in 1989 hoodlum priest released their debut album, heart of darkness, on ztt records. due to an excess of uncleared samples from films such as bladerunner, robocop etc, the album was quickly withdrawn and deleted.
luckily i managed to get a copy of the cd version and due to the bands use of rock noise, beats, and samples it totally hit the spot.
one thing lead to another, and the band effectively became a solo project of derek thompson, who then would drag in various cohorts as and when required, often from the apollo 440 gang.
after the ztt fiasco, the band released a few eps, explored drum and bass, and in 98 released a largely ignored follow up album, hoodlum priest.
and that’s been about it (bar a couple of high profile remixes for pwei.)
a website appeared a few years ago through which you could listen to the bands catalogue, but still, things remained silent.
until a couple of months ago, when out of the blue, hoodlum priest appeared on twitter.
i only found out when an old tweet of mine that referred to the band got ‘liked’ by @hoodlum23, which turned out to be derek himself.
then a few weeks later, derek posted the image above, referencing a radio show he was going to broadcast.
having got a copy of the broadcast in full 320, i can confirm it’s rather special.
120 minutes of ambient/drones, dark cinematic atmosphere, and plenty of the all important vocal samples, and yes, a revving motorbike of course.
apparently, a lot of the music is unreleased hoodlum priest material, there are sections which are recognisable from the back catalogue albeit in a revised form, making this a rather special mixtape.
for a limited time, the radio show is available to download : here