Whole Wheat Bread Punks Out Propaganda

Ever since Run-D.M.C. threw down rap verses on top of Joe Perry's guitar riffs on its 1986 remake of Aerosmith's "Walk This Way," many bands have endeavored to mesh hip-hop lyricism with rock wallop. While that formula has proven fruitful in some instances —Beastie Boys, Rage Against the Machine — other times, that mixture can prove to be utterly disagreeable, as in the case of Kid Rock. The members of Whole Wheat Bread were respected MCs in Jacksonville, Florida, who just so happened to be proficient musicians as well, so they pull off the combo remarkably well.

The group has been so successful in combining street-conscious flow with power-punk bombast, a hybrid it calls crunk-punk, that it counts ska-punk revivalists Rancid and the king of crunk himself, Lil Jon, as fans. In fact, WWB even collaborated in the studio with the latter for his forthcoming album, Crunk Rock. Currently made up of guitarist-vocalist Aaron Abraham, drummer Joseph Largen, and bassist Will Frazier, the trio can go from volatile in a Body Count way one minute to glossy in a Blink-182 sense the next.