AMG Review of Mix Tape

Stewart Mason
All Music Guide

This is getting slightly ridiculous. 2004's The Mix Tape is the third compilation covering MC Breed's early-to-mid-'90s career on the Wrap label. However, after 1995's remix-heavy The Best of Breed and 2002's Chopped and Screwed (which was part of the short-lived fad, led by the late DJ Screw, of slowing down records until they had the woozy, disorienting feel of a cough-syrup high), The Mix Tape is really the first single-disc sampler that presents the rapper's best tracks in their original and best versions. MC Breed's gift is his musical dexterity as much as his lyrical skills: 1991's "Ain't No Future in Yo Frontin'" pointedly uses elements from both the East Coast and West Coast hip-hop styles of the time to comment on the uselessness of turf wars, and although later records find the Michigan native rebased in Atlanta and incorporating more of a Dirty South funk flair to his music, songs like the chilling, piano-based "Everyday Ho" and the P-Funk style of "This Is How We Do It, Pt. 1" show that MC Breed is never completely beholden to one style.