How can you not love an MC who raps about food? When Montreal-by-way-of-Toronto rapper/producer/DJ isn’t dropping rhymes about brunch, the triple-threat is busy mining the best of old-skool hip-hop to make it sound fresh for the ’00s (those of you who like fellow Canadian MC Shad should also check out Les).

Despite having toiled his way through the hip-hop scene over the past decade (aside from his own music, Les has done engineering and production work for other artists, including Ali Shaheed Muhammed and the Wordburglar), he’s largely remained underground, though his two albums, I Only Stop For the Red Ants (2003) and The Truth About Rap (2006) were both critically lauded, and he’s toured right across Canada, landing prominent spots at Pop Montreal, Halifax Pop Explosion, even the Vans Warped Tour.

His profile was raised this past year when he guested on UK downtempo ensemble The Herbaliser’s Same As It Never Was album, appearing with the group during several Canadian and European tourdates. On tap for ’09 is the Les-Kils EP, a six-song collaboration with Toronto producer Fresh Kils (who engineered and produced tracks on Truth) that’s intended to play out like a live show – the duo arranged the tracks with an eye towards performing them, with Les rapping over Kils’ MPC drum machine and sampler. It’s an energetic mix (that also features the considerable skills of Halifax DJ Uncle Fester) that should hopefully bring Les’ easy-going yet always enjoyable take on hip-hop to the masses.