DJ Format

Few hip hoppers epitomise the american dream quite in the same way that Dj Format does, disregard the fact he’s from Brighton and he’d be up there with Eminem and Jay-Z… Well maybe not but he’s come a long way from merely being the driver on Jurassic 5’s first UK tour though his career started in 1995 with the group Suspekt.

It took until 1999 for a record to bear DJ Format’s name the fantastic ‘English Lesson’. After becoming chummy with Pablo from The Micronauts he hooked up with seminal label Mo’Wax which lead to the awesome ‘Last Bongo In Brighton’ and classic remixes namely Nigo’s ‘March Of The General’ and Major Force’s ‘Re Return To The Original Artform’. He has toured with DJ Shadow across the UK and would be described in the hip hop press as ‘Backpack’ owing to the preferred receptacle of his mainly male fans.

His debut ‘Music For The Mature Boy’ released in 2003 was hailed as a masterpiece by all who heard it which unfortunately was only the UK rap media and its followers. His second LP the excellently titled ‘If You Can’t Join ‘Em Beat Em’ is good enough to change this but general apathy among the record buying people to UK hip hop will certainly hinder its progress.