There were 3 main reasons to cop Kerrang in the very early 90s : their resident metal Mystic-Meg bird Fire (she had that whole rock-gypsy type look down pizzack and can lay claim to being the source material for one of my very first legitimate wanks), the Mike Gitter reviews of various reissued hardcore classics which were being released on cd for the first time (as essential a guide to the history of American hardcore as issues of MRR and Thrasher), and the highly titillating letters pages. Always a source of amusement, the zenith of the Kerrang correspondence section was the tsunami of angry dispatches the mag would receive every time a metal musician fessed up to batting for the other side (the explosion of Nirvana somehow led to various metal musicians finally feeling comfortable enough to admit that they were partial to the cock), with tearful metal fanboys denouncing their love of the band the guilty musician was a member of and concluding that, since the gay band member in question enjoys cock up his arse, he'll probably enjoy the feet of disgruntled fans next time the band play live too. Sock it to 'im, boys.
Faith No More's aptly named Roddy Bottum was the first musician to step out of the closet and into the metal sin-bin, but the least suprising case had to be Rob Halford from Judas Priest, the Cliff Richard of metal in speculation about his sexuality terms, admitting he was gay. A declaration which clearly brought the O Rly Owl fluttering out of its nest :
You might expect a mature gentlemen such as Rob would only sport get-ups like the one above when morphing into Priest-mode nowadays, but, nope, even a saturday afternoon trip to B&Q is deemed worthy to yield the full metal jacket, chaps and leather cap outfit :
He may have a pair of Lee Coopers under his chaps but, according to Barratt, there was nada under that waistcoat other than 2 harnesses on some MC Eiht & CMW type shit :
MC Eiht & CMW - We Come Strapped
Bonus beats :
Since we're reminiscing about metal at the turn of the 90s, the law of Sodom dictates that we have to pay bumfluffed lip service to the provincial metal diety that was Chris Needham and his glorious BBC2 video diary In Bed With Chris Needham, a show which the BBC can forever use to justify the TV licence fee :
Authenticity is key, which is why the ironic mullets sported by twats during the last decade lack the natural bouffant/lank synthesis of Needham's Herculean mullet. Parts 2 to 6 can be found in the related video links on the 'tube.
That new M.O.P album is really, really humdrum, and if there's one thing an M.O.P album should never be, it's humdrum. Nowt wrong with Fame and Billy's rapping, but those tepid Soundclick page circa 2003 sounding beats? Shit, even Joe Budden would have turned his nose up at them.
So, here's some post-Warriorz non-M.O.P joints with that M.O.P type ambiance which I wish the new M.O.P album sounded like :
Black Rob - Big Guns
You got guys on message boards who were listening to Deep Puddle Dynamics when Bad Boyz came out salivating over Shyne's imminent release but Black Rob's low-key return home after a 4 year bid for pilfering items from a hotel he happened to be staying at (shades of my mate Rob who once drunkenly gaffled a laptop from a drinking lodge and was was then caught by the porter outside having a fag who he tried to flog it to) a few months back was of more interest to me. Robbie-O out on bail Harlem dreamin' with a backdrop of John Barry and the Microphone Fiend 808s is what NY rap should sound like in 2009.
Maino - Role Model
A homage to both M.O.P and Smoothe & Trigga, Maino's ig'nant Brooklyn hardknock anthem manages to be not only the sorta tune you wish M.O.P were still dropping, but the type of bombastic stomper you also wish Primo were knocking out on the regular. Maino's album was the audio equivalent of a runny nose, but his LOLz shittalking and ability to actually write catchy songs which stick to their theme (Rumors, Take It Like A Man, Hi Hater) seperate him from the pack of post-Smack DVD NY battle rapper mooks.
Non Phixion - Rock Stars
The winner of the Why didn't M.O.P get this beat instead? award for the noughties thus far. Non Phixion were probably the best purveyors of household pet sacrificing fat whigga rap (it'd be unfair to place post-Stanley Kubrick R.A in the same category) so they wholly deserved Necro's better beats and token throwaway clunkers by Pete and Paul which everyone else probably rejected, but a Primo banger comprised of a delirious Bar Kays chop-up and that INS vocal sample hook? They weren't worthy of such greatness. Goretex was decent, Ill Bill was occasionally tolerable but the other two Dan Aykroyd voiced crackas in Non Phxion sounded like Jesse West and Puffy on the Dolly My Baby remix.
