Skimming through some old copies of XXL, I came across the issue when G. Dep's "shit, I was born ready, and I was already on fish and spaghetti" line from Let's Get It received the Step Your Rhyme Game Up award of the month and was reminded of that recent Bounce Squad and Black Rob joint where B.R homaged it during the intro :
The Bounce Squad ft. Black Rob - Live At The State Building
(From It's Always Sunny In New York; 2011)
So necessary since there's always been a burning void deep within my soul just waiting for a song where Snaggapuss references 2 Girls & 1 cup over J. Beez Comin' Through (Bonus Beats) to seal it with some audio asphault.
I have a really bad feeling that No Fear, Up North and this are going to be leap years better than anything on Rob's imminent Game Tested, Street Approved album because every Duck Down album since 2005 other than the underated Heltah Skeltah LP has been cursed by the death of tepid, tinpot production. But, then, that's probably a smidgen unfair since J. Beez Comin' Through (Bonus Beats) is only the best stand-alone instrumental in the history of recorded rap musik to date and after you've rapped over that then it can only downhill from there on in, no matter how much great music you make thereafter, right?
Jungle Brothers - J. Beez Comin' Through (Bonus Beats)
(From What "U" Waitin' "4"? 12"; 1989)
Showing posts with label Lookin' all Harlemish shoe game marvelous. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Lookin' all Harlemish shoe game marvelous. Show all posts
Monday, July 18, 2011
Wednesday, June 8, 2011
P.T got dough, iced-out mavado
Yep, it's another Mob Style post already. So, back in 2004 a Best of Mob Style compilation magically appeared in my inbox that one of my online associates had just found. It was completely untagged beyond generic track 1, track 2 titles, but it featured all the obvious cuts from the 2 Mob Style albums, a handful of interludes where Azie was talking about releasing a new album in 1999 called The Last Supper, an intro over Ill Phil C's In The Air Tonight and a previously unheard scuzzy-as-shit cut which sounded like it was recorded sometime in the late 90s where Pretty Tone Capone wilds the fuck out with his hallmark gobful-of-spit proto-Ghostface flow on the second verse.
Mob Style - Intro
(From The Best of Mob Style; 1997)
Mob Style - Where The Thugs At?
(From The Best of Mob Style; 1997)
Reading J-Zone's Mob Style post where he's trying to compile a full discography for the group yesterday reminded me I've still got the compilation on some CD-R in one of the drawers I have stacked full of the things so I thought I'd best up the intro and the unreleased song as proof since there's zero documentation online of any best of best of Mob Style collection ever existing. I'm tryna arrange an interview with the Mob Style producer Fred Flak and possibly even Pretty Tone Capone himself so I mailed Fred about the album and the previously unreleased song and he informs me that the best of CD came out as a secrete and rare independent release around late 1997 as it was a response to Biggie and 2pac getting popped, and that the song is called Where The Thugs At? and it was recorded sometime in 1996.
Hopefully the Fred Flak and P.T Capone interview situation pans out better than the Mello-T interview situation did when some dude claiming to be his manager who couldn't offer any sort of proof that he's employed by the godfather of Mississippi gangsta-rap got in touch and offered me an interview for the sum of $250. It ain't who you supposedly know, it's what you can prove, doggie.
Mob Style - Intro
(From The Best of Mob Style; 1997)
Mob Style - Where The Thugs At?
(From The Best of Mob Style; 1997)
Reading J-Zone's Mob Style post where he's trying to compile a full discography for the group yesterday reminded me I've still got the compilation on some CD-R in one of the drawers I have stacked full of the things so I thought I'd best up the intro and the unreleased song as proof since there's zero documentation online of any best of best of Mob Style collection ever existing. I'm tryna arrange an interview with the Mob Style producer Fred Flak and possibly even Pretty Tone Capone himself so I mailed Fred about the album and the previously unreleased song and he informs me that the best of CD came out as a secrete and rare independent release around late 1997 as it was a response to Biggie and 2pac getting popped, and that the song is called Where The Thugs At? and it was recorded sometime in 1996.
Hopefully the Fred Flak and P.T Capone interview situation pans out better than the Mello-T interview situation did when some dude claiming to be his manager who couldn't offer any sort of proof that he's employed by the godfather of Mississippi gangsta-rap got in touch and offered me an interview for the sum of $250. It ain't who you supposedly know, it's what you can prove, doggie.
Tuesday, June 7, 2011
The ravediggaz
It appears the araabMUZIK aesthetic of hittin' up nasty old Euro-rave choonz for Dipset to rap over has permeated the digital crates of actual Harlem producers for the neighbourhood's perennial mixtape stooges if Back To Rap by Fat Cat Pauly is anything to go by. The nasty old Euro-rave choon in question here is a live version of Kernkraft 400 by Zombie Nation, and, oh my lord, Back To Rap goes hella hard in the U.V paint thanks to it :
Fat Cat Pauly - Back To Rap (2011)
If this were the nineties Back To Rap would've been a 12" or cassette single that only Harlemites and J-Zone would give a fuck about, or had it come out during the last decade it would've been on a Fatman Scoop hosted mixtape beloved of Harlemites and 8 dudes on SOHH.com, but since we now reside in the year 2011, what started out as a as a banger lost on the latter half of some Kay Slay mixtape last summer became an abridged video single on Youtube back in january with a fanbase consisting of Harlemites and, um, me. That's progress for you, apparently.
Speaking of Uptown thug rappers with a penchant for bucket hats and referring to themselves as wolves, I bring you this slightly dubious claim from the thanks list of the Blood On My Money CD Azie put out to try and capitalise off the new lease of infamy Paid In Full & the Game Over documentary brought him, and its title track which is the album's second best song :
Azie & Mobstyle - Blood On My Money
(From Blood On My Money; 2003)
Honestly, if that Harmony Korine testtubed little twerp Mac Miller were to excrete a cover version of Thou Shalt Not Kill by Dan Le Sac & Scroobius Pip (AKA the most excruciating song ever made) I'd probably jam the living hell out of it if he mentioned Rich, Alpo and Fritz on there, so one of Azie's neighbourhood pals doing just that over the sort of crudely dope production that's eerily similar to the default sound of much of Tony Yayo's solo material over the past year or so is basically a 4 minute and 45 seconds eargasm for your author. The Mobstyle 2.0 of '03 were still helmed by Azie but Gangsta Lou and Whip Wop had been replaced by a of weed carriers and Pretty Tone Capone only appears on one song which, alas, is less Case Dismissed and more might-give-this-one-a-miss. Puzzingly, the guy who raps on this song goes by the name of Shiesty but his picture doesn't feature in the CD inlay with the rest of the nu-Mobstyle congregation even though he raps on four other songs on the album :
Ayo Shiesty - you'ze a good kid, do some rapping and then go to the store and get us some Dutches, B.
Fat Cat Pauly - Back To Rap (2011)
If this were the nineties Back To Rap would've been a 12" or cassette single that only Harlemites and J-Zone would give a fuck about, or had it come out during the last decade it would've been on a Fatman Scoop hosted mixtape beloved of Harlemites and 8 dudes on SOHH.com, but since we now reside in the year 2011, what started out as a as a banger lost on the latter half of some Kay Slay mixtape last summer became an abridged video single on Youtube back in january with a fanbase consisting of Harlemites and, um, me. That's progress for you, apparently.
Speaking of Uptown thug rappers with a penchant for bucket hats and referring to themselves as wolves, I bring you this slightly dubious claim from the thanks list of the Blood On My Money CD Azie put out to try and capitalise off the new lease of infamy Paid In Full & the Game Over documentary brought him, and its title track which is the album's second best song :
Azie & Mobstyle - Blood On My Money
(From Blood On My Money; 2003)
Honestly, if that Harmony Korine testtubed little twerp Mac Miller were to excrete a cover version of Thou Shalt Not Kill by Dan Le Sac & Scroobius Pip (AKA the most excruciating song ever made) I'd probably jam the living hell out of it if he mentioned Rich, Alpo and Fritz on there, so one of Azie's neighbourhood pals doing just that over the sort of crudely dope production that's eerily similar to the default sound of much of Tony Yayo's solo material over the past year or so is basically a 4 minute and 45 seconds eargasm for your author. The Mobstyle 2.0 of '03 were still helmed by Azie but Gangsta Lou and Whip Wop had been replaced by a of weed carriers and Pretty Tone Capone only appears on one song which, alas, is less Case Dismissed and more might-give-this-one-a-miss. Puzzingly, the guy who raps on this song goes by the name of Shiesty but his picture doesn't feature in the CD inlay with the rest of the nu-Mobstyle congregation even though he raps on four other songs on the album :
Ayo Shiesty - you'ze a good kid, do some rapping and then go to the store and get us some Dutches, B.
