Black Eyed Peas - Bridging The Gap (25th Anniversary) [2LP]

Bridging the Gap is the Black Eyed Peas album from before everything changed, and this 25th anniversary 2LP is a chance to hear who they were when they were still a hip hop group.

Released in 2000, this was the trio's second record, will.i.am, apl.de.ap, and Taboo trading verses over live instrumentation, backed by an actual band, years before stadium pop and a permanent fourth member rewrote the whole project. They came up in the LA underground alongside Jurassic 5 and Dilated Peoples, and this album is where their conscious, jazz-leaning approach found its widest audience without compromising much. Listening now, the gap in the title reads differently: it turned out to be the last stretch of road before the pivot.

Weekends brings in Esthero for a hook that floats over a genuinely lovely bassline, while Request + Line pairs them with Macy Gray at her scratchy best, the closest thing here to a proper single. BEP Empire is the hardest cut on the album, all boom bap swagger and posturing that they earned, and Cali to New York enlists De La Soul for a coast-to-coast handshake that never sounds like a favour.

For anyone who only knows what came after, this is the other Black Eyed Peas, and they were very good.