Cam'ron - That's Me MF DOOM blend (2004)
Was that a catcall of "lol, backpacker!" I heard from the cheap seats? Motherfucker, I'll cut your balls off to use as a backpack then sell you to a sultan as a serf, and while you're dancing a merry jig for us in your new role as a eunuch jester, the sultan and I are going to snort with laughter at you due to your preference of that airy-fairy Eve album track sounding original version of That's Me over DOOM's vastly grander remix from his Special Blends mixtape. That blend/remix beat is a far better suited milieu to one of Mr. Giles' most thoroughly offensive holdings of court (rape-talk, OFWGKTA fans!), with the pernicious strings, creepy disembodied laughing, and oddly syncopated chopped snares being redolent of what might've happened had the C.O.C sound been alowed to flourish during the pre-Dipset years of Cam's solo career or, simply, the results of what would've happened if Cam had called up Nashiem Myrick & Carlos Broady back in 1999.
MF DOOM - Mullein instrumental (2002)
That haunting string sample is a fair approximation of what I'd imagine a lost Bernard Herrmann score for Orson Welles' version of The Trial to sound like, so I assumed DOOM must've snagged the sample from some secrete highbrow source like a 1967 Polish art-horror movie soundtrack LP which only 6 people own and even then 2 of them are JuJu & Psycho Les. Imagine my suprise, then, at finding out that he was up to his old cartoon plundering tricks and it was taken from an episode of the first rejigged English language version of Dragon Ball Z which went wood on American TV before its incidental musik by the great Shuki Levy was redubbed and rescored for the Cartoon Network by the not-so-great Bruce Falconer, who then had some of his Dragon Ball Z scoring sampled by Shawty Redd on a Jeezy joint. Why does DOOM ever rhyme over other people's production when he's capable of locating the most eerie string sample since What's Beef? in US episodes of anime that originally did them Lucky Louie numbers?
Thursday, 31 March 2011
Wednesday, 30 March 2011
Lip-sing more
3 reasons why Mystikal's performance of Y'All Ain't Ready Yet on Soul Train in 1995 (his first National TV appearance according to whoever uploaded the video) totally rules even though he's lip-syncing and doesn't even get to the last verse. Fast-forward to 0:30 unless you feel compelled to watch a commercial for some gaudy Louisiana-based brand called BR 225 who've done a range with Webbie called - wait for it - Jigg City Clothing :
1. A leopard-print dress sporting Stacey Dash giggling after she announces the title of the song and then M.C UGK-ing Mystikal by introducing him as a "super-talented rap crew".
2. Mystikal finally redeeming himself for using that timeworn "bad like Michael" line in the mid 90s during the 2nd verse by whipping his flannel shirt off and launching into a dance-breakdown of M.J moves right after the words spill from his lips.
3. Ending the performance by ripping his wifebeater apart like he's Hulk Hogan. Nicki Minaj should really conclude all her TV performances the same way; Rick Ross, on the other hand, needs to keep his fucking shirt on as much as possible in future.
1. A leopard-print dress sporting Stacey Dash giggling after she announces the title of the song and then M.C UGK-ing Mystikal by introducing him as a "super-talented rap crew".
2. Mystikal finally redeeming himself for using that timeworn "bad like Michael" line in the mid 90s during the 2nd verse by whipping his flannel shirt off and launching into a dance-breakdown of M.J moves right after the words spill from his lips.
3. Ending the performance by ripping his wifebeater apart like he's Hulk Hogan. Nicki Minaj should really conclude all her TV performances the same way; Rick Ross, on the other hand, needs to keep his fucking shirt on as much as possible in future.
Tuesday, 29 March 2011
Only built 4 Alonzo "Mr Hyde" Brown linx
Dr Jeckyll & Mr Hyde - Yellow Panties (1985)
Remember the snippet of that upcoming interview with Alonzo Brown I posted about last year? Well, the whole shebang went live yesterday, and although the Troy L Smith dude who conducted it indulges in a pet-peeve of mine by calling them Dr. Jekyll & Mr Hyde rather than their officially sic moniker of Dr. Jeckyll & Hyde (because rappers ain't got love for Robert Louis Stevenson and don't adhere to actual spellings of literary classics), it's a dense read which takes in the crucial differences between Harlem and the Bronx, how seeing Luv Bug Starski live on stage in a room full of champagne drinking "dudes with gold chains and girls Jordache and Sergio Valente jeans" at some Uptown nightspot inspired him to start rapping, how Andre "Dr Jeckyll" Harrell once flipped out on him when he turned up to perform a live show in a sweatsuit, his Harlem World Crew days, how Genius Rap allegedly saved Profile Records and their relationship with the label thereafter, how they were jealous of Whodini working with Larry Smith, and his post-Jeckyll & Hyde career which included stints at Cold Chillin' and Warner Brothers, Hollywood restaurants which were ordered to sell fried chicken, and TV shows as diverse as New York Undercover and Cousin Skeeter.
Alonzo "Mr Hyde" Brown interview part 1
Alonzo "Mr Hyde" Brown interview part 2
Alonzo "Mr Hyde" Brown interview part 3
Alonzo "Mr Hyde" Brown interview part 4
The last few paragraphs of page 4 devolve into an irksome cliched old-school rapper rant where he moans about modern rap's supposed lack of variety, but I suppose this guy must be in his late fourties or early fifties by now so he's probably unaware of Curren$y, The Jacka, Yelawolf, Roc Marciano, $tarlito, Lil B, and the late career renaissances of E-40 and AZ. Being one of the originators of Uptown waviness alongside Spoonie Gee, he has no excuse not knowing about Max B, though, so someone needs to burn him a best of CD-R or *cough* my ‘Should've Been The Byrd Gang Album’ compilation.
Remember the snippet of that upcoming interview with Alonzo Brown I posted about last year? Well, the whole shebang went live yesterday, and although the Troy L Smith dude who conducted it indulges in a pet-peeve of mine by calling them Dr. Jekyll & Mr Hyde rather than their officially sic moniker of Dr. Jeckyll & Hyde (because rappers ain't got love for Robert Louis Stevenson and don't adhere to actual spellings of literary classics), it's a dense read which takes in the crucial differences between Harlem and the Bronx, how seeing Luv Bug Starski live on stage in a room full of champagne drinking "dudes with gold chains and girls Jordache and Sergio Valente jeans" at some Uptown nightspot inspired him to start rapping, how Andre "Dr Jeckyll" Harrell once flipped out on him when he turned up to perform a live show in a sweatsuit, his Harlem World Crew days, how Genius Rap allegedly saved Profile Records and their relationship with the label thereafter, how they were jealous of Whodini working with Larry Smith, and his post-Jeckyll & Hyde career which included stints at Cold Chillin' and Warner Brothers, Hollywood restaurants which were ordered to sell fried chicken, and TV shows as diverse as New York Undercover and Cousin Skeeter.
Alonzo "Mr Hyde" Brown interview part 1
Alonzo "Mr Hyde" Brown interview part 2
Alonzo "Mr Hyde" Brown interview part 3
Alonzo "Mr Hyde" Brown interview part 4
The last few paragraphs of page 4 devolve into an irksome cliched old-school rapper rant where he moans about modern rap's supposed lack of variety, but I suppose this guy must be in his late fourties or early fifties by now so he's probably unaware of Curren$y, The Jacka, Yelawolf, Roc Marciano, $tarlito, Lil B, and the late career renaissances of E-40 and AZ. Being one of the originators of Uptown waviness alongside Spoonie Gee, he has no excuse not knowing about Max B, though, so someone needs to burn him a best of CD-R or *cough* my ‘Should've Been The Byrd Gang Album’ compilation.
