Generic list post: june 2015

Obligatory roundup post of those songs I've listened to most during the month when Puffy should have paid Shyne to shoot up his son's football coach's office.

SPM ft. Baby Beesh - Oh My My (2000)
Baby Bash ft. SPM - Short Skirts (2002)
J Stalin - Pop My Collar (2005)
Nebu Kiniza - Myself (2014)
Dr. Yen Lo - Day 13 (2015)
French Montana ft. Chinx & NORE - Off The Rip (2015)
Lil' Chris ft. Sasha Go Hard - Ohh Na Na (2015)
Future - News Or Somthn' (2015)
Trill Younginz - I Look Fly (Martorialist Edit) (2015)
Willie P Keys - I Ain't Thinkin' Bout U (Martorialist Edit) (2015)
Trey Songz ft. Ty Dolla $ign - Loving You (2015)
Janet Jackson - No Sleeep (2015)
Charly Black - Gal You A Party Animal (2015)

Other notables: would have preferred WTF was a Nef The Pharaoh solo track TBH; really didn't expect the new TREE & Vic Spencer song to sound like a Pharrell production but it does and it works; Glory To The Lord by King Los & Kellz is the song B-Boy should have been; Kendrick Lamar had one job to do on the Classic Man remix and he made a complete pig's ear of it.

(PS - you can find some of the MP3s from this month's list in the most recent Martorialist compilation.)

Watch for the hook

Some of Nef The Pharaoh's lil' homies gettin' in the Swag-Rap renaissance is an interesting idea but there's two main problems with I Look Fly by Trill Youngins. Firstly, how y'all gonna hop on the Trill bandwagon when y'all hail from northern California? Y'all should be called Mainey Youngins innit. Secondly, that hook is so good I end up twiddling my thumbs through the rapping just waiting for it to reappear.

I can't do nuttin' for ya, man, with regards to their choice of moniker, but I can get DJ Step One to edit the song down to its bare essentials on some Cool Breeze type shit. And that's exactly what we did:

Trill Youngins - I Look Fly (Martorialist edit)
(From the internet; 2015)

Rap music? More like crap music amirite!

Did you know Sweaty Ken, Wee Stanky and Wankey Set are anagrams of KanYe West? The peanut gallery under The Guardian's review of KanYe at Glastonbury last night certainly do, and the comment section is the absolute treasure trove you'd hope it would be. Top 3 favourite exchanges:







Personal hot take on the KanYe set: no one man should have all that power to cut All Falls Down off before the "I can't even pronounce nothin', pass that Ver-Say-See" line.

I'm in a field in Somerset talkin' like it's just you & me

Have a load of some dickhead from The Guardian calling the 2 worst KanYe West singles since that clusterfuck he recorded for Mission Impossible 3 "nearly perfect Kanye songs" lol:



If KanYe brings out Jay-Z at Glastonbury tonight but not Twista and T-Pain then he's workin' for the FEDs. Oi A-Wax - dig up man's paperwork innit.

Just sayin', bruv # 10.5

A trifecta of actual facts about Bay Area rap on this humid friday evening:

Numero uno reason why Mac Dre & Khayree were one of the greatest rapper/producer partnerships ever: they made a genuine classic 5/5 rap song where Dre rapped over the phone from jail for nearly 6 minutes in I'm N Motion.

Be nice if some of the folks pontificating about Lil B being the most influential rapper of the last 5 years would acknowledge just how much a product of Oakland he is: Mac Dre was stylin' in Vans Eras a couple of years before The Pack dropped THAT song; B was the member of The Pack with the deepest voice until he switched his whole tone up and started rapping through his nose after DB Tha General dropped Welcome To The Navy in 2007; B's whole penchant for referring to himself as pretty and Jesus was liberally nicked from Husalah.

If Brian Coleman doesn't dedicate a chapter to Mac Dre's What's Really Going On EP in his next Check The Technique book then he's probably workin' for the FEDS. Top 5 EP of the early '90s no competition.