The NYG'z - Giantz Ta This
You could argue that The NYG'z are the sons of M.O.P with their whole hardbody rapping over DJ Premier beats steez, or you could argue that they're M.O.P's uncles as they're more of a product of the Ed Koch era than the Giuliani term M.O.P embody, but you'd be better off altogether if you stopped being so darned anal and just enjoyed their aggressively straightfoward NY rap with Primo's exquisite 7 Minutes Of Funk rejig for being the complete antithesis of the lazy middlebrow old man NYC rap N*s and J*y-Z have offered us for the majority of the past decade.
Blaq Poet - Don't Give A Fucc
One last Primo for the road? Ah, why not. Poet's most Ivan Drago tune since Bang This is what On The Go magazine would have called that ill Chewbacca type shit, but what I'm gonna call that Tyson coming out to Time 4 Sum Aksion type shit; that O'Reilly in Season 1 of OZ type shit; that OH SHIT, POET REALLY DOES LOOK LIKE POSDNUOS THESE DAYS, HUH? type shit.
State Property - Oceans Seven
In which all seven of the State Prop' go off over a guitar squall, with the standout verses coming from Beanie, Chris, Peedi and Freeway. Beanie's career has been built on insanely O-T-T rapping but his i'll buck 50 your neck, pull your tongue through your throat/that's all she wrote - the fat bitch hummin' ya note on here might just be his most graphic moment to date, which is quite an achievement when you consider this is someone who once rapped about broomsticks up the ass, have 'em poking your ribs.
Rock ft. Sean Price - Fuck Dat Rapper
Why on earth did this gem merely languish on that Rockness mixtape when it should have been given the WSHH.com video treatment as the first single from Heltah Skeltah's underrated D.I.R.T album last year? I'm tryna hear more Heltah Skeltah over spooky synth shit, so can someone contact Sid Roams and get him to loop up the full minute long intro of Being Boiled by The Human League for Rockness and Price to bless, please?
The Diplomats - Crunk Musik
The last great Dipset single before Wu-Tang syndrome set in, with weed carrier members, affliated groups and financial irregulaties causing their dissolution. The Warriors homaging bulky sleeveless denim jackets in the video weren't such a great look, but, in retrospect, were a far superior sartorial option to Juelz et Jim's later experimentations with Ed Hardy.
AZ ft. M.O.P - Sit 'Em Back Slow
Yeah, it features M.O.P and Fame even produced it, but it's an AZ song, okay? Look, you either agree that this song, which once caused me to mock-Sweet Chin Music a supermarket refridgerator when listening to it, is the best ever freak of Rick's Mary Jane or you lack the irons and the nizzutz like my man here :
Saigon ft. Kool G. Rap - The Letter P remix
Saigon was a welcome character back in the days of Say Yes, Contraband and Diduntdidunt when he was channelling equal measures of F.T and Intelligent Hoodlum, but I can live without him ever since he decided to become rap's self appointed saviour and transmogrified into the most annoying rapper this side of Sage Francis. So, sorry, Sai' but this remix with G. Rap would've been a much better song if your presence had been replaced with M.O.P and become an official follow-up to Stick To Ya Gunz.
Because you can find Van Damme doing Leno in '93 to promote Hard Target on there :
Topics covered during the interview : skiing, name swapping with friends, flower arranging, ballet, the cultural differences between European action stars and American action stars, bringing John Woo ("he's sorta like the new Peckinpah..") to America, the morning glory-inducing properties found within oysters, how sex is perceived in Asian culture vs. how sex is perceived in the western world, Van Damme's guerilla marketing technique for his early movies where he'd bumrush movie theatres to badger them into showing his trailers, and how a lack of budget to create big explosions on Bloodsport led to him having to create the thrills via his own body in the fight scenes.
And he's absolutely right on the last point, because what makes Hard Target my favourite American action movie of the 90s aren't the elaborate set pieces or any of the whopping explosions, but the little things : Van Damme's roundhouse kicks and dexterity, his amazing mullet and double-denim outfits, Lance Henrikson psychotically playing the piano, Van Damme punching out the snake, Arnold Vosloo's character being named Pik van Cleaf, Van Damme cleaning shop with the upside down pistol, Henrikson's expression after Van Damme puts the grenade down his kecks, the list goes on and on.