Sunday, 27 March 2011
In lieu of Grove St. Party not being a single...
Waka's Youtube channel have had the decency to conjure up the next best thing, which is a promo which consists of the lyrics in a semi-graffiti font over his modelling pictures :
Waka Flocka Flame ft. Kebo Gotti - Grove St. Party (2010)
You know how we have to take our draconian east coast purists friends who tut 'n' tsk whenever you play Flockavelli aside and attempt to explain to them that Hard In Da Paint and Bustin' At 'Em are just the modern ATL' equivalent of Ruff Ryders Anthem and Ante Up, yeah? I've been trying to explain Grove St. Party to them using similar pre-established N.Y reference points they'll understand by equating it to a 2011 version of a Crooklyn Clan & Fatman Scoop joint. Anyway, this promo isn't quite as good as that flawless WSHH live performance video some dude edited together where half the front row of hefty 'hoodrats were waving Waka masks in the air which now appears to have been removed from both WSHH and Youtube, but it's incredibly helpful because it appears I've been getting various key words in it completely wrong for the past 5 months. Might have been a good idea to run your spell check before going viral, though, Juaquin :
Also disappearing from Youtube recently is the sorta-official (as in co-signed by Max's camp, but not Amalgam Digital) video for Max B's Where Do I Go?, thus depriving future generations of knowing the correct arm movements to make during the "chicka-owww, chicka owwww, chicka owwwwwwwww"s. Or are they "checka owww"s? We need Max's team to put together a lyrics promo for Where Do I Go in the style of the Grove St. Party one above to clear this pertinent matter up.
Waka Flocka Flame ft. Kebo Gotti - Grove St. Party (2010)
You know how we have to take our draconian east coast purists friends who tut 'n' tsk whenever you play Flockavelli aside and attempt to explain to them that Hard In Da Paint and Bustin' At 'Em are just the modern ATL' equivalent of Ruff Ryders Anthem and Ante Up, yeah? I've been trying to explain Grove St. Party to them using similar pre-established N.Y reference points they'll understand by equating it to a 2011 version of a Crooklyn Clan & Fatman Scoop joint. Anyway, this promo isn't quite as good as that flawless WSHH live performance video some dude edited together where half the front row of hefty 'hoodrats were waving Waka masks in the air which now appears to have been removed from both WSHH and Youtube, but it's incredibly helpful because it appears I've been getting various key words in it completely wrong for the past 5 months. Might have been a good idea to run your spell check before going viral, though, Juaquin :
Also disappearing from Youtube recently is the sorta-official (as in co-signed by Max's camp, but not Amalgam Digital) video for Max B's Where Do I Go?, thus depriving future generations of knowing the correct arm movements to make during the "chicka-owww, chicka owwww, chicka owwwwwwwww"s. Or are they "checka owww"s? We need Max's team to put together a lyrics promo for Where Do I Go in the style of the Grove St. Party one above to clear this pertinent matter up.
Wednesday, 23 March 2011
Great songs from forgotten rap albums # 16
As usual, nothing particularly secrete as such, just a handful of songs I like from albums which came and went with little fanfare and songs I'm tryna put real life friends onto to prevent them complaining that they don't know it when we jam it in the car. # 16 is all songs from the past decade.
AZ - Dead End
(From Unbelivable; 2008)
One day the heavens are going to open, thunderbolts are going to rain down on me, and I'm gonna spend the rest of eternity listening to I Got To Have It on a loop as punishment for trolling Nas fanboys, but even though Undeniable was anything but what its title suggested and the worst album of AZ's career up until that point, it was still more worthwhile than Nas' Untitled disc from the same year due to The Game Don't Stop, the minor-classic single The Hardest 2 with Styles P, and this fairweather friend-admonishing ode to the struggle to recapture the simplicity and innocence of life as a shorty. Piano samples invariably lead to great songs, ditto string samples, so combining the two together here results in some A+ Anthony, with our host thankfully managing to avoid the Memories Are For Faggots type mawkishness that often ruins these type of songs as he goes about his business of imprinting a stamp of N.Y classicism onto proceedings.
504 Boyz - Get Back
(From Ballers; 2002)
If you've been paying attention closely, you may remember that I was blissfully ignorant to the existence of the 2nd incarnation of the 504 Boyz who included the young Curren$y amongst their ranks until a search for some of his No Limit era material last year led to their Ballers album, but since then its 2nd single Get Back has become one of those jams which would cause my cosmos to crumble if it to ever suddenly disappear from my MP3 player during a late-night trip to the 24 hour Tesco. A hi-hat ridden Neptunes replica and a rowdy chorus with references to 'bows are the perfect backdrop for a 2002 No Limit posse track given the label's penchant for shameless trend-hopping, and we find bandana $pitta starting and bookending the song with his own verse and a verse for Silkk Tha Shocker clearly written by him, with the grand imperial Percy Miller betwixt them with a ridiculous thirty seconds of lofty boasts about being able to outrun wild coyotes and checkmate Cagney & Lacey during stop-and-searches.
Mr Lif ft. Murs - Murs Iz My Manager
(From Mo' Mega; 2006)
The Def Jux village isn't exactly teaming with members of the Banger family, much less the Mr Lif household, and Murs when he's in rapping-about-the-rap-industry mode is a territory one daren't venture into without a map and a pair of wellies, but two of rap's most humourless exponents drop their usual po-facedness to poke a little fun of their priggish indie-rap personas here over some Edan production which is like Not Over Till The Fat Lady Plays The Demo with additional ringing telephones, snatches of fuzzy trumpet, and Craig Mack "BWWWWOOOYYY"s. Murs plays Bobby "The Brain" Heenan to Mr Lif's "Mr Wonderful" Paul Orndorff, but what I like most about this joint is that Lif's speaking voice is uncannily similar to dook who played Calvin in Paid In Full so I keep expecting him to tell Murs that he's "just made enough dough to bake biscuits for the projects" or Cam to pop up and call him a "Kermit The Frog faced ass n*gga" as he threatens to slap the shit outta him.
The Jacka ft. Husalah & Too $hort - Die Young
(From The Jacka; 2002)
After the show it's the afterparty, then after the afterparty it's the hotel lobby, after the Til My Casket Drops appearances then it's the C-Bo's Mob Figaz shit, and after AP.9's Headshotz album it's the second Mob Figaz solo album with this. AP.9 emerged fully-fledged and playing to his strengths on his own debut, but Jacka's self titled album saw him struggling to find a comfortable zone which suited his melodious delivery and world-weary, introspective persona, and, thus, this RobLo (then Rob Low) produced cut is the only real essential Jack' moment on there because it sounds like nothing else in the Mob's catalogue at the time and it hints at the way he'd break free from the traditional Bay area mobb shit orbit to take up his own trajectory, with Husalah following suit. I dunno where that strange crying Dolphin sounding noise sample comes from, but I was suitably impressed when it reappeared on Lil B's Pull Ya Pants Up last year because Husalah is so obviously a key influence on the Based God.
Speaking of Lilliputian Brandon, why isn't the video to Choppa & Curren$y's 2003 No Limit single Shake It Like That on Youtube when the fashion gawd Choppa apparently invented the cooking dance in it according to Lil B in his Nardwuar interview? Plz tell me that shit wasn't forever lost from the No Limit vaults when Katrina laid waste to Percy's mansion.