R.I.P Young Ready (AKA Racked Up Ready)

"The day they claim they all loved ya is the day ya died"

Enough rapper deaths this year already. If God really exists then why is he not taking some of these indie rawk and techno wastemen back to the essence instead? What purpose do Pete Doherty or Richie Hawtin serve in 2015?

Truth be told, I wasn't a big Young Ready fan, but he was involved in a handful of songs that I do love and I'll definitely miss his opportunistic beefing with practically every other Baton Rouge rapper bar his boy Mista Cain, his mentors C-Loc & Max Minelli, and Boosie, with whom he shared a baby momma. Here's 3 songs to remember him by:

Young Ready - Put Yo Money Down
(From Junkie Medicine compilation; 2006)


Young Ready from when he was young foreal. "I'm the snake eyes that gets rolled right out the gate, so your old lady gets passed like collection plates."

Tha Camp - 1 Rubber
(From Tha Camp's Break It Off! album; 2007)


Ready's best song and for that we should thank Mouse On Tha Track's bassline + Tha Camp 2.0's ability to present such a convincing case for wearing johnny hats. Very apt that a handwritten letter from Young Ready is one of Frankie Tha Lucky Dog's treasured possessions because it was via Frankie's old MySpace page that I found out about Ready's Break It Off! album with C-Loc & Max Minelli back in 2008.

Mista Cain ft. Young Ready & DJ B-Real - Mind Right
(From Mista Cain - Louisicain 2.5 mixtape; 2012)


A Mista song that Ready claimed as his own when Mista got sent down for murder. One of the hardest songs of 2012, which was no mean feat considering that was the year which gave us Gunplay's Jump Out and Fam-Lay's Clap Clap.

A recent(ish) jams 4 u compilation part 2

A follow up to this compilation, here's a RAR file of some more songs from the past 6 months (+ late december) that I've been feelin'. You know your friend who loves the YG album and Trap Queen but still posts Childish Gambino songs on his Facebook? Share this one with him innit.