Thursday, March 31, 2011
DOOM's remix of Cam's That's Me was so much better than the original
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?
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?
Tuesday, March 29, 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, $tarlito, Lil B, and the late career renaissances of E-40 and AZ. Being one of the originators of Uptown waviness alongside Spoonie Gee, he has no excuse not knowing about Max B, though, so someone needs to burn him a best of CD-R or *cough* my ‘Should've Been The Byrd Gang Album’ compilation.
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Ran outta ammo and started throwin' Black Rob RAR files
There didn't seem any point in including any of his main singles for Bad Boy such as I Dare You, Whoa, Espacio with Lil' Kim & G. Dep, Star In The Hood, and Ready since I put this together as a chronological primer for people who're only familiar with Banco Popular via those singles in the first place and the comp' had already spiralled into being 30 tracks long. Thus, consider this collection a Black Rob sandwich which uses 1991's Automator production The Smoothness as the top slice of bread, the Whoa-device revisting Up North from last year as the bottom slice, and 28 personal favourite joints which range from guest appearances, album cuts, mixtape joints and unreleased gems as the filling. Everybody gotta eat, yo, so tuck in :
Black Rob - Banco Popular's Dirty 30
1. The Smoothness
2. Nuthin' But (with Cru)
3. Make It Hot
4. 24 Hours To Live (with Ma$e, The Lox & DMX)
5. I Love You, Baby (with Puffy)
6. The Heist
7. One Way (with G. Dep)
8. Life Story (with Cheryl Pepsi Riley)
9. Can I Live? (with The Lox)
10. Thug Story
11. B.R (with G. Dep)
12. Let's Get It (with G. Dep & Puffy)
13. Business Never Personal
14. Permanent Scars AKA Live From The Eastside
15. Godfather (with Puffy & G. Dep)
16. Time 2 Ride AKA They Heard I Got Life O.G version
17. Questions And Answers
18. Broken Bottles (with Aasim & Wise G)
19. Y'All Know Who Killed Him
20. You Know What
21. Smile In Ya Face
22. Help Me Out
23. Jeans And Sneakers (with Notorious B.I.G)
24. Knock 'Em Out
25. High In The Clouds (with O.D.B)
26. New York
27. Live At The Bar-BBQ 2007 (with D-Dot, Notorious B.I.G, Ness & Aasim)
28. Big Guns
29. No Fear
30. Up North
Download
Feel free to use this as a soundtrack the next time you shoplift a scandalously priced can of liquid elastoplast from your local chemist/supermarket, safe in the knowledge that a kleptomaniac like Black Rob would approve. Just don't hold your breath for me to hook up a Loon's greatest hits or a Best Of Mark Curry next, though.
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
B-B-Byrd Gang is the word # 2
At some point soon there should hopefully be a The Martorialist X another certain blog mix based around songs which took the whole synth-noir sound of old Ice-T shit like Squeeze The Trigger and Drama and ran with it, but since I promised someone a Byrd Gang compilation after this post, here's my first foray into the realm of themed compilations with a rar file I'm titling ‘Should've Been The Byrd Gang Album’.
The criteria :
1. To create an album in the vein of Diplomatic Immunity without the multitude of irritating Freaky Zeeky interludes which behooves how good a group Byrd Gang were (unlike the actual post-Max B and Stack Bundles Byrd Gang retail album) with songs taken from the original 2005 - 2008 Jim Jones, Max B, Stack Bundles, and Mel Matrix line-up era.
2. To only use real songs instead of freestyles (their version of Black Superman works as a remake a la 'Bout It, Bout It Part 3 so that gets a pass) which came from mixtapes and compilations, rather than any of Jim's albums.
3. And under no circumstance would it include We Roll with Pete Rock because this is also intended as a sort've primer compilation for people whose only exposure to Byrd Gang is that very song.
Byrd Gang - Should've Been The Byrd Gang Album
1. Anniversary
2. New York Minute
3. Sour Diesel
4. Life's Like A Movie
5. Fire Flow
6. Bury Me In My Gucci
7. Prolific
8. Deez My Streets
9. I'm Paid
10. Black Superman 2006
11. Dope Game, Coke Game
12. Whenever I'm Around (with NOE)
13. Which Way
14. Different
15. Ya Dig
16. Hawaii 5.0 (with Styles P)
17. Cold Rocking It
18. 2 Blocks (with NOE)
Download
18 tracks is about the right length for an album to burn to a CD-R, though I might've stretched to 19 if I could find the original version of Man Down with Max B on the hook plus the 2nd verse before it became a Mel Matrix & Jim Jones song. Pour out a little snapple for another song which vanished from the 'net when Murdoch snuffed out Imeem.
"Since the kid was a misfit
I ain't have no best friend, just me and my biscuit.."
Mel Matrix ft. Jim Jones - Man Down (2009)
Kudos to the Kentucky Kid™ for hippin' me to some of the Byrd Gang mixtapes back in '07 when I was a square who was only checkin' their appearances on Harlem : Diary Of A Summer and Hustler's P.O.M.E.
Monday, January 17, 2011
Future fear
After last year saw promo clips for Planet Thug, Canal Street, Feel My Pain, and Figure Four all appear within the space of a few months, I joked that we'd probably end up seeing great new viral video singles by Snagglepuss and Black Rob before 2010 was done 'n' dusted. Lo and behold, Snagglepuss reappeared out of the blue upon the mention of his name like Candyman with the reformed Bounce Squad on 2 new songs including the sterling Jadakiss assisted The Bounce Is Back (still needs a vid', though), and it transpires that B.R's No Fear cut which was floating around last summer was afforded a video a few months back, although I didn't see it until recently when I was perusing his Twitter to see if there was any juicy gossip about G-Dep on there :
"So people throw your hands up and show me where the cash at
matter-of-fact, put 'em down, I might catch a flashback.."
Black Rob - No Fear
Nothing quite says 'hood viral video for WSHH.com more than the the lip-syncing being slightly off from the song at times and and the clip itself being some ol' entirely-too-darkly-filtered Christopher Nolan Batman movie lookin' ass shit. Good joint, though, because lyrically and production-wise it picks up where the likes of Help Me Out and Smile In Your Face from the last B.R album left off and, I dunno who laced it but it definately has that D-Dot or Nashiem Myrick feel to it, no?
By my reckoning, Black Rob has a 10 month window of oppurtunity left to release another mixtape and album before he winds up getting sent back to the bing again for stealing toasters from Wal-Mart, so his Twitter page reveals potentially excellent news for 2011 betwixt his general "'sup, fam?" tweets to Jadakiss and Styles P with the proposal that they record a sequel to the unquestionably classic 24 Hours To Live :
A 24 Hours To Live Part 2 which wouldn't feature the presence of DMX could surpass the song which beget it in theory, but the curse of every Duck Down release since Monkey Barz bar the Heltah Skeltah reunion album (Goldust's entrance music would've been one of the last WWF themes I'd have would ever get sampled, but it sounded mad imperious on That's Incredible) inevitably rears its ugly head to extinguish one's expections :
Sonofabitch. The only way this could ever be welcome news would be if 9th Wonder had finally woken up to the fact that the only great beat he's ever concocted was M.O.P's Instigator.
"So people throw your hands up and show me where the cash at
matter-of-fact, put 'em down, I might catch a flashback.."
Black Rob - No Fear
Nothing quite says 'hood viral video for WSHH.com more than the the lip-syncing being slightly off from the song at times and and the clip itself being some ol' entirely-too-darkly-filtered Christopher Nolan Batman movie lookin' ass shit. Good joint, though, because lyrically and production-wise it picks up where the likes of Help Me Out and Smile In Your Face from the last B.R album left off and, I dunno who laced it but it definately has that D-Dot or Nashiem Myrick feel to it, no?