AZ - Dead End
(From Unbelivable; 2008)
One day the heavens are going to open, thunderbolts are going to rain down on me, and I'm gonna spend the rest of eternity listening to I Got To Have It on a loop as punishment for trolling Nas fanboys, but even though Undeniable was anything but what its title suggested and the worst album of AZ's career up until that point, it was still more worthwhile than Nas' Untitled disc from the same year due to The Game Don't Stop, the minor-classic single The Hardest 2 with Styles P, and this fairweather friend-admonishing ode to the struggle to recapture the simplicity and innocence of life as a shorty. Piano samples invariably lead to great songs, ditto string samples, so combining the two together here results in some A+ Anthony, with our host thankfully managing to avoid the Memories Are For Faggots type mawkishness that often ruins these type of songs as he goes about his business of imprinting a stamp of N.Y classicism onto proceedings.
504 Boyz - Get Back
(From Ballers; 2002)
If you've been paying attention closely, you may remember that I was blissfully ignorant to the existence of the 2nd incarnation of the 504 Boyz who included the young Curren$y amongst their ranks until a search for some of his No Limit era material last year led to their Ballers album, but since then its 2nd single Get Back has become one of those jams which would cause my cosmos to crumble if it to ever suddenly disappear from my MP3 player during a late-night trip to the 24 hour Tesco. A hi-hat ridden Neptunes replica and a rowdy chorus with references to 'bows are the perfect backdrop for a 2002 No Limit posse track given the label's penchant for shameless trend-hopping, and we find bandana $pitta starting and bookending the song with his own verse and a verse for Silkk Tha Shocker clearly written by him, with the grand imperial Percy Miller betwixt them with a ridiculous thirty seconds of lofty boasts about being able to outrun wild coyotes and checkmate Cagney & Lacey during stop-and-searches.
Mr Lif ft. Murs - Murs Iz My Manager
(From Mo' Mega; 2006)
The Def Jux village isn't exactly teaming with members of the Banger family, much less the Mr Lif household, and Murs when he's in rapping-about-the-rap-industry mode is a territory one daren't venture into without a map and a pair of wellies, but two of rap's most humourless exponents drop their usual po-facedness to poke a little fun of their priggish indie-rap personas here over some Edan production which is like Not Over Till The Fat Lady Plays The Demo with additional ringing telephones, snatches of fuzzy trumpet, and Craig Mack "BWWWWOOOYYY"s. Murs plays Bobby "The Brain" Heenan to Mr Lif's "Mr Wonderful" Paul Orndorff, but what I like most about this joint is that Lif's speaking voice is uncannily similar to dook who played Calvin in Paid In Full so I keep expecting him to tell Murs that he's "just made enough dough to bake biscuits for the projects" or Cam to pop up and call him a "Kermit The Frog faced ass n*gga" as he threatens to slap the shit outta him.
The Jacka ft. Husalah & Too $hort - Die Young
(From The Jacka; 2002)
After the show it's the afterparty, then after the afterparty it's the hotel lobby, after the Til My Casket Drops appearances then it's the C-Bo's Mob Figaz shit, and after AP.9's Headshotz album it's the second Mob Figaz solo album with this. AP.9 emerged fully-fledged and playing to his strengths on his own debut, but Jacka's self titled album saw him struggling to find a comfortable zone which suited his melodious delivery and world-weary, introspective persona, and, thus, this RobLo (then Rob Low) produced cut is the only real essential Jack' moment on there because it sounds like nothing else in the Mob's catalogue at the time and it hints at the way he'd break free from the traditional Bay area mobb shit orbit to take up his own trajectory, with Husalah following suit. I dunno where that strange crying Dolphin sounding noise sample comes from, but I was suitably impressed when it reappeared on Lil B's Pull Ya Pants Up last year because Husalah is so obviously a key influence on the Based God.
Speaking of Lilliputian Brandon, why isn't the video to Choppa & Curren$y's 2003 No Limit single Shake It Like That on Youtube when the fashion gawd Choppa apparently invented the cooking dance in it according to Lil B in his Nardwuar interview? Plz tell me that shit wasn't forever lost from the No Limit vaults when Katrina laid waste to Percy's mansion.
Sunday, 20 March 2011
Royce Da 5'9" was not a singer of the Nate Dogg caliber
It pains me to return to the now totally passé subject of Nate Dogg, but in all the tributes I read I didn't come across any specific Before & After posts to demonstrate the transformative qualities a Nathaniel appearance could have on a song, which is a pity when we have a real humdinger of an example with the original version of Xxplosive AKA The Way I Be Pimpin' AKA one of the Royce Da 5'9"-featuring songs from Dr Dre's 2001 that ended up scrapped after he was disgorged from the Aftermath camp for casually blowing up the spot about ghostwriting for Dre in a magazine interview back in 1999 :
Dr Dre ft. Royce Da 5'9" - The Way I Be Pimpin' (1999)
Xxplosive is a song it seems like the sun was created solely to be able to shed light upon as it thumps from a car stereo on a summer afternoon; The Way I Be pimpin', ummmm, not so much. It isn't that it's a turkey, per se, but, with the exception of The Next Episode, 2001 was all about the album-cuts rather than the singles, so The Way I Be Pimpin' is less of an Xxplosive or a Fuck You, and more of a Big Ego's or a The Message. Admittedly, it does contain a few nice lines, but you'd have to be the spawn of a plebeian to possibly prefer Dre's uncomfortable autocue delivery of Royce's lyrics and Royce himself awkwardly intoning a chorus which is flatter than Nas's pockets after Kelis fleeced him in their divorce settlement over the song it eventually became on 2011 where Nate slides in for an extended crooning session in the vein of Ain't No Fun and Kurupt and Six-Two take a scenic stroll down misogyny lane either side of him.
Imagine if Royce hadn't incurred the wrath of Dre after opening up his big gob about what was rap's mostly poorly kept secret and The Way I Be Pimpin' did appear on 2001, we could now be living in a Bizarro world where Royce somehow went on to become the hooksmith du jour of the early noughties with a wall full of platinum plaques for the likes of Area Codes and 21 Questions, and Nate ended up unemployed but still alive today due to not being able to gorge himself on the junkfood, booze, and blunts which led to his two strokes. I 'unno, man, it's probably preferable alternative to having to listen to the Slaughtahouse album for the Royce verses, right?
Dre can make up for the debacle that Detox is bound to be by finally leaking the pre-The Way I Be Pimpin' version of the song King Tee is rumoured to have rapped on for his shelved 1998 Aftermath album Kingdom Come which was one of the few songs from those sessions to elude the clutches of the dudes who bootlegged the album back in 2002.
Dr Dre ft. Royce Da 5'9" - The Way I Be Pimpin' (1999)
Xxplosive is a song it seems like the sun was created solely to be able to shed light upon as it thumps from a car stereo on a summer afternoon; The Way I Be pimpin', ummmm, not so much. It isn't that it's a turkey, per se, but, with the exception of The Next Episode, 2001 was all about the album-cuts rather than the singles, so The Way I Be Pimpin' is less of an Xxplosive or a Fuck You, and more of a Big Ego's or a The Message. Admittedly, it does contain a few nice lines, but you'd have to be the spawn of a plebeian to possibly prefer Dre's uncomfortable autocue delivery of Royce's lyrics and Royce himself awkwardly intoning a chorus which is flatter than Nas's pockets after Kelis fleeced him in their divorce settlement over the song it eventually became on 2011 where Nate slides in for an extended crooning session in the vein of Ain't No Fun and Kurupt and Six-Two take a scenic stroll down misogyny lane either side of him.
