Every land is a beach, every man is an elephant. Bow down to the sounds of the Elephant Beach, the newest project between Chicago native Thaione Davis and Swiss beatmaker J Sayne. An album made in the midst of the European-American collabo trend that started off for real with the Foreign Exchange album.

‘People Of Today’ is a collage of observations: social commentary, random musings about everyday events, moral shifts and human behaviour. Although this album deals with today’s generation, we dare to say The 1978ers made a time document.

Underground heroes One Be Lo (on 'Lettin You Know') and Mac Lethal (on 'My Kingdom') are compatible to the sound of the album, and while their debut release from 2006 'Haven’t You heard?' remains mostly negatively answered (literally, in sales, and figuratively, as in an answer to the question in the album title), 'The Sacred Document' is your and their chance to get acquainted with each other.

The world ain’t no pretty place. Gloomy, pitch black synthesizers tinge like a threatening thunder sky. Steady drums pre-echo the clicking hoofs of the Apocalypse’s horses.

A feature by Martin Luther, an excerpt from the movie 'The Education of Sonny Carson', and a quote like 'Why these industry dudes push white rock?'…if this was a movie, it would be a Spike Lee flick!

Craziness on 'Rhymes I Sniff aka Carlos Died', a spacey hardcore beat with aggressive lyrics. In the same way is 'How the Fuck You Get A Record Deal', one of the most aggressive tracks against wack MC’s ever made in hip-hop.

The combination of DJ Doc’s creative, multi-sampling production and Lord Shafiq’s flow is great and makes this album a must-have and the year 1989 even more legendary.

None the less funk is back in hip-hop. If you would translate a good ol' Bomb Squad produced album or an early Ice Cube and Erick Sermon production to the year 2006, it probably would sound something like this. Boots Riley is the Bootsy Collins of hip-hop and has managed to put together a great thing on his own, puttin The Coup back on the map, having us reminiscing on the excellent 'Steal This Album' (what we actually did, but only to get in the spirit of the album, shhht!).

With a voice timbre that comes close to King Sun’s, the true Underlord’s raps are raw, sinister and rigid, adding more mystery to his persona than the mask he's wearing (yes, there are more similarities with the inspiror).

In the end you gotta give Bomshot credit for completin the album, he did a nice job by letting it sound as one whole and as a natural thing. While the story behind it is definitely as entertaining as the album itself, this shouldn’t keep you from checkin it out and give it some play. It’s good, hardcore and massive music.

The E.N.D. has sucked up the creativity that wanders around in the lively West Coast underground scene, and ‘Spark The Underground’ is clearly a product of the environment.

Claude 9 and Highway 411 are celebratin over twisted samples, quivering basslines and quirky drums, talking about their daily habit of tokin the Dutch, supported by movie quotes and short stories.