By my reckoning, Black Rob has a 10 month window of oppurtunity left to release another mixtape and album before he winds up getting sent back to the bing again for stealing toasters from Wal-Mart, so his Twitter page reveals potentially excellent news for 2011 betwixt his general "'sup, fam?" tweets to Jadakiss and Styles P with the proposal that they record a sequel to the unquestionably classic 24 Hours To Live :
A 24 Hours To Live Part 2 which wouldn't feature the presence of DMX could surpass the song which beget it in theory, but the curse of every Duck Down release since Monkey Barz bar the Heltah Skeltah reunion album (Goldust's entrance music would've been one of the last WWF themes I'd have would ever get sampled, but it sounded mad imperious on That's Incredible) inevitably rears its ugly head to extinguish one's expections :
Sonofabitch. The only way this could ever be welcome news would be if 9th Wonder had finally woken up to the fact that the only great beat he's ever concocted was M.O.P's Instigator.
Friday, January 14, 2011
White man's burden
Who knew that copies of Young Bleed's My Balls And My Word CD had replaced Air Jordans and Starter jackets as the top answer on Family Fortunes during the "things white ppl in Louisiana get relieved for by ethnic gentlemen" round, huh?
Can't imagine the HMF Presents.. Welcome To Mobville Volume 1 compilation which featured a handful of Bleed tracks stimulated the same response from da streetz, though, because I've never seen or heard anyone mention it and I only came across it myself during one of my once-every-few-months perusals of the Amazon mp3 store to see if Bleed's Put Your Stamp On has appeared anywhere yet. Unfortunately it hasn't, but I'm glad my search led to the discovery of this comp' as I'm diggin' the joints of his with Suga Free and 8Ball on there, and Top Back is so catchy that you'd swear it was written by Bernie Taupin, Cathy Dennis, or Max B :
Suga Free & Young Bleed - Baby Brother (2009)
Young Bleed & 8Ball - Top Back (2009)
Also found on Amazon when searching for a CDQ version of Heavy Rain by The Jacka recently was this Rain cut from one of the myriad of local Bay rapperswho get Jacka to do a couple of features with them and then pretend they've done a full project with him who've dropped an official mixtape or album with Jacka :
The Jacka & Kel of Western Conference ft. No Gottie - Rain (2008)
Gonna have to consider this one as noncanonical to the Mob Figaz's precipitation-related catalogue since it doesn't have any downpour or thunder sound-fx on it, and rather than resemble anything by the Mob themselves, it reminds me more of when NY thug-rap mixtape dudes were going for the whole low-budget version of College Dropout-era KanYe sound, best typified on Peep Game by Stack Bundles & Riot Squad :
Stack Bundles ft. Riot Squad - Peep Game (2005)
Can't imagine the HMF Presents.. Welcome To Mobville Volume 1 compilation which featured a handful of Bleed tracks stimulated the same response from da streetz, though, because I've never seen or heard anyone mention it and I only came across it myself during one of my once-every-few-months perusals of the Amazon mp3 store to see if Bleed's Put Your Stamp On has appeared anywhere yet. Unfortunately it hasn't, but I'm glad my search led to the discovery of this comp' as I'm diggin' the joints of his with Suga Free and 8Ball on there, and Top Back is so catchy that you'd swear it was written by Bernie Taupin, Cathy Dennis, or Max B :
Suga Free & Young Bleed - Baby Brother (2009)
Young Bleed & 8Ball - Top Back (2009)
Also found on Amazon when searching for a CDQ version of Heavy Rain by The Jacka recently was this Rain cut from one of the myriad of local Bay rappers
The Jacka & Kel of Western Conference ft. No Gottie - Rain (2008)
Gonna have to consider this one as noncanonical to the Mob Figaz's precipitation-related catalogue since it doesn't have any downpour or thunder sound-fx on it, and rather than resemble anything by the Mob themselves, it reminds me more of when NY thug-rap mixtape dudes were going for the whole low-budget version of College Dropout-era KanYe sound, best typified on Peep Game by Stack Bundles & Riot Squad :
Stack Bundles ft. Riot Squad - Peep Game (2005)
Monday, January 10, 2011
R.I.P Mr Robinson
AKA the obligatory pourin' out a lil' glass of vodka & cranberry tribute post to Enjoy Records supremo Bobby Robinson, who died at the age of '93 on friday and who was a veteran of the music business since 1946 with a legendary Harlem record store, a succession of record labels, and production credits for Gladys Knight & The Pips, Lee Dorsey, and The Shirelles. Record label big cheeses nowadays are usually some some fella in a baseball cap who looks like your uncle Richard that possibly used to be a mountain climber who played an electric guitar, but Bobby came from the era of the Harlem Beau Brummel and if Spike Lee had ever remade Gremlins with an all black cast then Bobby would've surely played Mr Wing :
Sugar Hill Records may have been the first and most iconic rap record label, but from '79 - '82 Enjoy had the much superior catalogue, since their records had a less glossy feel to them as if they were live routines captured on wax. Most early rap is an acquired, nay impenetrable, sound for yout' listeners, but on the occassions I've put together pre-Run Dmc primer compilations for friends, roughly 60% of the songs on them tend to be Enjoy releases; and so Love Rap/New Rap Language by Bobby's nephew Spoonie Gee is the definitive disco band era rap 12", Treacherous Three never bettered Feel The Heartbeat and Body Rock, Superrappin' by The Furious Five and Rappin' And Rocking The House by Funky Four Plus One More are as good as their more popular songs on Sugar Hill, Funkbox Party by Masterdon Committee was the unlikely source for Master P's Make 'Em Say Uhh, I'm The Packman (Eat Everything I Can) by The Packman is a more than worthy companion to Pack Jam by Jonzun Crew as far electro bangers about video game characters which transcend their novelty beginnings go, and, Fearlous Four had 2 Enjoy classics within 12 months of one another with Rockin' It and It's Magic. The Message and Planet Rock might be the most historically important rap records of '82, Rockin' It is my choice as the year's best banger, even after Jay-Z nearly ruined it with that single even he hated from his otherwise best album Volume One (or, at least, the only Jay-Z album I'll ever listen to again).
The Fearless Four - Rockin' It (1982)
Although Enjoy was on the wane by 1983 with money and contract disputes eventually seeing Bobby's flagship artists all defect to Sugar Hill or Profile Records, the label's place in history was already assured and even their declining years saw them savvy enough to release Doug E. Fresh's official solo debut single Just Havin' Fun in 1984, as well as future random-rap rarities like the vastly overrated Good Old Days and Mighty Mighty (Mike Tyson) by Most Wanted in the late 80s. I've never heard the latter and it sounds like it could be a flagrant sharking of Spoonie Gee & Marley Marl's '87 cut Mighty Mike Tyson, but Fat Lace linchpin Drew Huge apparently rates it, so I'll defer to his knowledge on this one.
R.I.P Bobby; you released my favourite doubled-sided rap 12" ever, you discovered rap's original producer auteur with Pumpkin, you resembled another weird oriental movie character I can't place (from one of the Crank movies, perhaps, and, no, I don't mean Bai Ling), and you were way more important than Roy Hodgson or Joanna Yeattes.
Thursday, January 6, 2011
Bobby all bound, Whitney with the g's
There's footage of me stagediving as the age of about 16 on Youtube, yet nobody has thought to upload that The Son Of A Preacher : The Black That Ruled Harlem documentary about Clarence "Preacher" Heatley and his crew The Family? Everything is heltah skeltah and the internet done got its priorities fucked up. You're probably thinking this is yet another generic 'hood dvd about a bunch of degenerate Uptown criminals who weren't even a quarter as interesting as Azie, Rich, and Alpo, right? Possibly; where these guys differ from the myriad of other bargain bin versions of Harlem's premier triumvirate is that there's an urban legend which alledges the crew kidnapped a certain drug addled R&B singer who happened to be married to a certain narcotics abusing MOR/R&B diva, and I really wanna know whether the incident is covered in more depth in this documentary. So, until someone ups it or I can find a non-suspicious looking downloadable link, here's the story, as jacked from elsewhere :
Troubled diva Whitney Houston secretly paid a $400,000 ransom demand to kidnappers who threatened to kill her ex-husband Bobby Brown, according to a new bombshell book by former gang member David Collins.
