When the book of hip-hop production is written, the world famous Beatnuts will have the right to an entire chapter. To understand them is to understand hip-hop music in its rawest inception. No bling-bling, no trendy sounds of the moment and no less than a good time is what’s come to be expected from these diversified beat-makers. Combining a gold-miners intuition for finding the rarest samples with the ability to turn the most subtle sounds into a full blown masterpiece, The Beatnuts are legends in hip-hop culture.

After a year hiatus from the game The Beatnuts return to instill their brand of raw hip-hop with their latest opus, Milk Me on Penalty Recordings. The album, due out August 31st, marks the re-launch of the prominent rap label that brought the world Capone and Noreaga, Lord Finnese, No-Limits’ Skull Duggery and David Banner & Kamakazee aka Crooked Lettaz. The fast-rising label was bought out by Tommy Boy during its height in 1999 and went into etchings of hip-hop history.

“I’ve been waiting for the right group to re-launch the label with” says label president Neil Levine. “The Beatnuts are the perfect fit for the label.”

For their 7th release, The Beatnuts return to the funky motif that made their past albums part of hip-hops must-have library. As the title suggests, the Nuts are giving it all its worth in a game where music has taken a background to glamour and glitz. Gunning to prove that they need not follow the trends of today, the Beatnuts give the streets something to speak on with “U Nahmsayin’”, an aggressive ode’ to the most used slang word featuring Roc-a-Fella soldier, Freeway.

Those in search of the infectious vibes that’s made songs like “Off The Books” and “Watch Out Now” classics will no doubt enjoy the groove that is “Find Us”, an off-beat gem that features the Beatnuts left-field approach to hit-making with SRC /Universal artist, Akon providing the vocal assistance. Hip-hop legend, Greg Nice of Nice and Smooth joins the Beatnuts on “Hot”, a boisterous smash that is already making its rounds through out New York City’s notorious mix-tape circuit. Not ones to limit their taste, the Nuts ease back for the west-coast stylings of “Madness”.

Through out the early 90’s, The Beatnuts reputation for providing memorable backdrops, earned them remixing jobs for artists such as Naughty By Nature, Cypress Hill, Ice Cube’s Da Lench Mob, incarcerated prodigy Chi Ali as well a Fat Joe. Seeing their potential as artists Psycho Les (b. Lester Fernandez) and Junkyard JuJu (b. Jerry Tineo), began recording their own material.

The Beatnuts early works were filled with the light touch of jazz and frat-house humor that was of the time. Even then, their level of innovation with samples made them stand apart from the medallion rap contemporaries of their day. In 1993, Les and Ju Ju made the risky transition from behind the scene hit-makers to respected rap act. 10 years after that decision, The Beatnuts look back with no regrets and a catalogue that spans 7 albums of monumental hip-hop material.

In 1993, The Beatnuts released their classic E.P., Intoxicated Demons EP to critical praise and underground fanfare. A year later, The Nut’s self-titled full-length LP, The Beatnuts: Street Level, offered listeners a dose of their warped perspective, with a progressively more hostile demeanor replacing the humor of their previous work. Ju Ju and Psycho Les continued to work behind the boards, returning to the studio in 1996 to record the highly inventive “Stone Crazy”, the album that found Les and Ju taking their penchant for sampling distinctive records (i.e.: children’s tunes) to introduce the world to the legendary Big Pun on the club classic “Off the Books”. A year later, Pun repaid the favor with the Beatnuts-produced “Beware”, the first cut off of Big Pun’s mult-platinum selling debut.

Between their respective releases 1999’s “Musical Massacre” which featured the classic “What Out Now” and 2002’s Take It Or Squeeze it, which featured “No Escapin This”, The Beatnuts injected their sound unto some of hip-hop’s elite releases including everyone from Fat Joe, internationally known DJ Tony Touch, Wu-Tang’s Ghostface Killah to emcee/ Beats; dug from the dirtiest crates any fingers have ever shuffled through. Sounds: perfectly chopped samples creating vibes catchy to the human ear. Drums: funky enough to make inspire a generation. That is The Beatnuts...that is hip-hop music.