Latest Bloggings

Here is this months round up of goodness from around the web and bloggasphere.  As is often the case with my highlights from the web, it's a mixed bag of old and new, but hopefully it's still full of the realness that us true hip hop heads are in need of (if not, please let me know in the comments section).

Before I get into some of these gems, I want to welcome Moyinka to the FoaWP team. He's an experienced blogger who shares many of his old school rarities (1986-1991) over at the To The Break of Dawn blog (which I recommend you check out). I think he's got something slightly different planned for this blog, but I don't want to spoil any surprises.

Up North Trips Presents The 10s

The fella's at Up North Trips have paid homage to one of the most significant album releases of the 90's, Pete Rock and C.L. Smooth's Mecca and the Soul Brother which celebrated it's 20th anniversary earlier this month. 
They've picked 10 tracks from the album and focused on the samples and beat construction to highlight the complexity and ingenuity of Pete Rock's production and thus the major influence his work has had on other producers ever since.  The end product is a brilliant mix of the original samples blended with the finished tracks.
You can listen to the mix on the Soundcloud player below, but I'd strongly recommend reading the full article to gain the full appreciation of this mix. 
 

Large Professor - Part 2

Following on from last months update, Extra P continues to break down his classic records in part 2 of Complex's review.  He not only talks about his productions, but also the tracks he featured on as an emcee working with people like Nas, Pete Rock, Beatnuts etc.  He also gives insights behind Nas' groundbreaking track Rewind (the one where he tells the story in reverse). 
http://www.complex.com/music/2012/06/large-professor-tells-all-the-stories-behind-his-classic-records-part-2/

Kurious & A.G.

Kurious is back with a new joint which features A.G. on the mic and Diamond D on the boards.  It's not what you might expect from Kurious or the DITC veteran, but it's still funky all the same.  Thanks to the DJ Premier Blog for sharing this.



Mike Check

Bomb The Bass - Megablast (Original Rap Version)

After many attempts at locating this particular version I finally had the good fortune of stumbling across it and I do mean stumbling. The recent bombardment of mix tapes with unknown or 'random' rap cuts have made me in to a bit of a wreck trying to track down certain records that I never knew existed, which admittedly is a lot easier nowadays what with the internet and all, but also actually owning quite a few that were featured is a surprise and also makes me glad I don't have to shell out silly money to get them. I'm referring in particular to the excellent 'Crown Jewels' series of mixes by King Aroe and the Sound Makers, volume 2 containing this excellent version of a reasonably popular record from the late eighties. It came free with a copy of the Record Mirror and on the back of the sleeve states, 'unavailable elsewhere' although I was told just yesterday by an online acquaintance that this was on the LP which made me feel slightly miffed but I only paid 99p so who could grumble at that? There's loads of these on discogs and they're all incredibly cheap, some starting at 75p and I only went for the 99p one because of the very reasonable p&p the seller was asking for. There's 3 other tracks on it too, all pretty ordinary and not worthy of a mention here but I ripped the whole thing anyway for the completists among us. All hail Michael Viner and his Incredible Bongo Band.

Download

Yo! Documented

First off I've got to say thanks to Warz over at the StyleWarriorzRevenge blog for digging this up.  For anyone who missed it, VH1 showed a documentary about Yo! MTV Raps a couple of weeks back.  Now don't let yourself be put off by the previous efforts that have feebly attempted to reflect on this iconic show, this is the real deal.  Firstly it was an hour long show (the minimum needed to do any kind of justice to a 7 year programme that hosted 100's of artists).  Ed and Dre are back reflecting on the highs and lows and some of the back stage drama that went on (like Chuck D being mad at Flava Flav for dropping crack on the stage during a live performance!).

If, like me, you had an episode of Yo! as part of your daily routine then this is essential viewing.  A copy of this documentary briefly appeared on DailyMotion for about a day, but it was quickly removed, so watch this pronto in case the same thing happens again!

The full episode is embedded after the jump

Mike Check

Update - If you haven't seen the first episode of Yo! (or maybe you've not seen it for a long time), then you can get it here in one of my previous posts.

My God!

Pace Won and Mr. Green have just leaked a new track, entitled My GOD, from their long awaited forthcoming album The Only Number That Matters is Won which follows up their 2008 LP The Only Colour That Matters is Green.  The new album has been talked about for the best part of a year and feels long overdue, but it's now got a release date of September 4th 2012.  The album features collaborations from Snoop Dogg, Masta Ace and Lee Scratch Perry.