Brown was snatched and held “naked and hog tied” at gunpoint by members of a notorious New York street gang known as the Preacher Crew, according to the author.
He was later allowed to make one phone call to Whitney, in which he pleaded with her to personally deliver the ransom to an abandoned building in the Bronx.
Disguised in a wig and dark glasses, the terrified singer obeyed, and handed over a duffle bag containing the cash 24 hours later to 6ft 7in gang boss Clarence “Preacher” Heatley, says Collins.
He claims the kidnapping, which was never reported to police, happened in April 1993 when Whitney was at the peak of her fame with her film The Bodyguard and its soundtrack album, both huge hits. Unlike the movie, however, in which Kevin Costner co-starred as her heroic minder, Whitney was forced to face her then husband’s kidnappers alone to hand over the ransom before they were both allowed to walk away free.
Former gang member Collins claims in his autobiography, Preacher of the Streets, that Brown was snatched over a $25,000 debt to a New Jersey drug dealer. Heatley, currently serving life without parole after admitting being involved in 13 gang-related killings, allegedly paid the dealer and “took over the debt”.
Heatley – described by Collins as an eighteen-and-a-half stone “mountain of evil” – then told gang members he had a plan “to make a whole lot more than $25,000”. His henchmen were sent to a Manhattan nightclub, where they allegedly plied Brown with high-grade cocaine, later luring him to a Bronx apartment with the promise of more.
Collins claims Brown was taken to a sleazy, abandoned apartment that had been taken over by Preacher Crew members. There, he was “knocked out with one punch” by one of Heatley’s henchmen. “When he awoke, Bobby was naked and hog-tied, his mouth stuffed with a rag,” says Collins.
The Pre-acher then showed up and took the rag out of Bobby’s mouth. ‘It’s a shame we have to kill you,’ Preacher told Bobby. Bobby begged for his life and said Whitney could pay the debt.
“The Preacher left the room and his men then terrorised Bobby for two hours. They kicked him. They told him they would kill Whitney. One of them put a gun to his head. Bobby was weeping when the Preacher came back in the room, begging the Preacher to let him call Whitney.”
This, according to Collins, was the fear tactic Heatley believed would help him score a big financial hit. Brown was allowed to phone Whitney, telling her he would be killed unless she paid the gang. Heatley, according to Collins, then took the phone from Brown.
As Whitney pleaded with him to spare her husband, “they came to an agreement. She was personally going to bring $400,000 to get her man back. The next day, she did just that. She was wearing a wig. She paid the money. Bobby was free to go.”
Collins writes: “Once they were gone, Preacher sat there with the duffle bag of money and split it with his men. Preacher kept over $200,000 of it.” Collins believes both Brown and Whitney were lucky to escape shaken but virtually unscathed.
More amusing mental image : a weeping hog-tied Bobby or Whitney trussed up in a wig and shades wandering around the Bronx with a duffle bag stuffed with 400 grand?
Bonus Harlem beats :
Yes! Thanks to Jasper in the comment section who put me onto a link for a Faith Evans appearances & remixes compilation which includes G. Dep's Everyday remix with her I keep harping on about wanting a dirty version mp3 of :
G. Dep ft. Faith Evans - Everyday remix
Already the 2nd best song on G. Dep's Child Of The Ghetto album as it was, the 12" remix with the appended crooning by Faith gives the song extra pathos a la the title track on Black Rob's first album. Now all I need to complete my stash of rare Bad Boy moments is someone to come through with an mp3 of Black Rob's Take It Off which was an obscure late 90s mixtape cut where B.R apparently reimagines Spoonie Gee's '86 classic as a stick-up kid anthem. I've never heard it and I don't think it's ever been uploaded to the 'net, but I want it. Anybody?
Monday, January 3, 2011
Ayo Fred Flak
From the MobStyle weekend 1 : their beef with N.W.A post.
Pretty Tone Capone - Case Dismissed (1992)
The caps-lock swag barometer is definately registering on the Prodigy level rather than the Necro one here, Fred, and those hardbody early Pretty Tone Capone solo cuts you produced were obviously a huge influence on Big L and Cam'Ron & Bloodshed. I got 5 questions for you if you happen to return :
1. What exactly happened at Def American Records with Pretty Tone, and is there a full unreleased PTC album from that period in the vaults somewhere?
2. Were you in the Case Dismissed video, which is almost certainly a top 5 rap video of all time? If so, which dude are you, who were the 2 white fellas (actors? friends of the crew?) and who was the honey-dip ridin' with Tone who looked like a Puerto Rican Winona Ryder?
3. Ever heard of the DiggersWithGratitude guys? They've put out unreleased material by Tragedy, Marley Marl, Godfather Don etc in the past 4 or 5 years. You should get in contact with them and try and work out a deal to release the songs with Lord Finesse and Showbiz.
4. K. Def has some footage on Youtube of him cuttin' up some unreleased Pretty Tone song on Serato (at 1:36 in) which I assume is with Def's old group Real Live. You aware of that song?
5. Ru-Paul, bro?
Pretty Tone Capone - Case Dismissed (1992)
The caps-lock swag barometer is definately registering on the Prodigy level rather than the Necro one here, Fred, and those hardbody early Pretty Tone Capone solo cuts you produced were obviously a huge influence on Big L and Cam'Ron & Bloodshed. I got 5 questions for you if you happen to return :
1. What exactly happened at Def American Records with Pretty Tone, and is there a full unreleased PTC album from that period in the vaults somewhere?
2. Were you in the Case Dismissed video, which is almost certainly a top 5 rap video of all time? If so, which dude are you, who were the 2 white fellas (actors? friends of the crew?) and who was the honey-dip ridin' with Tone who looked like a Puerto Rican Winona Ryder?
3. Ever heard of the DiggersWithGratitude guys? They've put out unreleased material by Tragedy, Marley Marl, Godfather Don etc in the past 4 or 5 years. You should get in contact with them and try and work out a deal to release the songs with Lord Finesse and Showbiz.
4. K. Def has some footage on Youtube of him cuttin' up some unreleased Pretty Tone song on Serato (at 1:36 in) which I assume is with Def's old group Real Live. You aware of that song?
5. Ru-Paul, bro?
Thursday, December 23, 2010
Pop muzik
D.J. Red Alert - Hip Hop On Wax Volume 2
Red Alert cuttin' up M's 1979 hit Pop Muzik in amongst more obvious mainstays like Blow Your Head by Fred Wesley & The J.B's and Heaven And Hell Is On Earth by 20th Century Steel Band back in 1984.
Who'd have ever imagined that the Bad Boy version of Cluedo would end with G. Dep as the murderer when a self-confessed former stick-up kid/perennial jailbird like Black Rob was also present at Tudor Mansion, huh? Rappers might have difficulty in restraining themselves from shooting innocent people dead during bungled street robberies back in the 90s, but at least they've always had the most sublime taste in 80s pop music, which, in certain cases, may have taken us saltines a deacade or so to admit that we enjoy. In the unlikely occurance that the biblical concept of Heaven is 100% accurate then it seems probable that G. Dep would get shooed away at the pearly gates for callously taking another man's life 17 years ago, but one imagines that Saint Peter is far more sympathetic to the plights of alledgedly homicidal rappers who happen to enjoy the sounds of Phil Collins and Cameo, so Azie and C-Murder should be be able to waltz right in.