V/A - Them Damn Buck Roger' Years Songs Volume Two

1. Nebu Kiniza - Myself (2014)
2. Lil' Chris ft. Sasha Go Hard - Ohh Na Na (2015)
3. 22nd Letter - Blunt On Me (2015)
4. Corn ft. Nef The Pharaoh - Old School Hyphy (2015)
5. Ty Money ft. Twista - Come Again (2015)
6. Audio Push - Normally (2015)
7. French Montana ft. Chinx & NORE - Off The Rip (2015)
8. Mr.2-17 ft. The Ratchets - Why? (2015)
9. Honey Cocaine - Honeydick (2015)
10. Slim 400 ft. Hunyae, YG & Big Quis - On My Set (remix) (2015)
11. J Hus - Dem Boy Paigon (2015)

~~~> DOWNLOAD THE COMPILATION HERE <~~~

Since Honey Cocaine originally hails from Canada I had to restore the equilibrium by including a song by a U.K rapper. Like RGF Island by Fetty Wap, Dem Boy Paigon by J Hus belongs to a new sub-genre of Dancehall-inspired rap, and if it's good enough for Westwood to play then it's good enough for you.

Savile Life 2

"Mama Mia, I wanna put somethin' in Aaliyah
Sippin' Sangria and smokin' on Maria"

SPM ft. Baby Beesh - Oh My My
(From Time Is Money album; 2000)



Oh boy @ that "Guess I been lookin' for love in all the wrong places" line!

This is the post where I become the rap equivalent of one of those Gary Glitter apologists who are like "yo, but he's still got tunes tho!" Probably booked myself a one way trip to Hades by posting two SPM tracks this year, but at least I'll get to spend the rest of eternity listening to Happy Perez-produced rap songs by #problematic artists whilst youz lot have to grit your teeth through endless rewinds to Doug's All The Way To Heaven. Don't worry about me, like SPM told his family after the judge sentenced him to 45 years in the bing - "it'll be okay!"

It was only fair that Baby Beesh got his own animated tattoo in the video and SPM didn't because double B kinda murdered Miguel Mars Bar on his own shit here: "I need a hearing aid or some handicapped parkin'/damn, Baby Beesh you so damn retarded!"

R.I.P The Cut

Can't believe Charlie Sloth is favouring Coke Boy Money over Off The Rip as his current French 'n' Chinx track of choice when the latter is the much better song and the one that's been adopted by New York radio playlists. Apt that Off The Rip should be a Bloody Money homage since Chinx was very much the Capone to French's NORE on their songs together.

French Montana ft. Chinx & NORE - Off The Rip
(From Casino Life 2 mixtape; 2015)


Related note: this 1995 freestyle by Capone, Noreaga & Tragedy is so good it almost sounds like an unreleased The War Report track.

Rap songs that aren't on YouTube but really should be #11

It wasn't until adding the html to yesterday's Rap Songs That Aren't On YouTube post about I Want My Money by Smooth B that I realised the Black Sheep track from Top Shelf 8/8/88 ain't on the 'Tube either. Dres probably recorded I'm The One with the intention that it should sound like Black Sheep's equivalent of Think, but you'll have way more fun with the song if you pretend it's an outtake from A Wolf In Sheep's Clothing which lost its place in the album's official track list at the last minute to make way for U Mean I'm Not.

Black Sheep - I'm The One
(From Top Shelf 8/8/88 compilation; 2007)

Rap songs that aren't on YouTube but really should be #10

Back in 2007 a compilation of mysterious origin appeared claiming to be a gaggle of lost rap songs by various golden-era big hitters, all recorded in 1988 at some Manhattan studio which had been looted during the Tompkins Square Park riots and then closed down shortly thereafter. Top Shelf 8/8/88's backstory turned out to be a complete crock of hokum cooked up by Fab Five Freddy & Benjy Grinberg AKA the CEO of Wiz Khalifa's record label, but you had to applaud the pair of them for dreaming up such an audacious piece of backpacker-bait and then having the cojones to make it happen.

The compilation itself was a surprisingly good mixture of tracks recorded specifically as if they were from 1988 like Grand Puba's Let's Go and Black Sneep's I'm The One, and previously unreleased cuts obtained by possibly underhanded methods like Melle Mel & Grandmaster Caz's The Battle Is On and Special Ed's This Mic. Smooth B's I Want My Money sounds like it was recorded a good few years prior to his 2005 single Game Over, so whilst the song definitely doesn't date back to 1988 you can still pretend it's some mythical double A side to Greg Nice's 1994 minor-classic party anthem Set It Off.