Imagine if Royce hadn't incurred the wrath of Dre after opening up his big gob about what was rap's mostly poorly kept secret and The Way I Be Pimpin' did appear on 2001, we could now be living in a Bizarro world where Royce somehow went on to become the hooksmith du jour of the early noughties with a wall full of platinum plaques for the likes of Area Codes and 21 Questions, and Nate ended up unemployed but still alive today due to not being able to gorge himself on the junkfood, booze, and blunts which led to his two strokes. I 'unno, man, it's probably preferable alternative to having to listen to the Slaughtahouse album for the Royce verses, right?
Dre can make up for the debacle that Detox is bound to be by finally leaking the pre-The Way I Be Pimpin' version of the song King Tee is rumoured to have rapped on for his shelved 1998 Aftermath album Kingdom Come which was one of the few songs from those sessions to elude the clutches of the dudes who bootlegged the album back in 2002.
Wednesday, 16 March 2011
I miss my dogg
:-(
Yup, it's the generic R.I.P Nate Dogg, yo post.
Nate Dogg - I Got Love (2001)
Nate Dogg - One More Day (1994)
We all know Nathaniel's classic hooks for other people, but contrary to belief, he did have some solo jams of his own too with I Got Love and One More Day being the best examples of the o.g 'Rother's unassisted mellifluous timbre in full flight and two of my favourite singles from their respective years to boot. I guess this means the likelihood of there being anything worthwhile on Detox is now nigh on nonexistent.
Nate Dogg ft. Warren G - Nobody Does It Better (1998)
And no rapper wore a bowler hat better; not even Mello-T.
Yup, it's the generic R.I.P Nate Dogg, yo post.
Nate Dogg - I Got Love (2001)
Nate Dogg - One More Day (1994)
We all know Nathaniel's classic hooks for other people, but contrary to belief, he did have some solo jams of his own too with I Got Love and One More Day being the best examples of the o.g 'Rother's unassisted mellifluous timbre in full flight and two of my favourite singles from their respective years to boot. I guess this means the likelihood of there being anything worthwhile on Detox is now nigh on nonexistent.
Nate Dogg ft. Warren G - Nobody Does It Better (1998)
And no rapper wore a bowler hat better; not even Mello-T.
Tuesday, 15 March 2011
Word to the Wise Intelligent
Wise Intelligent - UndergroundSpiritualGame (2011)
I'm doing my damnedest to try and parse the concept behind the Wise Intelligent Iz The Unconkable Djezuz Djonez album after copping it off Amazon a couple of evenings ago (thanks for the tip-off CritiQ) but I can't help feeling like Nas did the time he hung up on Krs One as the T-Cha was trying to persuade him to talk to astronauts at NASA. Maybe it's less impenetrable for black ppl than a peckerwood like me, and, yeah, I've deduced that Wise is presenting himself as a demigod delivering gospels to the needy, but wtf does ‘unconkable’ mean and would a true divine being really use the poor man's EMF as his namesake?
A delusional martyr-complex, cliched political sloganeering, erroneous theories bordering on sheer codswallop, and displaying seemingly conflicting viewpoints within the same bar are the bread & butter of such personal bete noire rappers as Immortal Technique and Saigon (or, at least, 90% of Saigon's output), but Wise has always managed to deploy the same tactics successfully without tumbling into into the po-faced conscious-rapper trap. This is because Wise was borne out of the era which gave us Brand Nubian's One For All as the blueprint for what the next wave of Five Percenter conscious-rappers should adhere to : you can be a great righteous rapper, you just have to teach the lessons of The Nation of Gods and Earths with eccentric panache in a variety of acrobatic voices which range from your own dulcet tones to cod-Jamaican rudeboy to Dickensian chimney-sweep, and spray a little arrogance like Rick "The Model" Martel as you're doing so.
Wise Intelligent - Water Walker (2010)
After four front-to-back plays I'm still at a loss whether I even like the album, let alone if it's a worthy follow up to his underrated 2006 sophomore effort The Talented Timothy Taylor. For now, the only definite conclusions I can draw are that it's his most brash work to date in every department with the production ranging from bombastic to almost trunk-rattling, and that I'm happy to finally have an MP3 of last year's viral video single Water Walker so I no longer have to watch its promo clip with dudes spraypainting walls in it any time I wanna jam it and marvel that Wise is making the exact sort of rap he should be in 2011, that's thankfully closer to recent Witchdoctor than the Nas & Damian Marley album of Glastonbury dance tent fare. What's the point in graffiti anyway if it's not by Kase 2 or it's not obscene toilet wall scrawlings about the barmaid from your local pub?
Saturday, 12 March 2011
The best of The Martorialist : a compilation
There comes a point where every blog indulges in the odd celebratory self-referential post, usually when said blog's owner can't think of anything to write about but still wants to hack something out to end the week regardless. So, with that thought in mind, here's a best of.. compilation made up of 25 songs I've posted about on here since 2008 :
The best of The Martorialist (so far)
1. Melle Mel - Drug Wars (1989)
2. Mac Mall - Soak Some Dope (1994)
3. Big Noyd - Heartless (2008)
4. Juvenile ft. B.G - 187 (1998)
5. Lil' Wayne - Cash Money N*gga (2005)
6. Poor Righteous Teachers - Wicked Everytime (1996)
7. C.O.D AKA Dope-E & K-Rino - Clever Word (1990)
8. The Diplomats - Drama King, Drama Gang o.g version (2002)
9. Jim Jones ft. Max B & Mel Matrix - Anniversary (2007)
10. The Jacka - Heavy Rain (2005)
11. Slick Rick - Treat Her Like A Prostitute movie version (1988)
12. 4-2 Tha Dome - Blame It On Society (1995)
13. Grand Puba - Let's Go (2007)
14. All $tar - Keep Doing My Thang (2008)
15. Pretty Tone Capone - Case Dismissed (1992)
16. Curren$y - Reagan Era (2008)
17. Edan - Funky Rhyming (2005)
18. Eddi Projex & Beeda Weeda - Gettin' G's (2010)
19. Buddah Nation - Buddah Nation (1992)
20. T-Bo & Mike Da Hustla ft. Mr Murder - Who Dem Boyz? (2000)
21. Beanie Sigel ft. Peedi Crakk - Philly (2006)
22. Casual - Turkey And Dressing (2001)
23. Max Minelli - My First Verse (2003)
24. Lil' Boosie - Fresh remix verse edit (2009)
25. Rock ft. Sean Price - Fuck Dat Rapper (2008)
~~> DOWNLOAD HERE <~~
The relevant info' :
1. Melle Mel's own Night Of The Living Baseheads from his Piano LP. A case of The Rapper Doth Protest Too Much, Methinks since he was freebasing at the time, but although he has songs which are more iconic, I contend that Piano contained his apex with this and Free Style where he accidentally created the iz-ing words trend that E-40 and Snoop would later squabble over the inventing rights to.
2. A Mac Mall non-album exclusive which can only be located on the Sic Wit Tis CD EP; produced by the gawd Khayree and probably Mac # 2's hardest jam from his prime era.