With that thought in mind, here's 5 of my favourite uses of 80s pop by rappers from the last 5 years. Please remember that I'm still waiting for someone - literally anyone other than La Coka Nostra, Joe Budden, Rick Ross, Termanology, Drake, The CunninLynguists, Freddie Gibbs, French Montana, Immortal Technique, or Sage Francis - to rap over Big Time by Peter Gabriel and You're The Best by Joe Esposito from the Karate Kid OST :
Z-Ro ft. Tanya Herron - Continue To Roll
(Uses True by Spandau Ballet)
How'd you make a sappy Spandau Ballet sample which had previously been used on travesties by P.M Dawn and Nelly sound as marvelous as 1:40 - 1:50 of So Ruff, So Tuff by Zapp & Roger? Why, you replace Tony Hadley's singing with some crooning by Mike Dean's wifey Tanya Herron, throw the Ashley's Roachclip drumbreak underneath it, and then have Z-Ro rap on top of it, of course! So, Z-Ro's I'm Still Livin' album was a mammoth disappointment after the triumvirate of The Life Of Joseph W. McVey, the Kings Of The South mixtape with Lil' Flip, and Let The Truth Be Told in 2004 and 2005, but this and his reboot of Scarface's Seen A Man Die were both wonderful.
Cam'Ron - Pass Tha Dutchie
(Uses Pass The Dutchie by Musical Youth)
Cam's rhymed over 80s pop staples by Sting, Cyndi Lauper, Starship, Bon Jovi, Winger, Salt-N-Pepa, Journey and the Magnum P.I theme in his time, so it didn't come as much suprise when he freaked Pass The Dutchie. What was suprising was that this 2008 mixtape throwaway which came at the lowest point of his career was a return of form and he really dropped the ball by not fashioning this into a legitimate single, if only because the members of Musical Youth could do with a few royalty cheques nowadays since that "how does it feel when you got no food?" refrain proved cruelly ironic. Cam uses that very same refrain to excellent effect here by chiding a fiscally challenged 'hoodrat as he's seducing her, and this, Glitter and Just Us just about saved an otherwise awful year for him. Uninteresting fact of the day : Musical Youth's LP was the 2nd LP I owned after the Muppet Show album which featured Robin The Frog's tour-de-force piano ballad rendition of A.A Milne's Halfway Down The Stairs.
AP.9 ft. The Jacka - Reflections
(Uses Hello by Lionel Richie)
Sad Mob Figaz songs examining their conflicting urges are usually when they're at their most potent for me because I'm a sensitive soul who used to burst into tears whenever my folks would play me the aforementioned Robin The Frog ballad as a kid (I was only about 4), so consequently this is my go-to jam on AP.9's I Am Legend album from last year since it finds AP and Jacka staring into the mirror and not recognising the men they've become. Chipmunking up a song as obviously mawkish as Hello really shouldn't work this well, but Reflections is the sort of ruminative Bay Area blues I can't get enough of nowadays. Still waiting for them to shoot a Hello parody video for this with Jack' shaping a clay head figure of Ice Cube circa the jheri-curl era, though.
Jim Jones ft. Max B - Beverly Hills Cop
(Uses Axel F by Harold Faltermeyer)
They say Jim is a buffoonish try-hard weedcarrier who stole Max B's whole delivery/persona and then had Max and Stack Bundles write all his songs for him. Ummmm, yeah, but he also salvaged Axel F after the Crazy Frog completely desecrated it so I'm forever in his gratitude since that was my shit when I was a youngster. 0.08 to 0.24 is pure comedic gold, and Max was the 1 man Lamont-Dozier-Holland of Byrd Gang.
Max B - Lonely
(Uses Licence To Kill by Gladys Knight)
This is a blog that's terribly fond of both Dipset and the 1989 James Bond movie Licence To Kill, so the true star of Byrd Gang over Gladys Knight's LTK theme song is a true best of both worlds situation, and the "rap Lou Rawls" Max B even reminds me of Licence To Kill's chief scoundrel Franz Sanchez in that he was just an old skool criminal who was genuinely hurt by the lack of loyalty in his organisation. It's only when we arrive at the 2 rapscallion's respective downfalls that their paths diverge : it took James Bond, a tanker full of gasoline, and a government spy's cigarette lighter to stop Sanchez; with Max it just took the sucker-move of hiring an idiot savant whigga-fan who wanted to be all up in them VladTV videos yappin' as his attorney. Ayo Max - you should've appointed the same lawyer Pretty Tone Capone used in the Case Dismissed video, or at least have procured the services of Tray if you were gonna insist on having a white Dipset aficionado attorney.
Gotta confess that I did originally intend to include the deliriously absurd, Owner Of A Lonely Heart by Yes-sampling I Like It by Lil' Wayne ft. Boo and Mack Maine (the 2nd of Wayne's 2 good Auto-Tune song after his tender ode to syrup Me And My Drank) in this post, but my mp3 has vanished and all the Da Drought Is Over 4 links Google throws up look like they might have the cooties.
Red Alert cuttin' up M's 1979 hit Pop Muzik in amongst more obvious mainstays like Blow Your Head by Fred Wesley & The J.B's and Heaven And Hell Is On Earth by 20th Century Steel Band back in 1984.
Who'd have ever imagined that the Bad Boy version of Cluedo would end with G. Dep as the murderer when a self-confessed former stick-up kid/perennial jailbird like Black Rob was also present at Tudor Mansion, huh? Rappers might have difficulty in restraining themselves from shooting innocent people dead during bungled street robberies back in the 90s, but at least they've always had the most sublime taste in 80s pop music, which, in certain cases, may have taken us saltines a deacade or so to admit that we enjoy. In the unlikely occurance that the biblical concept of Heaven is 100% accurate then it seems probable that G. Dep would get shooed away at the pearly gates for callously taking another man's life 17 years ago, but one imagines that Saint Peter is far more sympathetic to the plights of alledgedly homicidal rappers who happen to enjoy the sounds of Phil Collins and Cameo, so Azie and C-Murder should be be able to waltz right in.
With that thought in mind, here's 5 of my favourite uses of 80s pop by rappers from the last 5 years. Please remember that I'm still waiting for someone - literally anyone other than La Coka Nostra, Joe Budden, Rick Ross, Termanology, Drake, The CunninLynguists, Freddie Gibbs, French Montana, Immortal Technique, or Sage Francis - to rap over Big Time by Peter Gabriel and You're The Best by Joe Esposito from the Karate Kid OST :
Z-Ro ft. Tanya Herron - Continue To Roll
(Uses True by Spandau Ballet)
How'd you make a sappy Spandau Ballet sample which had previously been used on travesties by P.M Dawn and Nelly sound as marvelous as 1:40 - 1:50 of So Ruff, So Tuff by Zapp & Roger? Why, you replace Tony Hadley's singing with some crooning by Mike Dean's wifey Tanya Herron, throw the Ashley's Roachclip drumbreak underneath it, and then have Z-Ro rap on top of it, of course! So, Z-Ro's I'm Still Livin' album was a mammoth disappointment after the triumvirate of The Life Of Joseph W. McVey, the Kings Of The South mixtape with Lil' Flip, and Let The Truth Be Told in 2004 and 2005, but this and his reboot of Scarface's Seen A Man Die were both wonderful.
Cam'Ron - Pass Tha Dutchie
(Uses Pass The Dutchie by Musical Youth)
Cam's rhymed over 80s pop staples by Sting, Cyndi Lauper, Starship, Bon Jovi, Winger, Salt-N-Pepa, Journey and the Magnum P.I theme in his time, so it didn't come as much suprise when he freaked Pass The Dutchie. What was suprising was that this 2008 mixtape throwaway which came at the lowest point of his career was a return of form and he really dropped the ball by not fashioning this into a legitimate single, if only because the members of Musical Youth could do with a few royalty cheques nowadays since that "how does it feel when you got no food?" refrain proved cruelly ironic. Cam uses that very same refrain to excellent effect here by chiding a fiscally challenged 'hoodrat as he's seducing her, and this, Glitter and Just Us just about saved an otherwise awful year for him. Uninteresting fact of the day : Musical Youth's LP was the 2nd LP I owned after the Muppet Show album which featured Robin The Frog's tour-de-force piano ballad rendition of A.A Milne's Halfway Down The Stairs.
AP.9 ft. The Jacka - Reflections
(Uses Hello by Lionel Richie)
Sad Mob Figaz songs examining their conflicting urges are usually when they're at their most potent for me because I'm a sensitive soul who used to burst into tears whenever my folks would play me the aforementioned Robin The Frog ballad as a kid (I was only about 4), so consequently this is my go-to jam on AP.9's I Am Legend album from last year since it finds AP and Jacka staring into the mirror and not recognising the men they've become. Chipmunking up a song as obviously mawkish as Hello really shouldn't work this well, but Reflections is the sort of ruminative Bay Area blues I can't get enough of nowadays. Still waiting for them to shoot a Hello parody video for this with Jack' shaping a clay head figure of Ice Cube circa the jheri-curl era, though.