Smooth B - I Want My Money Back
(From Top Shelf 8/8/88 compilation; 2007)

Random stuff

Frankie Tha Lucky Dog is the only person who could ever make me laugh during a conversation about Lil' Phat's death. David Drake's article on/interview with Frankie got more quotables than Great Adventures. Read it here.

The pros of being British: you can enjoy Tyga's new Freaky Tales redux song with Boosie guilt free because Kylie Jenner would be 100% legal here.

The cons of being old: you try listening to Future's 56 Nights mixtape but the sheer barrage of Ironside theme samples just makes you go and play Positive K's Step Up Front and Above The Law's Murder Rap instead.

Told y'all Troy Ave was gonna fill the void left by Hell Rell. Would still rather listen to I Know Why You Mad over 90% of New York rap made during the last 3 years, mind.

Seeing the Ego Trip site posting mixes by a white 43 year old AZN fetishist who refers to records as vinyls and has a spreadsheet of how many ethnic friends he has like Wicked22 makes me think that Ted Bawno might be real after all.

Every day this week I've checked VladTV to see if there's a Lord Jamar interview about Rachel Dolezal and every day I've been disappointed.

Puttin' the TM into TMZ

"If your lawyer paid and you made out in court
And your baby momma took you off you child support
You at the club like *GLORY TO THE LORD, GLORY TO THE LORD*"

King Los ft. R Kelly - Glory To The Lord
(From t'internet; 2015)


King Los zings an ill-subliminal in the direction of Special Ed and his Kickstarter fuckery which closed 2 days ago 96 grand short of the number he was looking to raise to finally pay his outstanding CSA debts fund a new album? You know we've got love for he who once had It Made here at The Martorialist, we're just on some Tim Westwood meets Wendy Williams type shit today - glory to VladTV, glory to Lord Jamar!

Glory To The Lord is the Rap & Bullshit throwback banger B-Boy could have been if only it'd had R Kelly sanging "I got all the homies with me, that's the homie ghost" in the place of A$AP Ferg sounding like the poor man's Puffy on the Dolly My Baby remix. Glory to the R&B SPM, fuck the Trap Lord! When that nonce Kelz says "shorty is the shit, no manure/booty so big, Hallelujah" it's like he's been possessed by the homie ghost of Castor Troy.

Get yer copy of I Got That Work out fer the lads!

HD of Bearfaced prides himself on being one of the capital lock REALEST rappers in the Bay, and so when he bragged that he "got that old Big Tymers up in my deck" on 2014 Martorialist favourite Don't Like Me he knew he'd have to show and prove if he ever shot a promo for the song. Hope dude really does own I Got That Work from back in t'day and didn't just hit up Rasputin for a used copy to stunt in the video.

HD of Bearfaced ft. G-Dirty - Don't Like Me
(From YouTube; 2015)



Don't Like Me was one of last year's two great Bay songs to bear an accidental Carl Craig influence. This shit sounded like a Landcruising-era remix of an old Messy Marv track, whilst Sage The Gemini's Bad Girls sounded like Oscillator being played on a malfunctioning turntable. Here's hoping 2015 is the year some Oakland producers inadvertently channel My Machines and Bug In The Bass Bin.

Cheerio, Chingo & Pancho

Chingo Bling ft. Willie P Keys & Pancho V - I Ain't Thinkin' Bout U
(From Masahouse 2 mixtape; 2015)


Whatta beat and whatta hook! That rappin' really gets in the way, though, so it's gotta go. I hit up Jack The Snipper DJ Step One again and he edited the song down to its bare essentials of Willie P Keys' hook x 3 for the good of all dance floors across the globe. Think of us as the Crooklyn Clan of functional Function music:

Willie P Keys - I Ain't Thinkin' Bout U (Martorialist Edit)
(From t'internet; 2015)


Don't ever think we ain't got love for Chingo Bling here at the Martorialist, mind; after all, what kinda person could ever dislike the rapper who almost justified Makonnen's whole existence with I Don't Sell Tamales No More?

A Lev Berlak productions compilation 4 u

(Has anybody ever seen Lev Berlak and DJ Yoda in the same room??)
