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A TAV Curator’s Pick.

“The Main Ingredient picks up right where Mecca And The Soul Brother left off, continuing classic back to back releases from the duo. Characterized by sultry soul and jazz samples, The Main Ingredient saw a more polished sound from Pete & CL, building on the praise they got from All Souled Out & Mecca And The Soul Brother.

Right off the bat "In The House" sets off the album with Pete's trademark hypnotic drums (with a little help from a Q Tip vocal sample) and CL's elegant delivery. Yes elegant. The Main Ingredient is full of countless hits; "Caramel City", "I Get Physical", "Get On The Mic", "Worldwide" and the singles "I Got A Love", "Take You There" and "Searching" all show that the duo is unstoppable together. As Pete puts it “We were in a zone, and when you're in a zone, it's fun. It was a great time, and we put the album together with just that in mind. It was like a family thing, and music was a hobby, not a job. We kept it like we were in the basement, creating music just for the fun of it".” - Get On Down

“The Main Ingredient is full of rich, resonant, hypnotic songs -- the production being among some of the most seductive in hip-hop -- that subtly, but absolutely, swing with their lock-step precision. In characteristic Pete Rock fashion, all of the sharp edges have been sanded down, leaving a vibrant and completely lush musical backdrop which seems to have a dreamy nostalgia about it.

Old '60s and '70s soul, soul-jazz, and funk samples abound, and the music is dotted with gauzy keyboard washes, hugely echoed bass-drum kicks, milky basslines, and muted horn loops, almost sounding like they are emanating out of water. All of the songs feel immediate, yet they are infused with the sort of roomy ambience that lends to each the impression of a classic tune, evocative of an earlier era, but not one that can be described exactly, and not one to which you can definitively point.” - AllMusic

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