Jim Jones ft. Max B - Beverly Hills Cop
(Uses Axel F by Harold Faltermeyer)
They say Jim is a buffoonish try-hard weedcarrier who stole Max B's whole delivery/persona and then had Max and Stack Bundles write all his songs for him. Ummmm, yeah, but he also salvaged Axel F after the Crazy Frog completely desecrated it so I'm forever in his gratitude since that was my shit when I was a youngster. 0.08 to 0.24 is pure comedic gold, and Max was the 1 man Lamont-Dozier-Holland of Byrd Gang.
Max B - Lonely
(Uses Licence To Kill by Gladys Knight)
This is a blog that's terribly fond of both Dipset and the 1989 James Bond movie Licence To Kill, so the true star of Byrd Gang over Gladys Knight's LTK theme song is a true best of both worlds situation, and the "rap Lou Rawls" Max B even reminds me of Licence To Kill's chief scoundrel Franz Sanchez in that he was just an old skool criminal who was genuinely hurt by the lack of loyalty in his organisation. It's only when we arrive at the 2 rapscallion's respective downfalls that their paths diverge : it took James Bond, a tanker full of gasoline, and a government spy's cigarette lighter to stop Sanchez; with Max it just took the sucker-move of hiring an idiot savant whigga-fan who wanted to be all up in them VladTV videos yappin' as his attorney. Ayo Max - you should've appointed the same lawyer Pretty Tone Capone used in the Case Dismissed video, or at least have procured the services of Tray if you were gonna insist on having a white Dipset aficionado attorney.
Gotta confess that I did originally intend to include the deliriously absurd, Owner Of A Lonely Heart by Yes-sampling I Like It by Lil' Wayne ft. Boo and Mack Maine (the 2nd of Wayne's 2 good Auto-Tune song after his tender ode to syrup Me And My Drank) in this post, but my mp3 has vanished and all the Da Drought Is Over 4 links Google throws up look like they might have the cooties.
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
Forgottten 2000s Bad Boy mixtape songs
Consider this post a secrete hub where we can recount our experiences of being dragged to see Get Him To The Greek by our respective Russell Brand-infatuated wifeys and ending up sorta enjoying it for Puffy's turn as Sergio Roma, before I offer you 2 forgotten mixtape songs by Black Rob and Boyz 'N' Da Hood apiece in the hope that you'll school me on some Bad Boy South era 8Ball & MJG mixtape cuts in return or even hook up that damn Live At The BBQ 2007 Bad Boy posse cut I'm still after.
Black Rob - Permanent Scars
AKA the Phil Collins-sampling track Heavy D resold to Beanie Sigel for Feel It In The Air and the song which later became more widely known as Live From The Eastside on the Return Of Black Rob 'tape. Beanie's adaption was, arguably, the most remarkable emo-rap single of the last decade so that's the superior song of the 2, but Rob's heavy-hearted autobiographical tale works in its own right and the subtle differences in production mean you can enjoy Permanent Scars as a seperate entity, or, at the very least, an intriguing, seldom heard side-alley. Really wish Beans had hired trill Phil C to mean-mug in the Feel It In The Air video like Bone did with Home.
Black Rob - Knock 'Em Out
As far as Neptunes facsimiles go, this isn't quite as brzaen as Stuntastic by Yukmouth, Sav Out by Turf Talk, Sour Diesel by Byrd Gang, or Scared Of Monstas by Curren$y, but it'll definately feature in the ‘Songs Which Sound Like They Were By The Neptunes, But Weren't’ playlist I've been meaning to assemble whenever I get around to it. The highlight of Clinton Sparks's Maybe You Been Brainwashed tape, this is the type of club banger song Noo Yawk rappers plain forgot how to make for a good duration of the last decade after the Tunnel closed its doors. I hope B.R's Duck Down tenure produces music which is more Monkey Barz than Jesus Price Superstar 'cause the absolute last thing that label needs is another 90s rapper over quotidian 9th Wonder beats.
Boyz 'N' Da Hood & Lil' Wayne - Ride With Them Thangs
Boyz 'N' Da Hood & Lil' Wayne ft. T.I - Gangsta Boyz
Inbetween the Jeezy incarnation of Boyz 'N' Da Hood and the Gorilla Zoe manifestation of the group, there was a brief BNTH 1.5 after Puffy catapulted a bag of money at Wayne to get him into the studio with the intention that he'd replace Jeezy on their sophomore album. Label politics put pay to that Diddy pipe dream, but the fruits of their studio session appeared on DJ Drama & Bad Boy South's head honcho Block's Welcome To My Block Gangsta Grillz 'tape in 2006. BNTH's charm was derived from them being a no-frills ATL gangsta-rap group in an era when such a thing was hard to come by, and, man, both these cuts are even 'arder than the imperial Trap N*ggaz from Jeezy's interim with the lads.
Did anybody else think Jody Breeze was a chubby teenage lesbian rapper when you first saw him in the intro to the Dem Boyz video?
Rappers who look like lesbians; hhhmmm, there might be a post in that.
Black Rob - Permanent Scars
AKA the Phil Collins-sampling track Heavy D resold to Beanie Sigel for Feel It In The Air and the song which later became more widely known as Live From The Eastside on the Return Of Black Rob 'tape. Beanie's adaption was, arguably, the most remarkable emo-rap single of the last decade so that's the superior song of the 2, but Rob's heavy-hearted autobiographical tale works in its own right and the subtle differences in production mean you can enjoy Permanent Scars as a seperate entity, or, at the very least, an intriguing, seldom heard side-alley. Really wish Beans had hired trill Phil C to mean-mug in the Feel It In The Air video like Bone did with Home.
Black Rob - Knock 'Em Out
As far as Neptunes facsimiles go, this isn't quite as brzaen as Stuntastic by Yukmouth, Sav Out by Turf Talk, Sour Diesel by Byrd Gang, or Scared Of Monstas by Curren$y, but it'll definately feature in the ‘Songs Which Sound Like They Were By The Neptunes, But Weren't’ playlist I've been meaning to assemble whenever I get around to it. The highlight of Clinton Sparks's Maybe You Been Brainwashed tape, this is the type of club banger song Noo Yawk rappers plain forgot how to make for a good duration of the last decade after the Tunnel closed its doors. I hope B.R's Duck Down tenure produces music which is more Monkey Barz than Jesus Price Superstar 'cause the absolute last thing that label needs is another 90s rapper over quotidian 9th Wonder beats.
Boyz 'N' Da Hood & Lil' Wayne - Ride With Them Thangs
Boyz 'N' Da Hood & Lil' Wayne ft. T.I - Gangsta Boyz
Inbetween the Jeezy incarnation of Boyz 'N' Da Hood and the Gorilla Zoe manifestation of the group, there was a brief BNTH 1.5 after Puffy catapulted a bag of money at Wayne to get him into the studio with the intention that he'd replace Jeezy on their sophomore album. Label politics put pay to that Diddy pipe dream, but the fruits of their studio session appeared on DJ Drama & Bad Boy South's head honcho Block's Welcome To My Block Gangsta Grillz 'tape in 2006. BNTH's charm was derived from them being a no-frills ATL gangsta-rap group in an era when such a thing was hard to come by, and, man, both these cuts are even 'arder than the imperial Trap N*ggaz from Jeezy's interim with the lads.
Did anybody else think Jody Breeze was a chubby teenage lesbian rapper when you first saw him in the intro to the Dem Boyz video?
Rappers who look like lesbians; hhhmmm, there might be a post in that.
