Pumpkin (musician)

Pumpkin (sometimes credited as Eroll Bedward) was the musician, percussionist and band leader behind many old school hip hop tracks for the Profile, Enjoy, and Tuff City record companies.

He worked with several important early hip hop acts from 1979 to 1984, such as Spoonie Gee, Treacherous Three, Funky Four, Grandmaster Caz, Fearless Four, and Dr. Jeckyll & Mr. Hyde, as well as a host of more obscure names. His own "King of the Beat" (Profile, 1983) was followed by one of his last productions, Pumpkin And The Profile All-Stars' "Here Comes the Beat" (Profile, 1984).

In the words of writer David Toop, "In the early days of rap on wax, it was musicians like Pumpkin at Enjoy and Jiggs Chase at Sugarhill who defined a new musical style."

A collection of his work for Tuff City was released under his stage name in 1995 as The Tuff City Sessions on the retrospective label Old School Flava.

References

• Peter Shapiro, Rough Guide to Hip-Hop, 2nd ed., Rough Guides: London, 2005 (p. 369).
• David Toop, Rap Attack, 3rd ed., Serpent's Tail: London, 2000 (p. 17, pp. 87–88).