Album Review: Bodywash by Mndsgn

The last few years have seen a marked change in the beat making scene. In days gone by artists relied on collaborations with MCs to get their music noticed. However, recently there has been a growth of a scene which places the beat makers and producers at the fore. This hip-hop evolution has thrown up some prodigious talent and LA-based Stones Throw Records has become something of a a stable for beats artists.

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Ringgo Ancheta’s come-up story is an increasingly familiar type—the independently educated bedroom producer, influenced by friends and family, whose DIY approach led him towards Los Angeles’ beat scene. What might make that story a bit more curious than others’ is that Ancheta’s path began on a rural New Jersey commune, where he grew up in the ’90s. And in the late ’00s, it brought him to run in a crew called Klipm0de alongside future Kendrick Lamar producer/collaborator Knxwledge.

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Through its intro and interludes, Bodywash offers only traces of the stumbling drums, disintegrating keyboards, and other sunbeam-gazing-through-dust-particles soundtrack elements heard on Yawn Zen. Almost completely disconnected from the lo-fi, vaguely psychedelic hip-hop of the producer's 2014 album debut for Stones Throw, this is Ringgo Ancheta's spin on modern funk, assisted by instrumentation from the likes of Swarvy (bass), Keith Askey (guitar), and Kiefer Shackelford (keyboards). It tends to be more atmospheric and less energized than the output of Dâm-Funk, but the inspiration of Ancheta's labelmate is unmistakable through all the lively keyboard work, chunky basslines that prance and prod, and adroit drum programming.

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MNDSGN's Ringgo Ancheta imagined an album on which '80s boogie/soul/funk/jazz influences meshed with the '90s R&B sound, and the result is his latest release, Body Wash. The New Jersey-raised, L. A.

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