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
Hyde and seek
No legal documentation or map has ever proven T-La Rock's boast that he's the male sovereign of a mysterious land known as Lyrical to be true, and Suga Free's moniker has to be an outright fib given that blood glucose levels in the human body oscillate between 3.6 and 5.8 mM at all times, yet neither dubious claim hinders the sheer awesomeness of It's Yours or Why U Bullshittin'? because authenticity in rap is only important to the most delusional of rappers and dudes in Youtube comment sections with names like YayKingEnt or DAMONEY 187. Listening to Dr Jeckyll & Mr Hyde, you'd imagine their lofty gloats about extreme affluence were escapist yuppie fantasies inspired by them watching Blake Carrington ballin'-outta-control in Dynasty on tv, but, think again, because this snippet from an upcoming interview with Alonzo "Mr Hyde" Brown at The Foundation website reveals that, while the "Rockefeller, he balls for me" line in Gettin' Money may have been a teensy-weensy bit of an exaggeration, Alonzo and Andre "Dr Jeckyll" Harrell really were living that corporate lifestyle when they were moonlighting as the dons of republican-rap in the early eighties before they both went on to become genuinely stinking rich :
Dr Jeckyll & Mr Hyde - Gettin' Money
Troy : Yes I heard a lot of good things about Spivey as a D.J. back in those days. O.k so what turned you guys on to wearing suits regularly during shows?
Mr. Hyde : Well during the early 80's Andre was working at 1010Wins as an account executive and I was working at the American Stock Exchange. I took an internship there while going to Lehman College. I would go downtown and I would see these guys in these suits with this and that and they just looked like they had their shit together. They looked professional and they commanded respect and Dre was on the other side doing the same thing. He wore a suit and a bow tie and all of these things in terms of dealing with business. So it was the thing that we saw that made us go, "We want to be there!" Alright, living in Harlem back in those days your aspiration was to get a good job, you know what I mean.
Troy : Brothers wanted to get money hustling but the real American dream was to come uptown with that suit and tie from Wall Street. That was the real American dream.
Mr. Hyde : Bingo, and I was there! I worked at the American Stock Exchange. I was on the trading floor being a runner not a stock holder or anything like that. But I would work with all of these ballers. So I said I want to dress like the ballers, so it became like a normal thing for us. We didn't wear that in Harlem World because we couldn't afford it but we slowly graduated into that.
Troy : So it is safe to say both of you were getting off of work from downtown kind of late and went into Harlem World with your same suit on...
Mr. Hyde : Basically.
Troy : ...and started rocking the party!
Mr. Hyde : Well not in Harlem World. We started hanging out in Bentley's, Leviticus, Silver Shadow and we use to rap there. So we moved into the circle of the after party, six o'clock crowd, so brothers use to go from work to clubs on Thursday and Friday nights. So that was how we got the term the suit and tie rappers. Have you seen the album cover?
Troy : Of course I remember when I was a young teenager and you two were doing your thing. Ya'll stood out extremely, in fact I don't even remember seeing your face, I just seen the suits!
Mr. Hyde : And that was part of the reason why we did it. How could you tell us apart from Grand Master Flash and all of these guys and this and that.
Troy : You and Andre's name Jeckyll and Hyde was very interesting in itself but the suits took you guys over the top.
On a related note, I just wanna send out a quick "suck dick with piss in it" to Oliver Stone and FOX because Wall Street : Money Never Sleeps was a hodgepodge of about 5 seperate genres, 2 MacGuffins and 1 really annoying female lead, even though the original Alan Loeb script suggested this could be the first decent Stone movie in, well, lord knows how many years.
Dr Jeckyll & Mr Hyde - Gettin' Money
Troy : Yes I heard a lot of good things about Spivey as a D.J. back in those days. O.k so what turned you guys on to wearing suits regularly during shows?
Mr. Hyde : Well during the early 80's Andre was working at 1010Wins as an account executive and I was working at the American Stock Exchange. I took an internship there while going to Lehman College. I would go downtown and I would see these guys in these suits with this and that and they just looked like they had their shit together. They looked professional and they commanded respect and Dre was on the other side doing the same thing. He wore a suit and a bow tie and all of these things in terms of dealing with business. So it was the thing that we saw that made us go, "We want to be there!" Alright, living in Harlem back in those days your aspiration was to get a good job, you know what I mean.
Troy : Brothers wanted to get money hustling but the real American dream was to come uptown with that suit and tie from Wall Street. That was the real American dream.
Mr. Hyde : Bingo, and I was there! I worked at the American Stock Exchange. I was on the trading floor being a runner not a stock holder or anything like that. But I would work with all of these ballers. So I said I want to dress like the ballers, so it became like a normal thing for us. We didn't wear that in Harlem World because we couldn't afford it but we slowly graduated into that.
Troy : So it is safe to say both of you were getting off of work from downtown kind of late and went into Harlem World with your same suit on...
Mr. Hyde : Basically.
Troy : ...and started rocking the party!
Mr. Hyde : Well not in Harlem World. We started hanging out in Bentley's, Leviticus, Silver Shadow and we use to rap there. So we moved into the circle of the after party, six o'clock crowd, so brothers use to go from work to clubs on Thursday and Friday nights. So that was how we got the term the suit and tie rappers. Have you seen the album cover?
Troy : Of course I remember when I was a young teenager and you two were doing your thing. Ya'll stood out extremely, in fact I don't even remember seeing your face, I just seen the suits!
Mr. Hyde : And that was part of the reason why we did it. How could you tell us apart from Grand Master Flash and all of these guys and this and that.
Troy : You and Andre's name Jeckyll and Hyde was very interesting in itself but the suits took you guys over the top.
On a related note, I just wanna send out a quick "suck dick with piss in it" to Oliver Stone and FOX because Wall Street : Money Never Sleeps was a hodgepodge of about 5 seperate genres, 2 MacGuffins and 1 really annoying female lead, even though the original Alan Loeb script suggested this could be the first decent Stone movie in, well, lord knows how many years.
Monday, November 15, 2010
Kay Slayed 'em
Keith Grayson AKA the former graffiti writer Dez and the future Drama King DJ Kay Slay at some point during his transitional period between the two personas in the early nineties. Plaid turn-ups are so trill.
How'd you fancy a Dame Grease produced quasi-remake of N*gga Witta Gun with Sauce Money, Killer Mike, Bun B, WC, Joe Budden, and some weedcarrier called Hak Ditty who once made a song called My Moms Hates Me all crammed toe-to-toe on it? Whaddaya mean you like some of those guys and think Dame is an underrated producer but you're not exactly sure the contrasting styles of rappers from a variety of regions will inspissate together on a song without it seeming contrived, and the death-squeals of seals being clubbed are preferable to the sound of Joe Buddens's voice? Well, tough luck, dickface, because Kay Slay's 4 official compilation albums were full of such songs which make KanYe's G.O.O.D Friday marathons of mismatched personalities sound as organically communal as Day One or Watch For The Hook.
Thing is, though, is that there were always nuggets of gold to be found on them there Kay Slay albums inbetween the posse cuts where the Drama King answered the questions no one was ever likely to have asked in the first place like what would happen if Papoose hopped on songs with Yung Joc & Chamillionaire, Mike Jones & Paul Wall, and OJ Da Juiceman & Yo Gotti? So, here's 5 bonafide great songs from the Kay Slay albums as chosen by me. None of them are from his The Champions : The North Meets The South album with Greg Street because the only tunes I liked on there were the a tweaked version of the classic pre-Diplomatic Immunity track Drama Gang which wasn't as good as the original, and the Three 6 Mafia & B.G song which doesn't really fit with the east coast theme of the post :
Scarface, Raekwon & Fat Joe - I Never Liked Ya Ass
(From The Streetsweeper Volume 1, 2003)
On one hand, Scarface over a sub-Ayatollah/Just/KanYe/Heatmakerz chipmuk-soul banger with Raekwon and Fat Joe is emblematic of the main problem with Kay Slay's albums; on the other, why be so anal when 'Face has always sounded comfortable on east coast beats and there's little aesthetic difference between this and his most hard-nosed tracks like Raise Up or The Diary? I Never Liked Ya Ass is that puttin'-a-mawfucker-through-a-Spanish-announcer's-table-rap, but it's a pity that Joey Crack and not Ghostface or Beanie Sigel rounds the song off with that third verse because Joe really shouldn't be allowed near any sort of decent production beyond 1999 unless you're talking some D.I.T.C jam like Best Behavior or the classic Primo head-buster Who Got Gunz?.