3. Okay, so nothing will ever top Recognize And Realize Part 1, but Noyd's storming Heartless from his Illustrious album here just about nudges aside Shoot 'Em Up (Bang Bang) Part 1 as his 2nd best solo track and it whets my appetite for gimmicky male accessories with its mentions of "Infamous handkerchiefs".
4. A forgotten cut by Juve & B.G with Mannie in Mantronix mode which originally appeared on the advance copies 400 Degreez and then found its official home on that DJ Skribble compilation which the AZ It's War song where he dissed Kurupt and E-40 comes from.
5. The last song Wayne and Mannie did together which was intended for The Carter 2 but ended up on Wayne's Reebok mixtape with Mick Boogie and The Carter 2.5 mixtape EP type thing.
6. A late-period P.R.T joint from their final album with Wise Intelligent at his most stylized, gymnastic, and cracka-hating.
7. An early S.P.C cut by Dope-E & K-Rino's first group C.O.D from their amusingly titled Cummin' Out Doggin' EP where both rappers extol the virtues of using a thesaurus.
8. The original preferred mixtape version of Drama King, Drama Gang, which popped up at some point between Come Home With Me and Diplomatic Immunity Volume 1 since sample clearance prohibited it from appearing on Kay Slay's first album.
9. A Max B helmed Byrd Gang classic from the same comp Dipset compilation as Cam's Suga Duga which I've always though sounds like one of those DOOM productions from the Monsta Island Czars album which later became Ghostface joints where he resold the beats to him.
10. Jacka's most notorious and, indeed, best unreleased song to date, which is yet another entry into the ever-increasing catalogue of Mob Figaz songs about the pitter patter of drizzle on the concrete streets of the Bay.
11. The superior beatbox version of Treat Her Like A Prostitute with Doug E. Fresh taken from the Teenage Love 12" we can use as the missing link between The Show/La Di Da Di and Sittin' In My Car.
12. The introspective title track to the solitary EP release by Albama's 4-2 Tha Dome, who are kinda like a 90s version of fellow relatable 'bama everymen G. Side, just without the lyrics about bloggers.
13. Puba Maxwell's song from the Japanese Top Shelf '88 compilation where Black Sheep, Smooth B, Grandmaster Caz & Melle Mel etc all recorded songs in the '88 stylee to suprisingly good effect. In Germany and Croatia there are still fully-manned suicide hotlines open for Euro' hip hop dudes reeling from the shock that Top Shelf '88 wasn't the genuine album of ‘lost '88 gems from a secrete studio which burned down in mysterious circumstances’ that it was originally marketed as.
14. One of $tarlito's prime sad-rap moments from when he still went by the sobriquet of All $tar on the $tarlito's Way 2 'tape.
15. The unique guide to how rappers should beat murder charges by Mobstyle's Pretty Tone Capone, which the likes of Steady B, Cool C, Big Lurch, Max B, Boosie et al clearly should've studied more thoroughly.
16. Curren$y's viral-video single from the Independence Day mixtape and the song which made me reconsider my previous stance that he'd gone from respectable Wayne weedcarrier to Lupe-lite sap.
17. Edan's exclusive 2005 HipHopSite 7" which just about gets away with sampling played-out staples like Champ, Funky Drummer and U.F.O and whining about internet criticism because it's so good and it sounded what I'd always hoped those early Edan singles would.
18. A semi-remake of C-Bo's hardnosed classic Want To Be A "G" by Eddi Projex and Beeda Weeda, ripped straight off Youtube since no MP3 of it is currently floating around.
19. The weed themed Harlem posse cut by Downlow, Zhigge, the Ghetto Dwellas, and Figures Of Speech, which is thankfully a helluva lot better than the original weed themed Harlem posse cut Pass Da Boo-Dah that Spoonie Gee, Doug E. Fresh and DJ Spivey released in 1983.
20. The essential title track from T-Bo & Mike Da Hustla's album, a key release in the moonshine 'n' rhinestones southern whigga-rap movement and the South Coast Coalition discography.
21. A State Property cut from Beanie's mixtape with Clinton Sparks which also gets away with the whole retro samples schtick due to how good State Prop always sound over these sort of breaks, and one of Beanie's most savage verses where he performs unmentionable acts with broomsticks which would even have MC Ren blushing. Noz recently mentioned how B.G and Soulja Slim were particularly efficient at using murder as their muse and Beans belongs in the same category.
22. If there's one post-Fear Itself Casual song your writer would want to listen to before being strapped into the electric chair it would be Turkey And Dressing, and this result is achieved by a 50/50 ratio of Cas' going off on one and a Stimulated Dummies beat which ticks every box in the banger category.
23. Thee jam of all jams on Max Minelli's I'm All I Got album which uses a reoccurring "____ ass n*gga" motif towards the end four years before Hot Stylz made it famous.
24. Basically, Boosie's excellent verse about the finer points of men's fashion from the otherwise terrible Fresh remix by 6 Tre G, kindly edited into listenable shape by Paul.
25. A mixtape banger by Rockness Monsta & Sean Price over creepy John Carpenter soundtrack style synths which bafflingly didn't end up on that last Heltah Skeltah album.
The best of The Martorialist (so far)
1. Melle Mel - Drug Wars (1989)
2. Mac Mall - Soak Some Dope (1994)
3. Big Noyd - Heartless (2008)
4. Juvenile ft. B.G - 187 (1998)
5. Lil' Wayne - Cash Money N*gga (2005)
6. Poor Righteous Teachers - Wicked Everytime (1996)
7. C.O.D AKA Dope-E & K-Rino - Clever Word (1990)
8. The Diplomats - Drama King, Drama Gang o.g version (2002)
9. Jim Jones ft. Max B & Mel Matrix - Anniversary (2007)
10. The Jacka - Heavy Rain (2005)
11. Slick Rick - Treat Her Like A Prostitute movie version (1988)
12. 4-2 Tha Dome - Blame It On Society (1995)
13. Grand Puba - Let's Go (2007)
14. All $tar - Keep Doing My Thang (2008)
15. Pretty Tone Capone - Case Dismissed (1992)
16. Curren$y - Reagan Era (2008)
17. Edan - Funky Rhyming (2005)
18. Eddi Projex & Beeda Weeda - Gettin' G's (2010)
19. Buddah Nation - Buddah Nation (1992)
20. T-Bo & Mike Da Hustla ft. Mr Murder - Who Dem Boyz? (2000)
21. Beanie Sigel ft. Peedi Crakk - Philly (2006)
22. Casual - Turkey And Dressing (2001)
23. Max Minelli - My First Verse (2003)
24. Lil' Boosie - Fresh remix verse edit (2009)
25. Rock ft. Sean Price - Fuck Dat Rapper (2008)
~~> DOWNLOAD HERE <~~
The relevant info' :
1. Melle Mel's own Night Of The Living Baseheads from his Piano LP. A case of The Rapper Doth Protest Too Much, Methinks since he was freebasing at the time, but although he has songs which are more iconic, I contend that Piano contained his apex with this and Free Style where he accidentally created the iz-ing words trend that E-40 and Snoop would later squabble over the inventing rights to.
2. A Mac Mall non-album exclusive which can only be located on the Sic Wit Tis CD EP; produced by the gawd Khayree and probably Mac # 2's hardest jam from his prime era.
3. Okay, so nothing will ever top Recognize And Realize Part 1, but Noyd's storming Heartless from his Illustrious album here just about nudges aside Shoot 'Em Up (Bang Bang) Part 1 as his 2nd best solo track and it whets my appetite for gimmicky male accessories with its mentions of "Infamous handkerchiefs".
