Several tracks have emerged recently from golden era heavyweights, that I think are worth giving some shine to.
Infamous Sessions
First up is a track from the bonus CD that accompanied the recently released Mobb Deep album. For those who no longer pay attention to Mobb Deep (you're not on your own!), the bonus CD contains original/alternate versions from their 2nd LP The Infamous. I'm surprised that this particular version ended up on the cutting room floor, and that Ghostface was trimmed from the final release. This should have been a 12" remix.
The Blastmaster Returns
Whoa, KRS is back spitting like it's 1994 and Premo is on the production! Ok, so there's no Premo, but this is Kris back in full effect and doing what he does best, braggadocios, arrogant rhyming, with some knowledge dropped in for good measure.
"I'd rather make one righteous dollar on my level, than make a million dollars spitting rhymes for the devil".
Cookin Soul
The original version of this tune was a bit bland and certainly an album track. But this remix does it plenty of justice, and breathes new life into a 2Pac track that pays homage to the artists that influenced him, and reflects his early days growing up on the east coast.
Boof baf, here is, the latest round up of freshness from around the interwebz. There's always a lack of new releases early in the year, and 2014 has been no exception, but history shows that by March/April things start to hot up and there's usually something that looks promising. See what you think.
Dropping Diamonds
As Diamond D gets ready to drop his new LP The Diam Piece he hits us off with the first video, a collaboration with Pharoahe Monch entitled Rap Life. Both of them are on top form with Monch sounding effortless over Diamond's production. The video was directed by Deacon The Villian from Cunninglynguists.
B-Boy Stance
O.C. has just dropped this track on a limited edition 7". It's as fresh as a newly laid egg, with O.C. reminiscing about the golden era of hip hop, but rather frustratingly there is little more information about it. Even the website where you can purchase the vinyl doesn't bother to list what else you might, so we'll have to assume its a double A side of the same track and there's nothing more to come!
Ain't Saying Something
It's an observation that many artists have already made, but J-Live's stab at wack emcees with nothing to say takes a slightly different angle as he guns for the ones with dope sounding tracks, but when you scratch beneath the surface...
Probably The Greatest (Hip Hop) Concept Album
Prince Paul's classic LP A Prince Amongst Thieves is now 15 years old, but it still sounds as good today as it did back in 1999. And looking back, it's surprising that it wasn't more of a launch pad for Breeze Brewin to go on do much bigger things.
Well, Breeze recently took time out to inform Red Bull Music Academy of some of the history behind the album, including Prince Paul's original intention of having Chino XL in the other lead role!
Surely this needs little, if any, introduction. The image above should tell you everything you need to know, but if you don't know the history of the Incredible Bongo Band or their hit record Apache then I'd certainly recommend watching Sample This which documents the history, impact, legacy and continuous influence that the track has had over the past 40 years.
In the meantime, why not reflect on some of the different ways the Bongo Rock album has been sampled in this mix by Chris Read. Full track listing after the jump:
This is something a little bit different, but definitely worth a listen and download. Imagine finding an an album of the dopest instrumentals from unreleased tracks that were made in the 90's, and you won't be far off imagining what this sounds like. I've embedded the bandcamp player for ease of checking it out, but I'd recommend downloading it for a proper listen as it works much better as a mix.
In the words of the producer Jaz Infinite:
93 Culture is my ode to the golden era of boom bap hip-hop. To keep it authenticate as possible I created this album using only the techniques and tools typically used in the early 90s. DJ Chorizo Funk mixed the instrumentals in that classic mixtape format and Dinco D of the Leaders of The New School came through on the hosting tip to keep the vibe going.
Equipment used:
ASR-10
MPC 60II
Akai S-950
Mixed in ProTools, bounced to casette, then digitized again
***The bandcamp player adds gaps between songs when playing. To hear the mix without the gaps, download the album and play it in your usual music player (iTunes etc.)***
I'm pleased to see the stress and chaos of Christmas well behind me, now its time to focus on music and blogging.....