"Poor people get bored too!"
Unrelated news :
Join me as i fire up the iPlayer tonight for the first episode of the second series of Are You An Egghead? The first series featured various hardened quizers familiar to any Mastermind or Fifteen-To-One (R.I.P) aficionado, and was easily the finest tv quiz show of the decade. So let's hope the new series features the cream of the quizzing crop, by which I mean, a bunch of possibly autistic spods who were last seen being eyed with contempt by Vicki C on Only Connect.
Here at The Martorialist we employ a crack team of photographers who live and die by the creed of Streetz Iz Watchin' as they go about their civilian business. Hell, right this very moment we've got 2 seasoned photojournalists who started their careers in 'Nam working around the clock in deepest Runcorn to get to the bottom of the how, where and why emo kids circa '07 started wearing McKenzie shellsuit bottoms. But Martorialist snapper # 1.5 Killa Barratt has finally solved the most troubling question of modern times : just who exactly is buying up all the Makavelli Branded gear from TK Maxx? Please believe the sartorial Loch Ness monster has been spotted on dry-land, ladeez 'n' gentz :
Who'd have thunk one of the key tenets for practioners of Thug Life would be shopping for Couscous? I wonder if Heaven got a ghetto for moistened semolina wheat and finely ground wheat flour?
So, I caught C.L. Smooth's show in the 'pool a couple of evenings back. Not exactly the Pete & C.L. reunion show in London from 4 or 5 years ago, but a fine evening after a brief readjustment of expectations. The Pete Rock era stuff was greeted with scenes of rapture, while his solo era stuff begat puzzled yet polite applause, but reminded me that his post-Pete solo career actually started quite promisingly :
C.L. Smooth - Such A Long Time
His HipHopSite exclusive very first noughties solo track from 2005 has ended up being a long since forgotten track in the Mp3 leak age which barely even shows up on Google. Shame, 'cause it was a vintage Heatmakerz production. Whatever happened to The Heatmakerz anyway? They bettered KanYe and Just on the 2nd best NY rap album of the decade, and this tune from their '07 producer album The Rush was my shit. Lord knows Cam'Ron could do with some of their beats nowadays.
C.L. Smooth - Bars Of Fury
As the decade crawls to its close, there are two contenders for rap interview of the noughties : the one after Daz won the court settlement for unpaid royalties from Death Row where he mercilessly taunted Suge, and the completely out-of-the-blue CL Smooth one after Pete & CL's successful reunion which bore the much loved Appreciate and live shows where grown men were reduced to tears when the T.R.O.Y horns came in ( I've always prefered All Souled Out and Skins meself) where CL spent its duration alternating between calling Pete a fucking faggot and pleading for him to produce some of his solo album. Pete was never going to comply, so CL did the next best thing and gaffled one of the few non-ZZZZworthy beats from one of the Petestrumental albums for Bars Of Fury and ripped that shit. As the only good remix album of the decade proved, you cannae go wrong with Al Green samples.
C.L. Smooth - American Me
C.L. Smooth - I Can't Help It
When CL's American Me album arrived it was as dull as you'd imagine a 2006 C.L. Smooth solo album minus any Pete Rock beats would be, but it'd be unfair to deny that it included a couple of bangers. In fact, I'll take these two tunes over the noughties Pete and C.L. tracks like the aforementioned Appreciate, It's A Love Thing, Back On The Block and their remix of Mary J's Family Affair. Let's just pretend that Shine On Me/Climax 12" never happened, eh?
So what exactly is the deal with this reunion show in London next month? Have they squashed their beef and, as C.L. cancelled his London show the other night, what are the chances of both of them actually turning up for this?
Not even gonna get into this whole Cocaine by Z-Ro leak brouhaha, because even the most connected people in Texa$ appear to be in the dark about its shadowy origins (at a guess, though, I'd imagine it's some of the Cracc mixtape X some tracks from Heroin X some older odds and sods slyly released by Z-Ro as a 'Fuck You!' to Rap-A-Lot after J. Prince had 'Ro beaten down a month or two back for popping off about his lack of received royalties) but there is one thing I'm certain of here, and that is that 'Ro needs to start hittin' up Mike Dean for beats regularly again if this anything to go by :
Z-Ro - Raw
Parallels could probably be made between the quality of Z-Ro's Rap-A-Lot albums since he's stopped using large percentages of Mike Dean production and Arsenal's trophyless years since David Dein left (they'd have secured the services of Ribery, for a start) but, ultimately, it's this simple : The Life Of Joseph W. McVey and Let The Truth Be Told are Z-Ro's best albums because of the abundance of lavish Mike Dean production found on them. Really, it gets no better than this :
"..Man, you never heard of a Mr Magic Rap Attack? Where's this guy from?"
