Before you step outside to light up, pause to contemplate just how Sweden got so funky. For years now, e-Lab's seminal series of sample CDs--"Vinylistics" and "Strictly"--has remained fresh and full of inspiration in a world flush with cool sample makers. Continuing the legacy, "Smokers Delight" (one audio CD and two CD-ROMs), is packed with more than a gigabyte of smooth horn riffs, slinky guitars, spacey-sounding vintage keyboard and piano recordings and myriad head-nod drum grooves. All of "Smokers'" loops fall in the 80 to 100 bpm range and are provided in both REX2 and Acidized WAV file formats. (E-Lab calls this REXTC.)



Although inspiration for the tracks may be a little brown and fuzzy, I found loop groups like Seedzz, Doobee and Mudboy to be particularly well-stoked. E-Lab dubs this collection "Turntable Jazz & Loungin HipHop 'Nstrumentalz." As vague as that sounds, it does work. Along with the heaps of fat and funky beats, there are also thick batches of soulful MPC- and turntable-manipulated sounds. If you enjoy sexy vinyl crackles, trailing horn decays and other sonic dabbles dunked in MPC filtering and effects, you have a ton of material to work with here. It's no wonder that Propellerhead and Steinberg pack their factory libraries with a fat bowl of e-Lab material.