Mo’ Wax — Where Are They Now: Beans (2000)
Mo’ Wax was a record label started by James Lavelle in 1992, which closed about ten years later. Initially they released 12" singles and licensed a compilation from Japan of Japanese Hip Hop, until 1994 when they began releasing albums of their artists original work. While some of these artists such as DJ Shadow, DJ Krush, and Money Mark continued releasing music after Mo’ Wax closed, others have seemingly disappeared from the music scene. In this series I will look at each artist on Mo’ Wax and try to find out where are they now…
In 2000 Mo’ Wax created a spin-off label called Vecta. It put out four 12" singles by Beans, Divine Styler, Lenky, and Atmos. Only Divine Styler released anything further on Mo’Wax, but each artist continued releasing new music elsewhere too.
Beans is the aliases of Robert Stewart, a founding member of Antipop Consortium who formed in 1997 and became known as an “Alternative Hip Hop” group.
Made up of three MCs, Beans, High Priest (Kyle Austin), M. Sayyid (Maurice Greene), and producer Earl Blaize, several members had worked together previously, such as on releases by Shä-Key produced by Blaize, and The Blank Slates, a group formed by Beans and High Priest before Antipop Consortium. Described as a free-improvisational hip-hop troupe, The Blank Slates were still performing live in 1998 and can be heard on a mixtape released in 1999.
For Antipop (sometimes written Anti-pop) Consortium, record labels had initially been wary of the trio of MCs, and made suggestions on how they could change their sound, such as toning down their experimentation. But the group stuck to what they did best and gained a following off the back of their Consortium mixtapes, volumes 1, 2, 3.
In 1997 they released Disorientation, a single by Priest which appeared on various mixes and later featured on Antipop Consortium’s debut album. That year the group also remixed Attica Blues’ 3ree (A Means To Be), featuring new vocals from them and frequent Antipop Consortium collaborator Apani B. Fly. It marked Beans’ debut on Mo’ Wax, which would be followed by his debut proper with his solo 12" single Nude Paper.
Released on 27 March 2000, Nude Paper was given 4/5 by Muzik who wrote, “It’s what you’d expect and none the worse for that.” The song also appeared on Antipop Consortium’s debut album Tragic Epilogue, which was released by 75 Ark around the same time. Notably, 75 Ark was a label run by Dan The Automator, who brought in Beans to guest on the debut album of his Deltron 3030 project, which also arrived in 2000.
Tragic Epilogue compiled new tracks with others from a previous mixtape, but was new to most people, and the album was awarded 5/5 by Muzik, who called it unmissable. The Wire called it the “first really great Hip Hop record of 2000", and Spin awarded it 8/10. CMJ New Music Report were also fans, listing Nude Paper among the albums highlights, while Pitchfork felt the album had “unrealized potential” and gave it 6.5/10.
At the time, Beans called the album “a eulogy to the end of hip hop,” explaining they felt the genre was at a stasis so “you kind of have to kill it to start over.”
It had been a long time coming, as Tragic Epilogue was teased as early as 1998, and that same year an EP version of Tragic Epilogue was reviewed by CMJ New Music Monthly, who wrote enthusiastically about opener Math, led by Beans:
The isolated, off-key tones are set against decaying, rounded snare volleys and a muted 909 kick drum, drowned in short-wave radio interference, and it’s as funky as ten cans of Magic Shave.
Before their album launched in 2000, Beans, High Priest, and M. Sayyid had also teamed up with DJ Vadim, initially on an exclusive 12" given out in Muzik magazine in 1998, before they formed a new group The Isolationist. Hydrogen Slush was released as this group’s first single near the end of 1998, before a self-titled album arrived in 1999. Both the single and album earned 4/5 from Muzik who ate up any chance to hear the Antipop crew while waiting for their own debut to arrive.
The Isolationist wasn’t their only alias during this period, as in 2001 the group released Diagnol Ryme Garganchula 2.0, a new EP as Tri-Pinnacle. But they weren’t done with the Antipop Consortium just yet, and also released Shopping Carts Crashing, a Japan-exclusive album in 2001. This was followed by Arrhythmia in 2002, released in the UK by Warp where it entered the Independent Albums Chart at #29.
This album led to tours with Radiohead and DJ Shadow, but six months after Arrhythmia had released Antipop Consortium broke up. A final album Antipop Vs. Matthew Shipp, a collaboration with pianist Matthew Shipp, was released in 2003 and was their only album to enter the Billboard charts, reaching #22 on the Jazz Albums Chart and #11 on the Traditional Jazz Albums Chart.
By then the group had already moved on to new projects and in March 2003 Muzik announced “Beans has won the race to be the first former Anti-Pop Consortium member to put out a solo release”.
Although a solo EP Breath Made Visible had been announced as coming soon in 1998, this appears to have remained unreleased, and excluding the Nude Paper 12" on Mo’ Wax, Beans made his solo debut with the album Tomorrow Right Now on Warp.
Tomorrow Right Now received mixed reviews in the UK, with Muzik giving it 2/5, while Uncut, Mojo, and Q Magazine were equally unimpressed. In the US, Pitchfork awarded it 7.1/10, Spin gave it B+, and Billboard wrote it was “a compelling and surprisingly concise package that makes most mainstream hip-hop look somewhat lazy by comparison.”
While Beans was solo, High Priest and M.Sayyid toured and released music together as Airborn Audio. But their 2005 album Good Fortune was panned by Spin, while Pitchfork wrote it didn’t compare well to their earlier work with Antipop Consortium.
Later, in 2007 Antipop Consortium announced they had reformed with the full original lineup, and discussed plans for a new album. First they released a compilation of unreleased songs from 1996–98, including the previously mentioned Math, before their new album Fluorescent Black arrived in 2009 as the group went on tour.
The new album earned favourable reviews, with Exclaim suggesting it might be “the best Anti-Pop Consortium album to date”. Beans explained how it came together:
We always kept in touch with each other. It was just a matter of timing. We were never all in the same place at the same time. But then at my birthday party in 2007, we were all there and were like, ‘Let’s do this.’
After touring together, the group split again in 2009. High Priest and M.Sayyid went back to their Airborn Audio group, and Beans continued to release solo work. In 2011 Beans, High Priest and Earl Blaize collaborated with Matthew Shipp for a second time on the album Knives From Heaven, and in 2012 Antipop Consortium performed live again and created a soundtrack to the short film The Snorks: A Concert for Creatures. But Beans was no longer part of the group.
Between 2011 and 2017 Beans released no albums, but returned in 2017 with three albums and a novel, including Love Me Tonight which includes High Priest on several tracks, and was recorded by Earl Blaize.
Since then, Beans has consistantly released albums each year, with over 15 albums in total between 2003–2020.
April 2021 saw his most recent release, Bermuda Serpent Saliva Man/ Viragor, with more on the way, as Beans recently explained. “The next five is already scheduled. I know what I’m gonna do. I got to pump the brakes a little bit, catch my breath…I put out eight albums in three years, something like that. I’m tired…I need to recharge.”