Mobb Deep ft. Big Noyd - Get Shot The Fuck Up
(From The Streetsweeper Volume 1, 2003)
You know what I'm gonna do if anyone even thinks of piping up to tell me that 50 Shot Ya and Purple Haze were better than this as far as songs from the first The Streetsweeper album go? I'm gonna shrug and agree with them before explaining that both appeared elsewhere beforehand or afterwards so they're disqualified. So, that leaves us with Get Shot The Fuck Up, which finds a baronial orchestral sample and scattershot drums as the vertebrae for the Mobb and Noyd, who steals the show here since P had his soul stolen by Jay-Z a couple of years earlier and didn't manage to retrive it until 2006.
LL Cool J - The Truth
(From The Streetsweeper Volume 2, 2004)
'Face and Ghost's Face Off, and the Three 6 Mafia ft. Lil' Wyte & Frayser Boy single Who Gives A Fuck Where You From? were the cuts from The Streetsweeper Volume 2 which I recall generating the most discussion and radio/video play, but LL's wistful The Truth where he reminisced about the Dapper Dan store getting shot up, hanging with Harlem's legendary triumvirate of eighties hustlers, hittin' up The Rooftop, and first hearing himself on Marley's show was the one which led me a merry dance. Who'd-a-thunk Jack The Ripper-turned-Mr Smith would end up doing his best work since Ill Bomb getting introspective over a melancholy flute sample? Moreover, who'd-a-thunk that melancholy flute sample would've been provided by Swizz Beats?
Cam'Ron ft. Chinky Brown Eyes - Harlem
(From The Streetsweeper Volume 2, 2004)
"Them models grasp my fits, they call for fashion tips"
KILLA! So why wasn't this on Purple Haze again??
AZ, Raekwon & Ghostface - See The Light
(From More Than Just A DJ, 2010)
I don't know whether Green Lantern beget this beat specifically for these guys, but I'd like to think his modus operandi here was to create something in the vein of what a 2010 version of AZ & Raekwon's RZA remix of Doe Or Die would sound like. Not a bad song to use as your artistic inspiration, given that the previous AZ & Rae' collabo on a Kay Slay album sounded like the then absolutely-killing-shit Heatmakerz thought "hey, you know how we've just murked Just and KanYe with their own sound on Diplomatic Immunity? Let's abandon that altogether and give Kay Slay something which sounds like a Drag-On album track from 2000 for Prodigy, Raekwon, and AZ to rap on, yeah?"
Sunday, November 7, 2010
B-B-Byrd Gang is the word
Like Kurt Cobain was here.
Since Max B is teetering on the tightrope of being the first nu-New York rapper to become a legitimate blog darling, and KanYe's aimless Rapper's Delight-length G.O.O.D Friday posse-cuts are completely lacking in all of the crucial intermutual ingredients any song with 3 or more rappers on it needs, I really can't think of a better time for a quick appreciation of Byrd Gang at their 2005 - 2008 peak than this evening.
Byrd Gang were the closest thing rap had to Mourinho's Inter Milan side where an unlikely combination of longstanding weedcarriers and mercenary rookies were consolidated into a cogent unit and each man played his position with a brawny efficiency as he modelled his role in the group on the greats of the past : Jim Jones as the amusing Eazy-E central villain letting the other members get their hands dirty, Max B as the Pimp C-ish songwriter and hook-singer, Stack Bundles providing the muscle a la Styles P, and Mel Matrix being a reliable henchman with a fine line in disrespectful bars about the fairer sex in the Sheek Louch mold who was also possibly incumbent in picking up the group's amaranthine supply of Ed Hardy shirts, shiny skull-belt wallet chains, and bedazzle-arsed distressed jeans since he wasn't busy composing or ghostwriting like Max and Stack were. Still, at least Byrd Gang had a look, and that's an important consideration here because all great rap groups from Run Dmc and N.W.A to Mobb Deep and the Hot Boy$ to Dipset themselves circa 2002/2003 had a distinct gang look which helped enhance their mystique, even if that look in this instance can only be described as the 4 lads from the Jersey Shore :
So, here's 5 of my most cherished songs by the original incarnation of the group, which were all released on the various Jim and Byrd Gang mixtapes from 2006 - 2008 rather than any of Capo's proper albums or the Stack Bundles and Max B-less Byrd Gang group album from summer 2008. Honourable daps must go to G's Up, Ya Dig!, Beverly Hills Cop, Tell Me Sumthin I Dont Know, the Black Superman remake, I'm Paid, 2 Blocks, New York Minute, and We Roll.
"Screamin' and yellin', talkin' 'bout I bang too hard
you ain't got a problem bangin' on that Visa card"
Byrd Gang - Life's Like A Movie
"I hear voices, making crucial choices
tellin' me to cop the Bentley, Ferrar', or maybe Rolls Royces"
Byrd Gang - Sour Diesel
"Ohhh, there that n*gga go again with the wave
that got his grandmother turning in her grave"
Byrd Gang ft. Styles P - Hawaii 5.0
"Kitchen so hot you can see a mirage
and a n*gga move like he envisioning bars"
Byrd Gang - Cold Rockin' It
"Tell the G's if I have to say bye
bury me in a dark pair so you can't see my eyes"
Byrd Gang - Bury Me With My Gucci's
R.I.P to Stack Bundles; you totally made Lupe Fiasco listenable when he was sharking Fabolous instead of KanYe.
Since Max B is teetering on the tightrope of being the first nu-New York rapper to become a legitimate blog darling, and KanYe's aimless Rapper's Delight-length G.O.O.D Friday posse-cuts are completely lacking in all of the crucial intermutual ingredients any song with 3 or more rappers on it needs, I really can't think of a better time for a quick appreciation of Byrd Gang at their 2005 - 2008 peak than this evening.
Byrd Gang were the closest thing rap had to Mourinho's Inter Milan side where an unlikely combination of longstanding weedcarriers and mercenary rookies were consolidated into a cogent unit and each man played his position with a brawny efficiency as he modelled his role in the group on the greats of the past : Jim Jones as the amusing Eazy-E central villain letting the other members get their hands dirty, Max B as the Pimp C-ish songwriter and hook-singer, Stack Bundles providing the muscle a la Styles P, and Mel Matrix being a reliable henchman with a fine line in disrespectful bars about the fairer sex in the Sheek Louch mold who was also possibly incumbent in picking up the group's amaranthine supply of Ed Hardy shirts, shiny skull-belt wallet chains, and bedazzle-arsed distressed jeans since he wasn't busy composing or ghostwriting like Max and Stack were. Still, at least Byrd Gang had a look, and that's an important consideration here because all great rap groups from Run Dmc and N.W.A to Mobb Deep and the Hot Boy$ to Dipset themselves circa 2002/2003 had a distinct gang look which helped enhance their mystique, even if that look in this instance can only be described as the 4 lads from the Jersey Shore :
So, here's 5 of my most cherished songs by the original incarnation of the group, which were all released on the various Jim and Byrd Gang mixtapes from 2006 - 2008 rather than any of Capo's proper albums or the Stack Bundles and Max B-less Byrd Gang group album from summer 2008. Honourable daps must go to G's Up, Ya Dig!, Beverly Hills Cop, Tell Me Sumthin I Dont Know, the Black Superman remake, I'm Paid, 2 Blocks, New York Minute, and We Roll.
"Screamin' and yellin', talkin' 'bout I bang too hard
you ain't got a problem bangin' on that Visa card"
Byrd Gang - Life's Like A Movie
"I hear voices, making crucial choices
tellin' me to cop the Bentley, Ferrar', or maybe Rolls Royces"
Byrd Gang - Sour Diesel
"Ohhh, there that n*gga go again with the wave
that got his grandmother turning in her grave"
Byrd Gang ft. Styles P - Hawaii 5.0
"Kitchen so hot you can see a mirage
and a n*gga move like he envisioning bars"
Byrd Gang - Cold Rockin' It
"Tell the G's if I have to say bye
bury me in a dark pair so you can't see my eyes"
Byrd Gang - Bury Me With My Gucci's
R.I.P to Stack Bundles; you totally made Lupe Fiasco listenable when he was sharking Fabolous instead of KanYe.
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