Here's some interesting stuff the internet has thrown up over the last few weeks:
Boombox History
In this era, where virtually everything from the early days of hip hop has become either a collectable, iconic, valuable, or captured in some kind of documentary, it never occurred to me that nobody has every really given any shine to the good old boombox. You know, before the man bag, the record bag or the back pack, the must have accessory was a boom box (or 'ghetto blaster' in some local dialects). So it's great to see that Egotripland picked up this article which looks back at the power sucking radios that so many of us first heard the latest Electro album on way back in the 80's.
The original soloist on the mic breaks down a little history in this short biopic. There's some nice old school footage to accompany the Chief Rocker's narrative of his early years, and he touches on his clashes with Kool Moe Dee and Lovebug Starski.
R U Gonna Eat That?
I'm really feeling this Dopplegangaz joint of the recently released Marco Polo LP - PA2: The Director's Cut, and now it's got a video! Marco's smooth thumping beat really fits the Dopplegangaz flow and makes the perfect recipe. Yep, you should certainly digest this.
Madiba
Whenever I see something new by Rakim I approach with extreme caution, as so often I'm left feeling underwhelmed. I still burn a torch for him in the hope that one day he returns with the right producer and blows me away again. Unfortunately, this track wasn't the one, but it's a timely tribute to Nelson Mandela and for that reason alone it should get some shine.
November has been a busy month for me, so I've not been keeping up with all the goodness that the internet has to offer, but that doesn't mean that there hasn't been a few things that caught my attention. So here's a few things that you may want to check out if you haven't spotted them already.
Put Your Hands Where My Eyes Could See!
In 1997 Busta Rhymes' solo hit confirmed that he'd evolved, he could cut it on his own and that his Leaders of the New School era was firmly behind him. The latest edition in the Magnum Opus series goes back in time and uncovers the history of this iconic track in this short documentary.
Can't Lose
Elzhi is back with this smoothed out new track. He was also seeking some funding for his LP, but appears to have already exceeded his target, so hopefully a new solo LP will be on the way sometime soon.
Guru Tribute Gets A Video
It's been a while since Marco Polo and Talib Kweli collaborated on this joint, and now it's got a video. As tribute tracks go, this isn't bad. RIP Guru.
One of my friends has been trying to get his hands on the full video footage of this concert for some years now, but without success. It's definitely out there, but only clips of it ever seem to emerge.
But today Janka-Man over at the 1994HipHop blog has shared this 320kbps tape rip of the whole concert. You probably won't see this again, so if you're interested then head over and grab it before the links die.
There used to be a website that was dedicated to Hijack and held many video clips including some of this concert. They were low quality uploads (probably uploaded via a dial-up connection), but a quick google search hasn't helped me to find it. Mind you, its 2013 and using the search terms 'Hijack' and 'Terrorist Group' provides countless pages of other material, no doubt knocking what I'm looking for back onto page 243 of the search listing. If anyone knows the site I'm thinking of, please drop the address into the comments section, cheers.
I heard this years ago but can't remember where and I had forgotten about it until I heard it again a couple of years ago, tracked one down for a very reasonable price and bought it. I really got in to UK hip hop fairly late due to the fact that I was a little prejudiced towards the British accent. Yes, I am British, English if you want, from the third best place in the world if you believe what you read in the paper but the accent still troubled me until Gunshot, Hijack, etc blasted on to the scene at 100mph and it was probably then that the interest / obsession really began. I had a few early electro 12"s like Hardrock Soul Movement, Mutant Rockers and so on but they were different. No lyrics. Still, let's not dwell on that now as this tune is a belter. You may have noticed that it's the B-side yest again that wins, hands down in my opinion. Good sample, boingy 808 bass, what more do you need? An interesting fact too is that it's on a US label which is unexplainable at this moment. The other side is decent also, JB sample, tough beats and worth anyone's money if you ask me but it's this one that I played the most. Disorda had one in a few weeks back which was the reminder I needed to go dig it out and do a fresh 320kbps rip for y'all. I didn't pay any where near that for mine, just in case you were wondering.
