darrison), which is perfect for the down and out type of day that we all have sometimes, where self-indulgent ‘world ain’t so bad’ lyrics are required to even summon the energy to board the train to whatever ridiculous shit-kicking job we own. On the other hand there are bad tracks, try When I Was A Yout on for size, which is essentially a jump-up style drum n bass track but is so cliche’d it makes me embarrassed for them. A little too self-indulgent for me.

Of notable mention also is Tug Nut, tucked up all the way toward the end which features Deepcut (of Deepcut Records fame – the crew that brought that massive Put Your Hands Up tune, see above) and as far as I know is the leading single. It’s a pretty strong little breaks track, with a unique squeaky melody line which is unfortunately featured over the top of that generic hard bass line sound which is popular in big room breaks today. But I digress – it still gets high priority in my record case. Extra credit: Get the 12” and find another Ed Solo & Skool Of Thought track Terabyte which is a stripped back electro-breaks ditty perfect for warm up.

Where Random Acts Of Kindness flounders with generic drum n’ bass it flourishes with inspirational soulful hip hop, which could quite easily be construed the other way depending on what type of person you are. But no matter who you are, it must be agreed that all in all this is a very good release, Ed Solo & Skool of thought should be very proud of themselves. They seem to have attempted to create one of those all-rounder albums which focuses on every type of music that has been of influential value to them, one of those albums which is great at any time of day and perfect before a night out on the town, and kudos to them – they succeeded, because this one definitely has something for everyone. Everyone who likes breaks that is.