4. A forgotten cut by Juve & B.G with Mannie in Mantronix mode which originally appeared on the advance copies 400 Degreez and then found its official home on that DJ Skribble compilation which the AZ It's War song where he dissed Kurupt and E-40 comes from.
5. The last song Wayne and Mannie did together which was intended for The Carter 2 but ended up on Wayne's Reebok mixtape with Mick Boogie and The Carter 2.5 mixtape EP type thing.
6. A late-period P.R.T joint from their final album with Wise Intelligent at his most stylized, gymnastic, and cracka-hating.
7. An early S.P.C cut by Dope-E & K-Rino's first group C.O.D from their amusingly titled Cummin' Out Doggin' EP where both rappers extol the virtues of using a thesaurus.
8. The original preferred mixtape version of Drama King, Drama Gang, which popped up at some point between Come Home With Me and Diplomatic Immunity Volume 1 since sample clearance prohibited it from appearing on Kay Slay's first album.
9. A Max B helmed Byrd Gang classic from the same comp Dipset compilation as Cam's Suga Duga which I've always though sounds like one of those DOOM productions from the Monsta Island Czars album which later became Ghostface joints where he resold the beats to him.
10. Jacka's most notorious and, indeed, best unreleased song to date, which is yet another entry into the ever-increasing catalogue of Mob Figaz songs about the pitter patter of drizzle on the concrete streets of the Bay.
11. The superior beatbox version of Treat Her Like A Prostitute with Doug E. Fresh taken from the Teenage Love 12" we can use as the missing link between The Show/La Di Da Di and Sittin' In My Car.
12. The introspective title track to the solitary EP release by Albama's 4-2 Tha Dome, who are kinda like a 90s version of fellow relatable 'bama everymen G. Side, just without the lyrics about bloggers.
13. Puba Maxwell's song from the Japanese Top Shelf '88 compilation where Black Sheep, Smooth B, Grandmaster Caz & Melle Mel etc all recorded songs in the '88 stylee to suprisingly good effect. In Germany and Croatia there are still fully-manned suicide hotlines open for Euro' hip hop dudes reeling from the shock that Top Shelf '88 wasn't the genuine album of ‘lost '88 gems from a secrete studio which burned down in mysterious circumstances’ that it was originally marketed as.
14. One of $tarlito's prime sad-rap moments from when he still went by the sobriquet of All $tar on the $tarlito's Way 2 'tape.
15. The unique guide to how rappers should beat murder charges by Mobstyle's Pretty Tone Capone, which the likes of Steady B, Cool C, Big Lurch, Max B, Boosie et al clearly should've studied more thoroughly.
16. Curren$y's viral-video single from the Independence Day mixtape and the song which made me reconsider my previous stance that he'd gone from respectable Wayne weedcarrier to Lupe-lite sap.
17. Edan's exclusive 2005 HipHopSite 7" which just about gets away with sampling played-out staples like Champ, Funky Drummer and U.F.O and whining about internet criticism because it's so good and it sounded what I'd always hoped those early Edan singles would.
18. A semi-remake of C-Bo's hardnosed classic Want To Be A "G" by Eddi Projex and Beeda Weeda, ripped straight off Youtube since no MP3 of it is currently floating around.
19. The weed themed Harlem posse cut by Downlow, Zhigge, the Ghetto Dwellas, and Figures Of Speech, which is thankfully a helluva lot better than the original weed themed Harlem posse cut Pass Da Boo-Dah that Spoonie Gee, Doug E. Fresh and DJ Spivey released in 1983.
20. The essential title track from T-Bo & Mike Da Hustla's album, a key release in the moonshine 'n' rhinestones southern whigga-rap movement and the South Coast Coalition discography.
21. A State Property cut from Beanie's mixtape with Clinton Sparks which also gets away with the whole retro samples schtick due to how good State Prop always sound over these sort of breaks, and one of Beanie's most savage verses where he performs unmentionable acts with broomsticks which would even have MC Ren blushing. Noz recently mentioned how B.G and Soulja Slim were particularly efficient at using murder as their muse and Beans belongs in the same category.
22. If there's one post-Fear Itself Casual song your writer would want to listen to before being strapped into the electric chair it would be Turkey And Dressing, and this result is achieved by a 50/50 ratio of Cas' going off on one and a Stimulated Dummies beat which ticks every box in the banger category.
23. Thee jam of all jams on Max Minelli's I'm All I Got album which uses a reoccurring "____ ass n*gga" motif towards the end four years before Hot Stylz made it famous.
24. Basically, Boosie's excellent verse about the finer points of men's fashion from the otherwise terrible Fresh remix by 6 Tre G, kindly edited into listenable shape by Paul.
25. A mixtape banger by Rockness Monsta & Sean Price over creepy John Carpenter soundtrack style synths which bafflingly didn't end up on that last Heltah Skeltah album.
Friday, 11 March 2011
Reasons why I love Youtube # 11
The third Martorialist compilation will be hittin' the 'nets tomorrow, so in the meantime here's 2 absolute treasures from the era when WCW were going hard in the ring with Konnan and Master P so Curt "Mr Perfect" Hennig and his post-n.W.o posse the West Texas Rednecks had to strike back for the white ppl :
Wednesday, 9 March 2011
Thoughts on Rittz's White Jesus mixtape
(From White Jesus album; 2011)
Fulla Shit and High Five are the obvious standouts, but I may come to love Nowhere To Run too because it's an emo cracka-rap song us white ppl can listen to when we're feeling frail like a penguin's egg without being struck dumb by images of the fabled sulking teens in Papa Roach's Last Resort video. But anyway, since it's now k00l to like fat white southern rappers I present you with the best three songs by Haystak as according to me.
When dudes do "rap album covers lolz" message board threads you can guarantee that Crackavelli is always gonna follow the infamous Big Bear CD sleeve, but 'stak Bundles was actually one of the forefathers of Moonshine 'n' Rhinestones whigga-rap who was kicking double-time flows and launching into Newports & cheap booze-addled raspy harmonizing like a saltine ginger Z-Ro when Rittz was probably still playing air-guitar to Puddle Of Mudd and practicing the Grandmaster Sexay and Scotty 2 Hotty dance in front of his mother's TV. So, go grab your rhodium fronts, and then cop some 44" waist Southpole jean shorts, white softtoe Reeboks and Ecko t-shirts from TK Maxx and let's take it to the dirt roads. Or the fridge :
(From Car Fulla White Boys album; 2000)
Haystak - Broads And Alcohol
(From Portrait Of A White Boy album; 2004)
Haystak - Hell Naw
(From Cracks The Safe album; 2008)
Swear down that wasn't intended as a one-hot-song-ever-four-year-average there, because everybody knows that Haystak has made more good songs than Eminem at this point.