Being a bit of a nerd for hip hop trivia, I was pleased to see the soundtrack for the early 80's movie Breakin' 'n' Enterin' posted up on the 1994hiphop.net blog. I blogged about this movie last year so if you aren't aware of it, check out this post for more info.
Although the availability of the soundtrack was of interest to me, it was the narrative that accompanied it that intrigued me the most:
In 1983 director Topper Carrew produced a documentary about the Radio Club called “Breakin’ ‘n’ Enterin’”. For this early piece of West Coast History Ice T, Egyptian Lover and The Glove recorded five songs which were released on the legendary ‘Radio Crew’ EP. The artist Dupont who also first appeared on the soundtrack did three songs for this documentary; filled with vocoder voices and electro beats, which were well ahead of their time, but his tracks never made it on to the original vinyl pressing. The EP is one of the rarest pieces of vinyl in Hip Hop history, only pressed 25 times for the cast of the documentary.
This 2008 release contains the original 5 tracks that appeared on the EP in addition to the Dupont tracks.
If you've watched the movie then you'll know that Dupont's music is heavily featured, in fact it kind of becomes the films theme tune! So it's seems harsh that it was left off the original EP. But regardless, it's nice to have access to a 320kbps rip all these years later, especially as I'm never like to find (or afford) one of the original EP's. Here's the track listing and download link, and many thanks to Juicy for sharing the link and his knowledge.
01 Ice-T – Intro
02 Radio Crew, The – The Glove – 6 PM Mix
03 Radio Crew, The – Spray It – Super AJ
04 Radio Crew, The – Breaking & Entering
05 Radio Crew, The – The Glove Meets The Egyptian Lover
06 Radio Crew, The – The Egyptian Lover’s Theme
07 Ice-T – Breaking & Entering (Rap)
08 Dupont – Burn
09 Dupont – Break Dancer
10 Dupont – Let’s Rock
Del Tha Funkee Homosapien is back as Deltron with a new single from the forthcoming Deltron album Event II due out soon. The old school beat meets futuristic melodies and combine to make an infectious track. It's good to see the return of Del.
In my previous post, I skimmed through Nine's career history and shared with you some of his rarer material. So you should be reasonably up to date, well, up until as far as 2009.
I recently stumbled across Nine again on Soundcloud, and it was refreshing to see that he's still making relevant music. But most notably, I spotted that his web page is titled called Quinine 2! Some of the tracks are numbered as though they are tracks from an album. So whether these are tracks from a shelved Quinine 2, or tunes that haven't made the final cut, who knows?
Either way, it's good to see another artist from the 90's continuously active in the game. And if this is the material that he's sharing for free on Soundcloud, then there is surely some even better stuff in the vaults, possibly ready for release in the not too distant future...
I've embedded a couple of the tracks below, but check out Nine's Soundcloud page for plenty more: https://soundcloud.com/quinine-2.
What ya want Nine? Phat beats for my rhymes! I remember when those lines first blasted from an episode of Yo! MTV Raps. With the somewhat infectious baseline, Nine's gruff voice and a style that epitomised 90's NY hip hop, this was surely a new talent destined to go far.
Well to my surprise Nine's career was fairly modest. Two critically acclaimed albums and signing to a major label should be considered successful, but to me, Nine never really had the recognition he deserved. And then he disappeared from the scene after his 2nd album was released in 1996.
Well, that's not entirely true. He did do a couple of guest spots for some unheard groups, and in more recent times he had a little MySpace thing going on, but even that went quiet a few years back.
But Nine has always been active and you may be surprised to know that he's released several albums since his MTV days in the 90's. In 2007 he released Return of the Hardcore and followed it up in 2009 with Quinine. Return of the Hardcore was nowhere near to the same standard as his early work and feels more like a mixtape or cuts that didn't make an album, but Quinine is a good album, more cohesive and a return to his previous form, so it's well worth a listen. If you were a fan of Nine back in the day, then I'm sure you'll enjoy both albums, but Quinine is by far the better choice.
