{"id":2865,"date":"2013-05-06T22:02:32","date_gmt":"2013-05-06T21:02:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sonicrampage.org\/blog\/?p=2865"},"modified":"2026-03-31T14:14:20","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T13:14:20","slug":"guest-mix-benjy-bars-presents-the-roots-of-ruff-sqwad","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sonicrampage.org\/blog\/2013\/05\/guest-mix-benjy-bars-presents-the-roots-of-ruff-sqwad\/","title":{"rendered":"Guest Mix: Benjy Bars presents The Roots of Ruff Sqwad"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/sonicrampage.org\/blog\/2013\/05\/guest-mix-benjy-bars-presents-the-roots-of-ruff-sqwad\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/sonicrampage.org\/guestmixes\/bb\/BenjyBars-TheRootsOfRuffSqwad.jpg\" alt=\"Benjy Bars presents The Roots of Ruff Sqwad\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<h2><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/mixes-upload.pearsall.workers.dev\/guestmixes\/bb\/BenjyBars-TheRootsOfRuffSqwad.mp3\">Benjy Bars presents The Roots of Ruff Sqwad<\/a><\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><em>Right-Click, Save As to Download<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Mixed in London, May 2013<br \/>\n(54:19, 99.6 MB, 256 KBPS MP3)<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"100%\" height=\"166\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"no\" src=\"https:\/\/w.soundcloud.com\/player\/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fapi.soundcloud.com%2Ftracks%2F91037526\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/sonicrampage.org\/guestmixes\/bb\/BenjyBars-TheRootsOfRuffSqwadBIG.jpg\">Large cover<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/mixes-upload.pearsall.workers.dev\/guestmixes\/bb\/BenjyBars-TheRootsOfRuffSqwad.cue\">Cue File<\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Style: Freeform<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><!--more-->Direct link to the mix: <a href=\"https:\/\/mixes-upload.pearsall.workers.dev\/guestmixes\/bb\/BenjyBars-TheRootsOfRuffSqwad.mp3\">https:\/\/mixes-upload.pearsall.workers.dev\/guestmixes\/bb\/BenjyBars-TheRootsOfRuffSqwad.mp3<\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Tracklisting:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>01. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Anna (Instrumental)<br \/>\n02. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Anna (Instrumental)<br \/>\n03. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Tings in Boots (Instrumental)<br \/>\n04. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Tings in Boots (Vocal)<br \/>\n05. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Together (Instrumental)<br \/>\n06. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Together ft. Wiley (Vocal)<br \/>\n07. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; No Bass<br \/>\n08. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Xtra (Vocal)<br \/>\n09. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Underground (Instrumental)<br \/>\n10. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Underground (Vocal)<br \/>\n11. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Awake (Instrumental)<br \/>\n12. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Awake (Vocal)<br \/>\n13. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; It&#8217;s Nuffin (Instrumental)<br \/>\n14. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; It&#8217;s Nuffin ft Roll Deep (Vocal)<br \/>\n15. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Down (Instrumental)<br \/>\n16. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Down (Vocal)<br \/>\n17. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Clio remix<br \/>\n18. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Pied Piper (Skepta Remix)<br \/>\n19. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Pied Piper (Gods Gift vocal)<br \/>\n20. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Pied Piper (Scratchy Vocal)<br \/>\n21. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Pied Piper (Stryder Vocal)<br \/>\n22. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; From a Place (Instrumental)<br \/>\n23. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; From a Place (Vocal)<br \/>\n24. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Misty Cold<br \/>\n25. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Lethal Injection<br \/>\n26. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; An Ting<br \/>\n27. Ruff Sqwad &#8211; Functions on the Low<\/p>\n<p><i><font color=\"red\"><b>Enjoy this mix? Please consider <a href=\"http:\/\/sonicrampage.org\/blog\/2012\/08\/please-donate-to-help-keep-sonicrampage-awesome\/\">making a donation to help support Sonicrampage<\/a><\/i><\/b><\/font><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"100%\" height=\"166\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"no\" src=\"https:\/\/w.soundcloud.com\/player\/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fapi.soundcloud.com%2Ftracks%2F30874077\"><\/iframe><br \/>\n<i><a href=\"http:\/\/sonicrampage.org\/blog\/2011\/12\/pearsall-drop-the-hammer-8\/\">my own grime mix &#8230;<\/a><\/i><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/static.guim.co.uk\/sys-images\/Guardian\/About\/General\/2012\/12\/6\/1354806828663\/Tinchy-Stryder-and-Ruff-S-010.jpg\" alt=\"Ruff Sqwad\"><\/p>\n<p>Over the last year or so <a href=\"https:\/\/soundcloud.com\/benjybars\">Benjy Bars<\/a> has been posting on Soundcloud an awesome series of mixes called &#8220;The Roots of &#8230;&#8221;, each of which is a perfectly-formed little tribute to some of the key early figures in dubstep and grime, such as Dizzee Rascal, Mala, Coki, Skream, Wiley, Loefah, and more. I&#8217;ve been a big fan of the mixes, so a little while back I got in touch with Benjy to see if he would be up for one of the mixes appearing here at Sonicrampage as a guest mix, and since we are both big fans of East London grime heroes <a href=\"http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/music\/2012\/dec\/06\/a-history-of-grime\">Ruff Sqwad<\/a>, I&#8217;m quite pleased to host Benjy&#8217;s The Roots of Ruff Sqwad.<\/p>\n<p>Enjoy!<\/p>\n<p><b>Pearsall: Firstly, Benjybars, the basics: who? What? Where? When? How?<\/b><\/p>\n<p><b>Benjy Bars:<\/b> Ben Caldwell, just the wrong side of 30, grew up in South East London but have been living in North London since I was 16.<\/p>\n<p><b>What&#8217;s the thinking behind your &#8216;Roots Of &#8230;&#8217; series?<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Well, I suppose I kind of nicked it from Martin Clarke (<a href=\"http:\/\/blackdownsoundboy.blogspot.co.uk\/\">Blackdown<\/a>) and whoever else was behind the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.discogs.com\/El-B-Ammunition-Blackdown-Present-The-Roots-Of-El-B\/master\/34431\">Roots of EL-B<\/a> release on Tempa &#8230; but yeah I always like mixes which have a proper focus to them; these mixes give you a chance to see how a producer&#8217;s output has changed\/developed over the years.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"100%\" height=\"166\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"no\" src=\"https:\/\/w.soundcloud.com\/player\/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fapi.soundcloud.com%2Ftracks%2F80108138\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><b>Have you had any feedback from any of the artists that you have featured in the &#8216;Roots Of &#8230;&#8217; series?<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Yeah, Plasticman (Plastician) put it on his Facebook page and bigged it up, which was good of him, and I think maybe a couple of others might have tweeted the mixes but I&#8217;m not on Twitter so I&#8217;m not too sure &#8230; I should probably get on Twitter really, innit!<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"100%\" height=\"166\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"no\" src=\"https:\/\/w.soundcloud.com\/player\/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fapi.soundcloud.com%2Ftracks%2F34740802\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><b>Your &#8216;Roots of &#8230;&#8217; series has looked at both early grime and early dubstep &#8230; do you have a favorite?<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Dunno &#8211; too hard to choose. The hype and energy of classic grime is ridiculous, but then I&#8217;ve got a lot of love for the early work of <a href=\"https:\/\/soundcloud.com\/benjybars\/roots-of-skream-mix\">Skream<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/soundcloud.com\/benjybars\/roots-of-loefah-mix\">Loefah<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/soundcloud.com\/benjybars\/roots-of-benga-mix\">Benga<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/soundcloud.com\/benjybars\/roots-of-mala-mix\">Mala<\/a> etc &#8230; <\/p>\n<p>If you mean have I got a favourite mix from the Roots of series, then probably the Loefah one just cos it was the first one and I&#8217;d never really seen his Rephlex\/Big Apple tracks in one mix before.<\/p>\n<p><b>In my personal opinion, Ruff Sqwad were, alongside Wiley, the finest and most consistent producers of the early grime period. Where do you see them in the grime pantheon?<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Yeah, definitely &#8211; although maybe not strictly &#8216;early&#8217; grime cos then we&#8217;d be talking about Oddz, Eastwood, Alias, Youngstar etc &#8230; but yeah, best crew in grime. Others would argue that classic NASTY crew era hold that title but for me it&#8217;s Ruff Sqwad, no doubt &#8211; their Sunday night sets on <a href=\"http:\/\/rinse.fm\/\">Rinse<\/a> in summer of 2005 &#8230; fuck.