"Oh, i heard of a heart attack but not a Rap Attack, what's a Rap Attack?"
Whodini - Magic's Wand
Shit was somewhat prophetic.
R.I.P
This would be the perfect oppurtunity for me to post the audio of the show where Mr Magic dissed P.E after playing Public Enemy # One and ended his rant with the infamous "i guarantee you, no more music by these suckers" line which P.E then sampled a later year on Nation Of Millions.., but I can't find the darned mp3. Edit : Thankfully, Robbie has it.
Ever wondered what brand and model jacket Seth Green is wearing in the dire Italian Job remake? Nope, me neither, but apparently it's the Levi's Vintage Collection Bonneville Cafe Racer Jacket. And how do I know this utterly irrelevent information about an admitedly fairly nice jacket? Because I've been browsing the Filmjackets website, innit.
If, like me, you watch The Thing and spend as much time drooling over Kurt Russell's ill leather as you do simultaneously on edge from the tension and marvelling at the effects then this is a website I implore you to peruse when you have the chance. Some of their best finds thus far are :
THE THING (1982)
ORIGINAL MANUFACTURER: SCHOTT, NYC (ACCREDITED)
REPLICA VENDOR(S): NOT KNOWN
DESCRIPTION: This jacket was worn by Kurt Russell as R.J. MacReady in the John Carpenter version of the film The Thing
ORIGINAL MANUFACTURER:
Schott, NYC (ACCREDITED)
Information: Schott, NYC Style #674 G-1 Jacket
EASY RIDER (1969)
ORIGINAL MANUFACTURER: ABC LEATHERS
REPLICA VENDOR(S): BATES LEATHERS LEWIS LEATHERS SCHOTT, NYC SCOTT LEATHERS, INTERNATIONAL LTD. VANSON LEATHERS, INC.
DESCRIPTION: This jacket was worn by Peter Fonda as Wyatt in the film Easy Rider.
THE AVIATOR (2004)
ORIGINAL MANUFACTURER: BELSTAFF
REPLICA VENDOR(S): NOT KNOWN
DESCRIPTION: This jacket was worn by Leonardo DiCaprio as Howard Hughes in the film The Aviator.
ORIGINAL MANUFACTURER:
BELSTAFF
Information: This is the Belsfaff "Howard Jacket." There is currently no information available from Belstaff concerning this jacket.
EASTERN PROMISES (2007)
ORIGINAL MANUFACTURER: BELSTAFF
REPLICA VENDOR(S): NOT KNOWN
DESCRIPTION: This jacket was worn by Naomi Watts as Anna Khitrova in the film Eastern Promises.
Information: This jacket is the Belstaff Tripmaster. Thanks to Rachel Telfer from Belstaff for providing the information.
Only online a few months, the concept of the site is better than the actual content at the moment (is there anybody really interested that the jacket Jennifer Lopez was wearing in Angel Eyes was a Kale Uniform replica Police Department Jacket?), but research is underway on identifying some particularly interesting jackets. Here's some of my all time favourites which they're currently trying to source :
Carlito's black leather from Carlito's Way :
Snake's beat-up brown leather from Escape From N.Y
Rocky's leather from Rocky 1 :
Ferris's jacket from Ferris Bueller's Day Off :
Bob The Goon's Joker jacket from Batman :
Typically, there's neither hide nor hair of other favourites of mine. Here's the ones I'd personally love them to identify :
Forest's tassled suede Alaskan jacket from On Deadly Ground :
Jef's trenchcoat from Le Samourai :
Anyhoo, Filmjackets.com also has a small TV jackets section to their site where their sartorial detective work has revealed that Jack Bauer has a penchant for both CP Company plus Ralph. And there was me thinking Jack shopped exclusively at the American equivalent of Matalan.