And whilst sharing some of Nine's hard-to-find back catalogue, you might also be interested in the Bootleg & Unreleased album. This is a compilation of tracks that aren't on the first two albums, including the mighty Famaldahyde 12", his smash single with Funkmaster Flex (under the 'Nine Double M' moniker) and various remixes etc, this is golden era Nine at his finest.
But the real rarity here has to be his 1991 debut on Warlock records. It's a 3 track single, all of which were produced with Funkmaster Flex. It's fair to say that Nine sounds much different (he was much younger and still mastering his craft) on this 12" and he certainly hadn't fully evolved the distinct gruff and grimy voice that later became his trademark. I've got to give thanks to Juicy over at the 1994 HipHop Blogspot for recently uploading this.
So why is the title of this post Quinine 2? Good question, and I may not have a definitive answer, but hopefully all will become much clearer in part 2 when I bring things up to the current day.
It's been an interesting month on the internet. Aside the drama around Tim Dog's supposedly fake death, and the passing of one half of Kris Kross, there's also been some retro goodness. Here we go....
The Microphone Master
The Red Bull Music Academy has been consistently representing good hip hop for a few years now, but now they bring us nearly 2 hours of discussion with hip hop's greatest emcee. I don't think I need say any more, let Ra do the talking.
NYC Live Throw Down: 1979-1985
Just take another look at that image! 26 hours!!! Props to Janka-man for sharing this. It turned up on one of the best websites there is for finding obscure and out of print records. I'd never seen it before, so I'm assuming many of you won't have either. Here's the description:
Over 1 full day (33 live performances) of vintage and official live throwdowns, spanning from 1979 to 1985. New York City's original school together in one complete set. This collector's set includes one data DVD containing 3.5 GB of high quality (320 Bit Rate) mp3's. Each show is ID'd and sequenced, resulting in convenient use and enjoyment, as opposed to each show being one thirty to ninety minute-long continuous track.
No collection is complete without the infamous Kool Moe Dee / Busy Bee scuffle, or the notorious routines of the Force MCs, Treacherous Three, and Cold Crush 4 MCs. The list of essentials on this disc is endless. Includes a 24 page full color booklet of vintage NYC show flyers and artwork.
If you're an old schooler with a passion for this type of stuff, then download, buy some food supplies and lock yourself in a room for a couple of days whilst you reminisce. All the links and a detailed track listing can be found here:
Last month was the 3rd anniversary of Guru's death. Somehow this tribute track from Marco Polo, Talib Kweli and DJ Premier completely passed me by, which is a shame, because it's pretty nice. See what you think.
Would You Like a Demo of ESP?
Nope, I'm not offering to read your mind, or bend a spoon. I'm talking about the demo tape of Tha Alkaholiks when they went under their previous name, the Educated Street Poets or ESP. I've previously covered this demo (and 29 others) here, but the tracks were embedded and were not available for download, whereas this downloadable version contains all 6 tracks. Props to Warlord for sharing this rarity.
Producer Dominic Owen has released the 3rd instalment of his unreleased Rakim tracks. This time round we're blessed with Get Visual (which eventually made it onto Rakim's debut LP The 18th Letter under the title When I'm Flowing).
For me, this is an interesting piece of history that adds another layer to this track. As you can see from the Soundcloud title, Dominic produced this track in 1995, but the LP wasn't released until 1997! This version is far superior to the album cut, but then I've always hated the LP version. Why? Because there is another (bootleg) version that ranks as one of my all time favourite Rakim tracks. Both versions are presented here, you decide which is better, but don't waste your time with the LP version.
1996 was probably the last time I put those two words in the same sentence. Maybe that's a little harsh, individual members of the Wu have certainly shone at various times, but in my mind the Wu Tang have been fairly underwhelming since around 1996/97. That is, until now.
You've either been in a coma, working on the international space station, or stranded in a desert somewhere if you've missed all the hype around the latest Ghostface Killah project Twelve Reasons to Die. But just because there's been a lot of hype, it doesn't mean that you've paid it any attention. I haven't, because experience has taught me not to get excited about the Wu, and I'm sure I'm not on my own.