<\/p>\n<p><b>Ruff Sqwad producer showdown: Dirty Danger or Rapid?<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Rapid. The way he uses horns is sick. Badman producer.<\/p>\n<p><b>Favorite Ruff Sqwad mc?<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Probably Rapid as well actually. He almost sounds like an old skool garage MC sometimes &#8211; simple but effective style, although I remember a period in early &#8217;06 when Slicks just went nuts and looked like he was gonna become the greatest MC in the world, but then he kind of fell off. I liked Fuda Guy a lot too; his &#8216;Easy man &#8230;&#8217; bars were the biggest in the scene for a while there. <\/p>\n<p>And Mad Max &#8230; what happened to him?!?<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"420\" height=\"315\" src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/JIvGC6u75HU\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><b>Favorite ever Ruff Sqwad tune?<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Hmm &#8230; fuck! Probably Anna. Those horns! Sick video for that tune as well. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=m89TafOdIAk\">Pied Piper<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=vehT9HG6gbo\">Functions on the Low<\/a> are also well up there.  <\/p>\n<p><b>What&#8217;s the thinking behind the structure of the mix, i.e. moving from instrumentals to vocals throughout the mix? <\/b><\/p>\n<p>Just a good way to give equal exposure to the riddims and the bars, I suppose.<\/p>\n<p><b>Boring tech question: what gear do you use to record your mixes?<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Traktor with a controller. Not to boast, but I had the sickest record collection of grime and dubstep &#8230; literally impeccable! Got really skint, though, and had to sell it all. Ripped everything first, though, so my mp3 collection is saying a lot!<\/p>\n<p><b>How did you get into grime in the first place?<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Just through radio mainly! I should have been much more into it from far earlier really, specially growing up and living where I did. I had a friend in college who went to all the classic early grime raves like Heartless Crew clashing Pay As You Go etc etc, and I remember hearing people spit early Dizzee bars (&#8216;boxin MCs like my name was Frank&#8217;!) but I dunno &#8230; I think I just generally wasn&#8217;t into music as much back then, but then sometime in 2004 I started to hear grime on radio more regularly and I had another mate who was into it as well. Then from late &#8217;04 to early &#8217;06 I was pretty much obsessed &#8211; I just listened to everything I possibly could. <\/p>\n<p>Then later in &#8217;06 i started to hear dubstep sets on Rinse that would come on in between Roll Deep and Ruff Sqwad sets or whatever, and I finally made it down to FWD in summer &#8217;06 and saw plenty of MCs down there in the next year or so &#8230; but I&#8217;m not gonna lie I reckon I missed the golden age of grime, in terms of raves at least &#8211; although I did see Dizzee at FWD with Tubby playin loads of dubs, and i saw a few classic Skepta and Plasticman sets so I can&#8217;t complain too much I suppose!                              <\/p>\n<p><b>What mixes do you have planned for the future?<\/b><\/p>\n<p>I wanna do a Shackleton one, and a Pinch one, and a Ramadanman one, and a Newham Generals &#8230; maybe some more &#8230;<\/p>\n<p><b>Check out more of Benjy Bars&#8217; mixes at <a href=\"https:\/\/soundcloud.com\/benjybars\">Soundcloud<\/b>!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Benjy Bars presents a very special tribute to old skool East London grime legends &#8230; Ruff Sqwad!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[194,155,43],"class_list":["post-2865","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-guest-mixes","tag-benjy-bars","tag-grime","tag-guest-mix"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonicrampage.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2865","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonicrampage.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonicrampage.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonicrampage.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonicrampage.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2865"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/sonicrampage.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2865\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6073,"href":"https:\/\/sonicrampage.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2865\/revisions\/6073"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonicrampage.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonicrampage.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonicrampage.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}