Tuesday, 8 March 2011
Greatest movie scenes ever # 38
Lessons to be learned from the fate which befell the Mexican gangbangers in this Falling Down scene : woe betide any infidel who attempts to pull a drive-by without first consulting the No Limit soldier handbook on the rather novel way N.L maharajah Percy Miller recounted that he used to escape his drive-by debut on the last verse of Somethin' Funky For The Street :
"..it's bein' real 'cause the P don't hindsight
'89 did my first fuckin' drive-by
opened fire with the deuce-deuce on the crowd
they started yellin' as the bitches started fallin' down
all I heard was sirens from the po-leece
ran through the crowd, actin' like it wad'nt me
n*ggas in the back of the chev' gettin' chroniced out
just handled our business, and we slowly smashed out
now we on the freeway
danked out *just bust caps* and we got away
true g's in the dope game
but always comin' through with somethin' funky for the streets, mayn"
Master P - Somethin' Funky For The Street (1994)
Questions :
P begins the third verse by noting that he's on the highway in a black Chevy to commit a drive-by and concludes it by chronicling how he heads back to the same Chevy after escaping the scene of the crime to find the No Limit soldiers getting high, so does this infer that he steals another car between and then jumps out of it into the panicking mass of people he's just blasted at to make his get away, or does he really claim to have perpetrated a drive-by without the aid of a car?
Are P's casual mentions of listening to his own albums and the albums of other No Limit soldiers in his music a mere act of product placement or a more devious ploy to disguise that he was ripping off various other rappers by fabricating a universe where they don't exist and the only music he bumps is his own and that of his roster?
Is Somethin' Funky For The Street a top top E-A-Ski beat ever?
Is the Mexican Douglas shoots in the leg wearing Vans Eras in the clip or some sort of Winos and, if they are Eras, were Mexican gang bangers really wearing Vans in the early nineties?
Sunday, 6 March 2011
bAZy area
AZ ft. DJ Greg Mack - Live Your Life (2009)
I did detect AZ's modus operandi of releasing 2 indie albums in quick succession with practically zero promotion had a whiff of the Bay Area about it when he put G.O.D out about a couple of weeks after he released the sunday morning dump of an album that was Legendary back in summer 2009, but it's only after picking up a physical copy of G.O.D in a generic outlet village music store's january sale for under two quid that my suspicions were confirmed correct because it was released by Siccness.net and features beats by The Batkave and guest appearances by Bay upstart Smigg Dirtee. One of the most conservative old man NY rappers who had beef with the Ambassador Of The Bay shacking up with the offshoot label of northern California's most infamous internet hub of Gangsta-Rap which began life as a Brotha Lynch Hung message board appear the least likely of bed fellows at first glance, until you cotton on that Siccness is distributed by the new E1 Entertainment pseudonym Koch are now lurking under and that they've been diversifying the Siccness brand into the east coast market with low-rent indie albums by DMX and Keith Murray as well as a couple of cheap but very effective releases by Beanie Sigel and Beanie & Freeway, which'll suffice as modern postludes to the two State Property group albums quite nicely for the time being.
AZ - Hustle In My Blood (2009)
Even though a cursory listen of G.O.D had me dismissing it as AZ's 2nd Veteranz Day style point-of-no-return in the space of a month, my CD collection contains such dubious albums as Can't Hold Back by Ice Cream Tee, the Tonka Boyz abortion, Crime Mob's 2nd CD, Veteranz Day itself and now this due to the possibly farcical reasoning that it's cheap and future revisitations may well reveal, if not gems, then rhinestones of the finest quality, and investigating it more thoroughly now by jamming it properly via a Hi-Fi/car stereo instead of skimming through songs on laptop speakers while watching clips of Ravishing Rick Rude pwning the Big Bossman's mother one has to concede that there are three joints of Anthony doing what Anthony does best by effortlessly locking into the pulse of some unexpectedly lavish beats with his seamlessly fluid flow on there : Hustle In My Blood doesn't ascend to the heights that a song which features him rapping over a cover of Stevie's Part Time Lover (someone plz ID who the cover is by) should in theory but it works just fine all the same; album highlight Live Your Life really should've been stashed for the 15th anniversary Doe Or Die project because it has the feel of a low-budget-but-still-wavy Sugarhill about it; and while Get Low with Smigg Dirtee isn't exactly Phone Tap or The Essence the two rappers manage to impart a sense of chemistry between them when they go back-and-forth and finish each other's lines on the second verse over some pretty luscious guitar squalling, which I'm chalking up as a notable victory since guitar samples are a notoriously dangerous animal for rappers to befriend, and Smigg says "then murder dog with a magazine" which I thought was quite witty.
AZ ft. Smigg Dirtee - Get Low (2009)
A Google search informs me that there's one last Bay Area twist in this tale, with G.O.D's original title of I Am Legendary (it was billed as this to pre-order on Amazon at the time before being switched a week or so before the album leaked) ending up on the rap-album-title scrapheap alongside Don't Be A Faggot by the Beasties (Licensed To Ill) and Starved Bandit by DJ Quik (Safe & Sound) due to its similarity to AP.9's also-summer-2009-released I Am Legend, and if a traditionalist New Yorker like AZ can drop an album through Siccness then we've reached the point where Rap is virtually limitless in possibilities, so I'd like a trans-regional jailbird possecut by Cool C, C-Murder, Max B, Lil' Boosie, South Park Mexican, and Tragedy Khafafi over some beatboxing by Big Lurch, and a The Firm 2.0 consisting of AZ, Jacka, Husalah & Cormega with at least one song where Jacka assumes the position of Nas on Gimme Yours and delivers a gloriously off-key chorus.
Tuesday, 1 March 2011
Great songs from forgotten rap albums # 15
Since the 'net is currently entrapped in a game of ascertaining which old hardcore band Odd Future are the rap equivalent of (ZOMG they're like the 1982 demo line up of Black Flag when Chuck Biscuits was on drums!!) it seems like a good opportunity for the first ‘Great songs from forgotten rap albums’ post of 2011. The ‘forgotten’ part of the title became a personal bugbear because it's not like I'm coming with any secrete material here, but it's a handy contrivance to post some slept-on songs I like from albums which don't get yapped about that often in one fell swoop, so it'll have to suffice.
Govna Mattic ft. Pacewon, Roz Noble, Tame One, Runt Dog, Redman & Young Zee - Family Day
(From Hell Up In Newark; 1998)
Drew Huge alerted me to this seldom-heard posse cut when he played it on one of the Fat Lace podcasts, and while Govna Mattic's Hell Up In Newark album is worth a pop if the notion of Dare Iz A Darkside-era Reggie rapping in a vaguely rastaman baritone is appealing to you, Family Day remains its high spot. The weed carriers hold their own alongside the 4 Jersey heavyweights, it's one of the few late nineties tracks to go for that whole ciphering-on-a-radio-show aesthetic and actually pull it off without sounding too cluttered, meandering, or amateurish, but the absolute best thing about Family Day is the okie-doke during the breakdown when it goes into the whole "and now, what you've been waiting for.." build-up speech which has you anticipating Redman's verse only for some dude called Runt Dog who'd never appeared on wax before and who wouldn't be heard of again for another decade to start rapping.
Backbone ft. Big Gipp & Slimm Calhoun - Believe That
(From Concrete Law; 2001)
Backbone for Dummies : his album was co-billed with Slic Patna even though the latter only appeared on 2 songs, it got lost in the shuffle alongside the Dungeon Family group LP following Stankonia's success, and he had a voice which, at times, was remarkably similar to what I'd imagine Jim Carrey's The Grinch doing Devin The Dude impersonations would sound like. The main single 5 Deuce 4 Tre where we get to hear Backbone's peculiar country tones unaccompanied over Organized Noize beats is a Dungeon Family classic, and the galumphing title track is pretty interesting since it attests to the influence Three 6 Mafia had over ATLanta by that point, but I'm gonna plump for Believe That here since it's probably the most typically D.F sounding song on there with that whomp-whomping bassline (like a swamp-funk version of For The Love Of Money by The O'Jays), and Slimm Calhoun's verse with the "got gorillas with banana clips who love to go ape" line predated Sigel's Beanie (Mack Bitch) with the "gorilla n*ggas goin' ape in this concrete jungle/banana clips 'll make them monkeys humble" line by mere weeks.