Last year I really enjoyed the Trophies album by Apollo Brown and O.C., in fact it ranked in my top three. So when I saw that Apollo Brown had remixed the new Ghostface album I felt compelled to pay some attention to it, and I'm glad I did.
I should probably mention now that the Apollo Brown remix is currently only available on a limited edition free cassette that accompanies the CD album. Most (if not all of these) have been sold, but I can help you out there so keep reading.
Before I get into the music, let's just read the concept for the album, how it was conceived and understand that this album was recorded live.
From the official website: As those involved tell it, the story came first, the music second and the lyrics last. Twelve Reasons to Die is the creation myth of a black superhero set in 1960s Italy, which looks a lot like 1990s Scorsese. The curtain opens on a young man born into a life of crime. But anyone familiar with Robert De Niro’s characters in Goodfellas and Casino knows what’s coming next when Ghostface’s character rhymes, “I was a boss among white boys, rocking a ‘fro.” He hits the ceiling, leaves to start a black syndicate, falls in love with a boss’s daughter and makes a ton of money importing cocaine. For these crimes, the criminal organization he came up in murders him and dumps his body in a vat of acetate. His former friends press 12 records from his remains, but when those records play, his vengeful spirit arises. Though he was rebuffed and disrespected in life, in legend the Ghostface Killah becomes immortal.
And just like it's cinematic concept, the album plays out like a film. The production quality is akin to the same creativity that Rza showed in the early days of the Wu, often using simple, effective, stripped back melodies and beats that give everything space to breathe.
It's not my intention to write a review of this album, so that's enough of my analysis. Why not check it out for yourself without having to part with your hard earned cash. Even better, why not check out the Apollo Brown remix for free too? And just for good measure, I'll even embed the video too. If you're feeling this album, or just a fan of Ghostface, then you've got a full hit to you main artery here.
Mike Check.
Stream the original full length album...
Stream the Apollo Brown remix album - The Brown Tape...
I was watching football focus the other week and Ledley King was on with some local kids at some kind of get-the-kids-off-the-streets-through-sport type project and they described him as 'Spurs legend, Ledley King'. He was an excellent player but legend he ain't. I think Masterscratch, however, deserves legendary status. His tapes were the best around and he was pretty darned good. If you had one it was your prized possession and other people who heard it instantly asked for it too.
He played the break from this record, if you can call it a break, on quite a lot of his tapes and I wanted it so badly but never knew what it was called. I was browsing in a used record shop we used to visit once a fortnight on a trip with a few mates. One of them saw it and told me it was 'that record Masterscratch used on all his tapes' and proceeded to describe it to me human beatbox style. I didn't believe him at first; how the hell did he know what it was?. It was 50p so I got it anyway, played it and was most pleased with my purchase.
I searched around for some info on Warren Mills but no-one appears to know where he is or what he's doing now. The record on the whole is pretty lame and I'm sure Jive thought little Warren would be the next Michael Jackson but there's only ever one of anyone and there's certainly only one Masterscratch. Legend.
There may only be 28 days in Feb (excluding leap years of course!), but the internet has been a busy place. Here the latest crop of stuff that grabbed my attention over the last 4 weeks. Follow the jump link after the first item for much more.
The People's Champ
R.A. The Rugged Man has begun promoting his new album (due April 30th) with this blistering track which sets expectations pretty high. Despite his own Demigodz album about to drop, Apathy still finds time to get on the production boards and conjure up this perfect backdrop for R.A.'s tongue tying, verb flipping style.
Its been 9 years since R.A.'s last official release, so he's had plenty of time to work on this long overdue (and long promised) follow up. Let's hope this is a sign of things to come.
I tend to find that January and February are pretty quite months for new releases, or more specifically, the good quality releases that we're waiting for don't generally drop during the post Xmas lull. But although no killer albums have dropped yet, there are a number of tracks that are bubbling right now that hint towards 2013 having some interesting releases.
There's even enough of them to make it worth me cobbling together this post together and sharing them with you (and that doesn't happen to often!).
