Altered Beats: Assassin Knowledges of the Remanipulated by Various Artists (CD, May-1996, Axiom Records)

This collection of Bill Laswell productions is obviously a labor of love put together by a man who misses hip-hop's old school. Though it features artists as current as Prince Paul, DXT and New Kingdom, the album's focus on turntable scratching and a preponderance of relatively simple, monolithic beats make it sound like a period piece. That's not a bad thing, especially when Laswell imbues the proceedings with an up-to-the-minute ambience and a rumbling bass (as in bass guitar, not 808). But the complete absence of rapping — the only thing that keeps this from actually being a hip-hop record — may leave some listeners scratching their heads. Instead, we get a Bootsy Collins cameo (never a problem) and the occasional sample of a right-wing radio preacher. Some of the scratching is truly virtuosic; in particular, witness the retro-ensemble sound of the Filipino turntable group the Invisibl Skratch Picklz and the quicksilver manipulations of DJ DXT. Laswell's production overlays everything with a spacy, ambient sheen.