Generic list post: March 2024

Obligatory wrap-up post of those songs I've played most during the month when the "Madvillainy is #actually MF DOOM's masterpiece" brigade were out in full force again. I like Madvillainy, but never in a month of Black Sundays is it on a par with Operation Doomsday let alone better than it. Youse lot are some literal wrong 'uns.

Warren G - Dope Beat (1999)
Saigon - Favorite Thingz (extended) (2006)
Daya1k ft. Kiki Tha Prize - Good (2024)
Sexyy Red - Get It Sexyy (2024)
Level ft. Mouse On Tha Track - To Da Beat (2024)
AyooLii - Dumpin' Out A Zip (2024)
Rogue Unit - Good To U (Rogue Unit mix) (1995)

Bonus beats: sung the praises of T.C.K by Y@k Ballz and included it in this little playlist of legit jams by tragically unhip New York rappers. Put together a top 5 Level & Mouse On Tha Track singles playlist too.

Bonus bloggin': I'm gonna blatantly bite take a page outta Party Sparty's blog and use these monthly wrap-up posts to keep track of the best movies and TV shows I've been watching.

Movies I watched and liked:
Sherlock Holmes: Terror By Night (1933)
Offerings (1989)
Late Night With The Devil (2024)
Immaculate (2024)
Robot Dreams (2024)

TV shows I watched and liked:
Prisoner: Cell Block H (episodes 45 to 68) (1980)
Neighbours (new episodes) (2024)
Wanted (series 3) (2018)
Mandy (series 3) (2024)
How To With John Wilson (series 3) (2023)
Match Of The Day 1 and 2 (new episodes) (2024)

The worst TV show I saw this month (and possibly all year) was Michael Owen & Howard Webb's Sky Sports show, which was on in the pub a couple of weeks back when there was no football on TV that night. The two most charmless men in sports broadcasting, a field which also contains such titanic c**ts as Garth Crooks, Glenn Hoddle and Mark Goldbridge. Never have I more wanted Vladimir Putin to launch a drone attack on a TV studio.

Born To Audiomack: The Tragically Unhip

Tragically Unhip New Yorkers
1. Homeboy Sandman ft. J-Live & Kurious - Enough (2014)
2. Maino - Rumors (2005)
3. Blaq Poet - Bang Dis! (2005)
4. Y@k Ballz - T.C.K (2001)
5. Necro - Rugged Shit (1999)
6. Consequence - Alphabet Boys (2010)
7. Uncle Murda - Anybody Can Get It (2008)
8. Sen City - Cloud Surfin' (2014)


Continuing my one man quest to get Y@k Ballz's T.C.K and Maino's Rumors recognised & realised as 5 Star General classics, here's a playlist of eight legit choonz by New York rappers who are deemed tragically unhip. You ain't gonna score no cool points with any of these songs, but I swear you'll have more fun listening to this playlist than you'll have listening to the latest factory-farmed Alchemist EP with one of Earl Sweatshirt's trendy m8s ;)

Things To Do In Denver When You're Daya

"Yeah, my tank on E and my phone on 3
Drive slow, bitch, I got this pack on me
Got your n*gga droppin' all these racks on me
And I'll make your n*gga spend his rent stack on me"

Daya1k ft. Kiki Tha Prize - Good
(From YouTube; 2024)


Denver got slaps too, huh? Shit talk real big, hook real big, beat real regionally ambiguous, Daya1k's outfit real cosy. There's summat so incredibly sexy about a lass in a sweatsuit and a beanie.

My Mind Spray 14

None of Duke Deuce's singles from the past twelve months have quite hit for me, and I'm gonna attribute this to him developing a penchant for Doc Marten boots. When rappers start dressing like crusty punx, a part of their musical mojo vanishes forever.

More than any other genre, Rap songs are messages in bottles from the eras they were created, and the details wot date them are a strength not a weakness.

A.I is a wasted technology until somebody uses it to create a 1980s-set video for Ice-T's Soul On Ice. Best closing song on an 80s Rap album IMHO.

No spoilerz, but that new horror movie Late Night With The Devil really missed a trick by not using Andre Nickatina's Conversation With A Devil as its end credits music.

Speaking of movies, here's a rare picture of the Scottish darts player Peter Wright visiting the set of Ghostbusters II in 1989. Left to right: Ernie Hudson, Peter Wright, Dan Aykroyd, Bill Murray and Harold Ramis.

Warren 3

"Unbelievable how time just flies
Right before your eyes, but you don't recognize"

Warren G - Do You See
(From Regulate... G Funk Era album; 1994)


It's 1994, teenage Marty has just copped Warren G's debut album, and Regulate + Do You See are such a killer opening combination that I spend a couple of days constantly rewinding both songs and don't even listen to the rest of the album until the third day. Actual factz, shit really went down like that. Do You See went on to be the album's third single, and it's such a lush Slick Rick-ified slice of G-Funk with a streak of sad boi sentimentality at its core that it's now my favourite single from the album - no mean feat when the two preceeding singles were Regulate and This D.J.. Come to think of it, The Chronic's third single Let Me Ride is top billin' for me too. Maybe three was the magic number for Warren and his stepbrother Dr. Dre?

