Freshly signed to Distinctive Breaks, Ils (real name Ilian Walker) delivers his third artist album and more damn fine breakbeat with "Bohemia". Ils rose to prominence with the storming song, "Next Level" followed by the hits 'Music' and 'No Soul' which all featured on his second album "Soul Trader". The album was a change of pace for Ils who had spent a long time releasing drum'n'bass tracks with LTJ Bukem's label Good Looking. It which showed his new found love of breakbeat, which developed out of a meeting with Dave Tipper, who was then one of Ils many studio engineering clients along with James Lavelle's hip trip-hop label Mo'Wax. Tipper was doing something called breakbeat with some crazy guys from Fuel Records.
""With drum & bass by 1999 there was a thick rule book about what you can and can't do in d&b production. Dave Tipper was coming in buzzing, he'd started his DJ thing, he was getting a lot of work. It was the time of Wall Of Sound, Derek Dahlarge - I was engineering for him as well. My clientele expanded to working with these guys at 125bpm, and I found it more enjoyable with these different bunch of characters - it was exciting and fun.
From there Ils signed with Marine Parade to deliver his breakbeat breakthrough Soul Trader . He delivered the finished 'Bohemia' album to Adam Freeland's Marine Parade imprint in August 2004, only to experience the label temporarily fold with the collapse of distribution company 3MV a week later.
"As soon as that happened I immediately thought of Distinctive. I'd done one of their Y4K mix series, got to know them and thought they were all really switched on. They've got such a good reputation, too, and it seems they've helped introduce a lot of people to breaks all around the world."
With Ils signed to Distinctive by December 2004, Bohemia now hits the shelves in Australia on 20 June 2005. The album is a diverse song based album showing Ils beautifully crafted melodies and evoking deep emotions. Indeed it is Ils combination of melody and harmony with astute dancefloor savvy that is his trademark. Whether you look at the heavy guitar riff led nu skool breaks monster "Angels", rocky radio track "Cherish" to multi-layered breakbeat feast "Storm From The East", he executes each track beautifully.
The album features many guest vocalists including Val from London indie band the Bee Stings, Bulgarian duo Desi and Roni, growling grime/garage MC Wonder, Plavka, R&B singer Rhalia and Ils' late friend Stevie Hyper D, the junglist MC who passed away a few years back. The album takes us on a new journey in the world of breakbeat that is spritual, rocky, decadent and moving. Bring it on!