One of the French lads turned my Lev Berlak appreciation generic list post into a zipfile. 32 tracks deep and featuring songs by Dru Down, Richie Rich, Mac Dre, the Mob Figaz, The Jacka, Husalah, A-Wax, 3x Krazy, Keak Da Sneak, PSD Tha Drivah, Agerman, Mind Over Matter, X-Mob, Da Productz, N2Deep, and J Stalin.

Download the compilation here, and peep the original post for an explanation on why Lev Berlak is the Mike Dean to RobLo's N.O Joe.

Martorialist elegance # 79

You can take the man outta Baduizm, but you can never take the Baduizm outta the man:

Septum-piercings may have set black people back a couple of decades. Swag levels set to ‘gap year in Goa’?

The Slim 400 blows

Speakin' of current singles which exist in hella incarnations, there's also Slim 400's On My Set. Originally a Hunyae song which Slim merely guested on, Slim then copped the song for himself, added his Pushaz Inc boss YG on the 2nd verse, and removed Hunyae's verse but kept his hook. Now there's another remix that's basically On My Set 2.0 with a new 3rd verse by Big Quis from Doughboyz Cashout AKA Juverassic 5:

Slim 400 ft. Hunyae, YG & Big Quis - On My Set (remix)
(From YouTube/Foe Block mixtape; 2015)


As a fan of previous Pushaz Inc/Doughboyz Cashout collaborations like Hella Ice, I ain't mad at this new remix becoming the def facto version of On My Set. Shit, Big Quis might even have the best bars in the whole song now with "I am not tryna kick it, I ain't Bruce Lee!"

"Any requests?"

"Never had no patience, waited for nobody
I feel like the mayor when I'm in the party"

Nebu Kiniza - Myself
(From Soundcloud; 2014)


This snappy little Wizcore ode to doin' it thyself sounds so much better in june 2015 than it did when I first heard it back in december 2014. What a pity fat Rickie from My So Called Life had to besmirch it with a remix a couple of weeks back before I could throw the original here into rotation and annoy everyone at the bar by recreating it inna Fresh Prince stylee. Even your girlfriend gonna act a fool on her glass of Prosecco with a spoon like "yeah, yeah, yeah!" to this one.

Generic list post: a Lev Berlak appreciation

Until I peeped his AllMusic page last week, all ya boy knew about Lev Berlak was that he was the Oakland producer who'd notched up credits for Dru Down, Mac Dre, and the Mob Figaz, and helmed A-Wax's Thug Deluxe album from top to bottom. Turns out Lev was also responsible for a shitload of deep cuts I'd never realised were his beats and a shitload of great tracks I'd never heard before. What's more, his studio The Grill has been the go-to spot for mixing & mastering in northern California since the late nineties, making him the Mike Dean of Mob Music. Lev Berlak? More like Lev BerSlap amirite:

Dru Down - Choppin' It Up (1996)
Dru Down - Head And Shoulders (1996)
Richie Rich - Real Shit (1996)
Richie Rich ft. Simply E - It's Not About You (1996)
Mind Over Body - Anotha Day (1996)
Mind Over Body - Creepin' Thru Yo' Hood (1996)
X-Mob - Paper Chasing (1997)
3x Krazy ft. Dru Down & Yukmouth - Pistols Blazin' (1997)
Da Productz - It's About The Money (1998)
N2Deep ft. Baby Beesh & Mac Dre - The Throw (1998)
Mac Dre - Rapper Gone Bad (1999)
Mob Figaz - Tailor Made (1999)
Mob Figaz - Hustle In The Rain (1999)
Agerman ft. Richie Rich - All About Dollar$ (1999)
Keak Da Sneak - Alright Cool (1999)
Keak Da Sneak ft. Agerman - No Love (1999)
Mac Dre - So Hard (2001)
Mac Dre - Bleezies-N-Heem (2001)
The Jacka - Tha Mayor (2002)
Husalah - Hustlin' Ass (2002)
PSD Tha Drivah ft. Keak Da Sneak - Streets Or Rap Game (Remix) (2002)
Mac Dre - Witme? (2004)
Mac Dre - Me Damac (2004)
Mac Dre - Hotel, Motel (2004)
A-Wax - Dollar Bill (2004)
A-Wax - This Town (2004)
A-Wax - Check 1,2 (2004)
A-Wax - Be Together (2004)
A-Wax - Before You Go (2004)
J Stalin - Pop My Collar (2005)
P.S.D Tha Drivah ft. J Stalin - Joseph Stalin (2007)
A-Wax - Hum Bum (2009)
Gonna hazard a guess that there's also a handful of Lev Berlak tracks spread out across all those noughties Messy Marv albums with no production credits. Plz tell me he was behind "B" or Cheese You Out?

Pat Queen/Garetty Wap

Much like there are multiple different edits of Sam Peckinpah's Pat Garrett and Billy The Kid, Trap Queen is a song which exists in various incarnations: there's the O.G version uploaded to Soundcloud which is absent of Fetty Wap's rap verse and the closing monologue by his mate Nitt Da Gritt; there's the 1st retail version featuring Nitt Da Gritt's monologue but no Fetty verse; there's the video-turnt-2nd-retail version featuring the verse and the monologue; and there's at least 4 different remixes, including the UK mix with Azealia Banks which is probably some sort of punishment on this country for inflicting Ed Sheeran on the U.S.