Boston's Finest
First up is some new Edo G. Boston's long time favourite emcee is back with more of the grown man rap that we've come to expect from him. This is a release from his forthcoming album Intelligence & Ignorance that drops on 5th February. I've got to say, that Edo G is certainly one of the more consistent emcees from the golden era, and this track demonstrates it.
That's not it, there's plenty more after the jump!
Following on from my previous post, producer Dominic Owen is blessing us with yet another unreleased track from his personal collection. In my last post I speculatively questioned how many other Rakim tracks had better versions that remained unreleased, and this is just further evidence that the answer to that question could be many.
What I find quite frustrating is that 1995 is the era when Rakim was coming under a lot of fire for his poor selection of producers and tracks, and rightly so. Many of his official releases were lyrically outstanding and musically underwhelming. And now we see another example of a shelved track that is far superior to much of what was being released at that time.
This version has that classic mid 90's sound to it and would have been a real head nodder had it been released. Forget that, it still is a head nodder, take a listen.
Yep, updating this blog is a good couple of
weeks overdue, but I’m hopefully now back in
action and normal service will resume.
My online
persona had to take a back seat for a few weeks
whilst the living and breathing me
got on top of some real life business!
You’ve got to keep life in check, or else it
sneaks up on you with surprises. So, having conquered several family illnesses, completed a DIY
project, started a new job and survived the festive period,
I find myself in 2013.
I
should probably start by wishing everyone a belated happy New Year, but I guess
that by now you’ve quit the diet, started smoking again, cancelled the gym
membership etc and things possibly aren’t looking so happy!
Well the best fix for getting through the dismal month of
January is…… to immerse yourself in hip hop.
It’s been a short while since I shared some vinyl, so I thought
I’d kick the New Year off by sharing something that on face value might
not seem that appealing, but read on and I think you might be surprised by an early example of record industry interference with the artists lyrical content.
Last year I discussed the classic singleGirl's ain't nothing but trouble by DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince as part of my Silver Anniversary Series. However, I was discussing the original 1986 version, not the one that is more commonly found on various compilation CD's and their 1988 debut album. The original version is much harder and contains stronger lyrics (well, stronger than what we have come to expect from Will Smith).
The frustrating thing for me at the time of writing was that I couldn't track down a copy of the original 12" to include with my post, like I'd done for most of my other reviews in the series. Then recently, one of our readers kindly shared some insightful knowledge in the comments section saying that they thought the UK release on Champion Records was the same version as the one released on Word-Up Records, and the licencing note confirms this. Hmm, interesting!
What makes this information even more interesting to me is that sitting in my own collection is a promo copy of the UK version, released on Champion Records. I'd never considered it as being a potential copy of the original, and it's not a record that I frequently dig out and listen to (I can't imagine why), so I was unfamiliar with this version. But upon checking it, sure enough it's the original version!!!
So it seemed only right to upload it for the nerds out there who appreciate the intricate differences between records and those who are curious about how hardcore Will Smith once was. Warning - he doesn't drop any truly hardcore lines and it certainly isn't ignorant rap, but here's just one example of how the language and tone of the record changed:
1988 revised version: "she started grabbin' all over me, kissing and hugging. So I shoved her away and said you better stop buggin." 1986 original version: "she started grabbin' all over me, kissing and hugging. I punched her in the chin and said, 'you better stop buggin'." For a more detailed breakdown of the differences between the two versions, refer to the previously recommended article by Werner Von Wallenrod here: http://wernervonwallenrod.blogspot.co.uk/2011/01/dj-jazzy-jeff-fresh-prince-uncensored.html.
Thanks to the reader who took the time to leave the comment and for pointing me to my own record collection, lol. It's crazy to think I spent time looking for something on the internet that I had sitting under my very nose (quite literally, this record was within 4 feet of my computer)!
November's been a pretty dope month for classic material and historical hip hop trivia, as this months round up hopefully demonstrates. Amongst the collection is an unreleased mix of a Rakim classic, some Pharcyde craziness, and a monster collection of rare old school radio rips. Check it out after the jump.