Three Warren G bonus thoughts:

* I've never heard Warren's third album. Stay tuned for the n-x-e-t episode when I check it out.

* Warren's remix of Slick Rick's Behind Bars has gotta be a top 3 remix which made the original version completely irrelevant.

* Warren & Nate Dogg's 2015 single My House remains a great example of L.A "you 43 and you still rappin'?"-core.

Berserker back!

AyooLii - Dumpin' Out A Zip
(From Dumpin' Out A Zip single; 2024)


I just had an epiphany and realised that the AyooLii songs I fuxwit are kinda like Milwaukeee's equivalent of peak 70th Street Carlos. The boi Carlos made Berserker-Bounce, while AyooLii makes Berserker-Bass. This particular song is Certified Fatter's first keeper since On My Daddy IMHO. No shotz @ AyooLii's backyard, but he is not a horticulturist of the Mouse On Tha Track caliber.

Completely unrelated: I had a dream where Jim Jones remade Kim Gordon's slam poetry fake-Trap song. Don't ask me why my dreams are concocting Jim & Kim fusions because I haven't listened to any Jones in months and I dislike the Gordon song. But in the unlikely event that Jim & Kim ever do collaborate then here's the perfect song title for them: My Friend Goonies.

Breihan's Got A Baby (Part 2)

Y@k Ballz - T.C.K
(From demo tape; 1999/Mondee's Where My Dogs At? compilation CD-R; 2001)



Top three Rap songs I've finally found CDQ versions of in recent years: Heavy Rain by The Jacka, Do The Crew by Jay Tee & Mac Dre, and T.C.K by Y@k Ballz. The latter is some super duty Transylvanian-toothed indie-Rap which doubles as a tribute to Y@k's graffiti crew True City Killahz. A cult-classic from Bobbito & Lord Sear's C.M Famalam radio show, it's Y@k's second best song after HomePiss innit. And so kiddies, the story goes that Bobbito decided T.C.K wouldn't be included on Y@k's debut EP on Fondle Em Records due to the rogue n-bomb he dropped. Seems plausible because you definitely shouldn't be dropping n-bombs on wax if you're a half Persian white lad who looks like a lesbian modelling for Zoo York (before commie-caps became the backpacker's hat of choice, there were peaked-beanies.) I'm always sure like the coral reef that T.C.K and Flossin' woulda sounded perfect back-to-back on side B of that first Y@k Ballz EP.

My own 1990s graffiti crew weren't so much True City Killahz as Toy Town Goonies. Here's an ELS dub ya boi painted in a hospital carpark's subway back in 1998 as homage to my Grandma Elsie. This shit woulda looked more James Flames if I'd used Montana spray-paint and a fat cap nozzle, but it was done with watery British spray-paint stolen from the auto shop in Kwik Save. Picture me spendin' money on posh spray paint and fancy nozzles when there were Screwball 12"s and Devin The Dude CDs to buy.

Mind you, I used to gladly spend money on graffiti magazines back when Tower Records was the muhf**kin' spot in Birmingham. Graphotism Magazine was my fave periodical, but the only shit I ever ordered from their store was Kool Keith's Sex Style cassette and a handful of early Kid Capri mixtapes. Call me Nat Robinson because my first priority was always music. Yo, I just dropped a jewel on 'em, my man Dave told me to go Puba Maxwell on 'em.

Levelling Up

Level ft. Mouse On Tha Track - To Da Beat
(From Unsupervised 2 album; 2024)


How you Lev that? A couple of Martorialist readers have recommended me Level & Mouse's latest track. Took me a while to warm to it but now I'm all over this shit like an Our Legacy shirt on a skinny bloke's body (f**k that brand and their boxy fitting clobber!) It sounds like a new Level & Mouse single should sound like without sounding like any of the previous Level & Mouse singles. But don't take my word for it, here's proof via a Level & Mouse Quinary Of Quality™ playlist. Music to dance the pain away the Baton Rouge way.

Level & Mouse On Tha Track top 5 singles
1. Get It Back (2013)
2. I Bet U Won't (2015)
3. #DFWT remix (ft. Boosie) (2018)
4. I Don't Miss (2022)
5. MC Hammer (2014)

Good Morning, Vietnam

Saigon - Favorite Thingz (extended)
(From bonus track on Welcome To Saigon mixtape; 2006)


Sum shit I found out during my recent reacquaintance with Saigon's 2001 to 2007 catalogue: there's an extended version of Favorite Thingz with a second verse and no bellowing by Kay Slay & Whoo Kid. A legitimate mixtape/street DVD classic from an era that's now a literal lifetime ago. I might mock Saigon for his delusions of graNYdeur, but that lad knew how to write a song with a chorus which is bulletproof like Batfink's wings. He was no Max B, but he was no Maino either.

Noo Yawkers, plz forgive me for taking Maino's name in vain. I'm allowed to talk shit because I'm Earth's biggest fan of Rumors and Role Model.