Hexstatic

Best known as the savants who flash the visuals behind Coldcut’s live performances and craft the eye candy for that legendary duo’s CD-ROMs, Hexstatic’s members also create their own perverse brand of funk. With Listen and Learn, the second installment of Coldcut’s Solid Steel mix series, Robin Brunson and Stuart Warren Hill prove they’re able DJs, too, albeit on CD decks. (Some of you will cry heresy, but hear me out.) Working on digital tables even vinyl purist DJ Shadow champions, the duo time-stretches tracks to brilliantly psychedelic effect while also slipping in loads of scratching, porn-flick samples, astrology chatter and enough spacey FX to score several Star Trek episodes. More important, Hexstatic has pulled some of the tangiest party-rockin’ tracks from its crates and segued and layered them with brilliant, spliff-toking logic. Downtempo (Boards Of Canada), old-skool electro (Man Parrish), ’60s soul (Ike and Tina Turner), reggae (Toots and the Maytals) and E-Z listening (Shirley Bassey) tracks parade past listeners’ ears, but the real treasure of this comprehensive crate excavation is the Incredible Bongo Band’s “Apache,” which might just be the funkiest cut ever released.