While Peckinpah stans still can't agree on which of the current cuts of Pat Garrett and Billy The Kid is the best, you've gotta to be a right moron not to consider the 2nd incarnation of Trap Queen as the definitive one, even if it was Trap Queen mk 3 which ultimately became the all-conquering global hit. There's no cumbersome attempt at rapping by Fetty to kill your buzz, but you still get the pleasure of Nitt Da Gritt on his Don King type shit to end the song on a victorious high:

Fetty Wap - Trap Queen (2nd version)
(From the internet; 2014)


Basically, one love to all the true Trap Queen fans who copped their MP3 of it before mid-december 2014.

"This is reality-rap, we all go through it!" part 100

"Everything 100, my n*gga
Took my phone off the charger at 100 percentage"

D-Rek ft. C Plus & Nef The Pharaoh - WTF
(From Soundcloud; 2015)



Very much feeling this Hyphy/Ratchet hybrid movement Nef The Pharaoh seems to be spearheading right now. Nef raps about bringing zombies back to life and eating eagles on WTF but that "I got the Furly Ghost, you feel me, cuddy?" line is the key lyric here because this track is pretty much Hustle 2k15 in everything but song title.

Related note: how on Earth did Derek C & Derek D manage to get first dabs on the best DJ Mustard beat since Post To Be? Moreover, how on Earth did they manage to convince Jeremih to fly over to the UK and appear in the video when he refused to shoot a promo for Don't Tell 'Em? Every country gets the Costco value knock-off of Bash Bash's Certified Freak it deserves.

#Problematic

(No Slim Thug & Pharrell.)

Styles P ft. Max B - Kill That Faggot (remix)
(From Max B's Million Dollar Baby 2 mixtape; 2008)



Hat tip to ANU for reminding me there was a Max B remix of Styles P's Kill That Faggot where Biggavelz spat some of the foulest raps of his career. Bumped into Styles in a hotel last year and suggested to him that Kill That Faggot was the hardest shit since MC Ren. He agreed and lamented how the suits at Koch wouldn't let him include it on his Super Gangster (Extraordinary Gentleman) album because of the song's title/hook. Oh what a difference the letter M coulda made.

Styles P - Kill That Faggot
(From The Ghost In The Shell mixtape; 2007)

Lil' Chris should have been in the 2015 XXL Freshman list

Lil' Chris ft. Sasha Go Hard - Ohh Na Na
(From the internet; 2015)


Wherein the Mr. Darcy of polyphony Lil' Chris goes Quiet Storm stadium-rap and Sasha Go Hard returns from the wastelands of Ryan Hemsworth cloud-rap collaborations/Alex MacPherson FACT Magazine reviews where he complains about her getting pregnant. Throw this on repeat with your significant other tonight and you might just have your own little bundle of joy to clog up your friend's Instagram feeds with in 9 months time. "Pussy so good that I wanna sing to youuuuuuuuu..."

True story, my best of Lil' Chris compilation still decimates anything that's been uploaded to Livemixtapes or DatPiff in 2015.

Tweetz is talkin' and they're sayin' 2$hin is a transphobe

Plz believe Team Martorialist stays holdin' AZNs down like gravity in their times of crisis. Thus, here's an MP3 of that lauren Harries & Pete Burns duet of You Spin Me Round (Like A Record) on Celebrity Big Brother's Little Brother for the Mongolian Mike Parry to open his breakfast radio show with tomorrow morning. Show these haters why you're the Genghis Haaan of hot tracks, lid!



LOL @ 'Murica shamelessly biting the U.K's juiciest news scandals. Bruce-turnt-Caitlyn is just a half-arsed rehash of the Frank "Kellie" Maloney story, minus the UKIP side-narrative and the Ricky Hatton soundbites.

Is he really a fan or did my gun make his thumb put scrill' in my hand?

A-Wax really stepped up his fan-relations game since the Everybody days, huh?

"Yeah, so you bought my CD
What you wanna see a slug in 3D?
So I'll f**k your bitch
And she pretend you me when she suck your dick"

A-Wax - Everybody
(From Thug Deluxe album; 2004)



Wouldn't say no to a remastered reissue of Thug Deluxe with the Game track removed.