Cam'ron - Suga Duga
(From Dipset : More Than Music Volume 2; 2007)
AKA the 2nd best song on DukeDaGod's Dipset : More Than Music Volume 2 compilation after Byrd Gang's Anniversary and a relic from that brief period when Lil' Fame was tossing out great beat after great beat to every east coast Koch Records project. Much like He Tried To Play Me and Glitter this was an upgrade of S.D.E-era tracks like Whatever, and on it we find Mr Giles firing subliminals at Tru-Life on the first verse before getting down to business by chirpsing some broad like Humphrey Bogart in To Have And Have Not or The Big Sleep before claiming he's a work of art himself. It's a pity that Cam couldn't have used token female Dipset weedcarrier/Luther Blissett lookalike Jha-Jha as a Lauren Bacall figure in a song at least once because there aren't enough back-and-forth Battle Of The Sexes rap joints which use flirtatiously acerbic banter between a gentleman and his damsel/potential damsel as a form of foreplay, and it'd be funny to hear a female counterpart snap on Cam with a few zings about his I.B.S.
Lil' Keke ft. 8Ball & Kyleon - We Made It Out The Bottom
(From Str8 Out Da Slums; 2005)
Lil' Keke & The Jacka's Str8 Out Da Slums is your archetypal bicoastal collaboration album which doesn't even bother to feature its two protagonists on the same song together, but it does have a few joints from either camp; Jacka emerges victorious from the contest on points for the album's stand out Pigeons On A T-Shirt (apparently originally recorded for The Jack Artist as Thunder and left off due to the sound quality on Husalah's verse which was probably recorded in his uncle's pantry since it's from the period when he was on the run from the feds), but Keke wins the last round with this album-closing banger which features 8Ball and a young Kyleon before he prefixed the Killa to his moniker. Really smart move there by Kyle' now he's finally blowing up beyond the outskirts of Texas, seeing how it isn't like Ghostface Killah and Killer Mike have spent their respective careers hampered by aggressive rap nom-de-plumes or anything.
A related epilogue : Redman's "I got Tic-Tacs in my mouth with a big dick" line is often painted as his ultimate AYO! moment, but I 'unno, man, I find the "when I die I want one in my mouth burnin'/with my dick out while Krs One preaching a sermon" lyric from Family Day far more Pause!-worthy since it involves homosexual necrophilia with the batshit Blastmaster babbling on about how astronauts should be taught how to use fat cap nozzles on spray paint and how 9/11 victims who ended up jumping from the twin towers may have landed safely had they knew any breakdancing freeze moves.
Govna Mattic ft. Pacewon, Roz Noble, Tame One, Runt Dog, Redman & Young Zee - Family Day
(From Hell Up In Newark; 1998)
Drew Huge alerted me to this seldom-heard posse cut when he played it on one of the Fat Lace podcasts, and while Govna Mattic's Hell Up In Newark album is worth a pop if the notion of Dare Iz A Darkside-era Reggie rapping in a vaguely rastaman baritone is appealing to you, Family Day remains its high spot. The weed carriers hold their own alongside the 4 Jersey heavyweights, it's one of the few late nineties tracks to go for that whole ciphering-on-a-radio-show aesthetic and actually pull it off without sounding too cluttered, meandering, or amateurish, but the absolute best thing about Family Day is the okie-doke during the breakdown when it goes into the whole "and now, what you've been waiting for.." build-up speech which has you anticipating Redman's verse only for some dude called Runt Dog who'd never appeared on wax before and who wouldn't be heard of again for another decade to start rapping.
Backbone ft. Big Gipp & Slimm Calhoun - Believe That
(From Concrete Law; 2001)
Backbone for Dummies : his album was co-billed with Slic Patna even though the latter only appeared on 2 songs, it got lost in the shuffle alongside the Dungeon Family group LP following Stankonia's success, and he had a voice which, at times, was remarkably similar to what I'd imagine Jim Carrey's The Grinch doing Devin The Dude impersonations would sound like. The main single 5 Deuce 4 Tre where we get to hear Backbone's peculiar country tones unaccompanied over Organized Noize beats is a Dungeon Family classic, and the galumphing title track is pretty interesting since it attests to the influence Three 6 Mafia had over ATLanta by that point, but I'm gonna plump for Believe That here since it's probably the most typically D.F sounding song on there with that whomp-whomping bassline (like a swamp-funk version of For The Love Of Money by The O'Jays), and Slimm Calhoun's verse with the "got gorillas with banana clips who love to go ape" line predated Sigel's Beanie (Mack Bitch) with the "gorilla n*ggas goin' ape in this concrete jungle/banana clips 'll make them monkeys humble" line by mere weeks.
Cam'ron - Suga Duga
(From Dipset : More Than Music Volume 2; 2007)
AKA the 2nd best song on DukeDaGod's Dipset : More Than Music Volume 2 compilation after Byrd Gang's Anniversary and a relic from that brief period when Lil' Fame was tossing out great beat after great beat to every east coast Koch Records project. Much like He Tried To Play Me and Glitter this was an upgrade of S.D.E-era tracks like Whatever, and on it we find Mr Giles firing subliminals at Tru-Life on the first verse before getting down to business by chirpsing some broad like Humphrey Bogart in To Have And Have Not or The Big Sleep before claiming he's a work of art himself. It's a pity that Cam couldn't have used token female Dipset weedcarrier/Luther Blissett lookalike Jha-Jha as a Lauren Bacall figure in a song at least once because there aren't enough back-and-forth Battle Of The Sexes rap joints which use flirtatiously acerbic banter between a gentleman and his damsel/potential damsel as a form of foreplay, and it'd be funny to hear a female counterpart snap on Cam with a few zings about his I.B.S.
Lil' Keke ft. 8Ball & Kyleon - We Made It Out The Bottom
(From Str8 Out Da Slums; 2005)
Lil' Keke & The Jacka's Str8 Out Da Slums is your archetypal bicoastal collaboration album which doesn't even bother to feature its two protagonists on the same song together, but it does have a few joints from either camp; Jacka emerges victorious from the contest on points for the album's stand out Pigeons On A T-Shirt (apparently originally recorded for The Jack Artist as Thunder and left off due to the sound quality on Husalah's verse which was probably recorded in his uncle's pantry since it's from the period when he was on the run from the feds), but Keke wins the last round with this album-closing banger which features 8Ball and a young Kyleon before he prefixed the Killa to his moniker. Really smart move there by Kyle' now he's finally blowing up beyond the outskirts of Texas, seeing how it isn't like Ghostface Killah and Killer Mike have spent their respective careers hampered by aggressive rap nom-de-plumes or anything.
A related epilogue : Redman's "I got Tic-Tacs in my mouth with a big dick" line is often painted as his ultimate AYO! moment, but I 'unno, man, I find the "when I die I want one in my mouth burnin'/with my dick out while Krs One preaching a sermon" lyric from Family Day far more Pause!-worthy since it involves homosexual necrophilia with the batshit Blastmaster babbling on about how astronauts should be taught how to use fat cap nozzles on spray paint and how 9/11 victims who ended up jumping from the twin towers may have landed safely had they knew any breakdancing freeze moves.
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