These guys are the perfect blend.  Green's retro sounding beats perfectly compliment Pace's authentic, old school, rhyme style, yet neither sound outdated.  The end product is real, conscious hip hop that's reminiscent of how things used to be, but still contemporary enough to be fresh, new and innovative.  If you need more proof, see my previous post which contains two of their best pieces of recent work.

In the meantime check out their new track which represents what we can expect more of when the album drops.

Mike Check

Golden Era History

Large Pro breaks down his classic records

I think the title says it all.  Extra P tells Complex.com the stories behind some of his classic joints whilst this month sees him release his latest LP Professor @ Large.  Essential reading:

http://www.complex.com/music/2012/05/large-professor-tells-all-the-stories-behind-his-classic-records-part-i/#gallery

Nas - The Making of It Was Written

Complex.com has produced a number of gems this month.  As well as the Large Pro stories, they've also produced something that is long overdue, a proper look at Nas' 2nd LP It Was Written.  His debut LP Illmatic has been analysed, dissected and digested to the point where there is nothing new left to say, but his 2nd LP is largely ignored.  As Complex rightly point out, it's his best selling LP to date and there was so much riding on it.  How the hell do you follow up Illmatic?  It could have easily been a flop and signalled the end of Nas' career, but it didn't, so how was this achieved:

http://www.complex.com/music/2012/05/the-making-of-nas-it-was-written/

Free Ice-T albums

The OG rapper has offered to share two of his lesser known albums for free. 

The first is an album that was originally recorded in 2004 when he was part of the SMG collective which consisted of Smoothe Da Hustler, Trigger Tha Gambler and the Ice man himself.  However this album was never released worldwide and therefore it is relatively unheard.

The second album is more recent and is released under his Twitter moniker, Final Level. 

To obtain your free copies, go to his bandcamp page and select to 'buy' the album.  Then enter 'zero' in the price box.

Peace
Mike Check

You got a little girl?

Peep Nas' new video for his single Daughters.  It's good to see Nas back doing more conscious tracks, and I'm sure that all of you Dad's with teenage daughters will certainly see Nas' perspective on this one. 

What is Rap SM?

If you liked my recent Pharcyde post then you might also like this live concert from Oakland's Souls of Mischief. 
The gig was filmed at an event in Helsinki, Finland called Rap SM.  I don't know anything about this event, but it's billed as a 'Freestyle Battle' [if any of our Finnish readers want to expand on this, please feel free to update us in the comments section].  Having looked at the Rap SM website, it seems like an event for Finnish emcees to battle each other, and each year they get a major US underground artist to perform at the event.  The last two years have seen Elzhi and Wildchild perform, but in 2009 it was the turn of the Hieroglyphic affiliates.

All to often, the footage of your favourite rapper in concert turns out to be a grainy, muffled, dimly lit and filmed from the back of the stage on a mobile phone type of affair, which is more than a little disappointing (whoever thought we wanted to see the back of an artist?).  And I'm not talking about the crap you find on YouTube filmed by paying fans, this stuff is frequently padding out full price retail DVD's!
So footage like we have here, with clear audio and visuals (where you can actually distinguish the faces of each emcee) feels like a real treat, especially when it's for a group that these days receives a minimal amount of exposure.  Read more after the jump...

A Kiss Goodbye

With the recent closure of New York’s 98.7 Kiss FM it seems like a good point in time to reminisce about it’s heyday, and there’s probably no better way to do it than to listen to one of the stations legendary DJ’s/pioneers, Koooooool DJ Red Alert.

This recording is labelled as being from 1988, but any knowledgeable listener will know that this can’t be right. Red Alert plays tracks like: De La Soul’s Plug Tunin, several BDP tracks from the By All Means Necessary LP, Biz Markie’s Vapours etc, all of which were released in the fall of 1990. Therefore I’d say this is most likely a show from late 1990.

As you would expect from Red Alert in this era, he plays a good selection of east coast rap including JVC Force, Jungle Brothers, Chill Rob G, BDP, EPMD, Doug E. Fresh, P.E, B.D.K and more.  He's also joined by DJ Sammy B from the Jungle Brothers who shares the mixing boards.

One of the great things about this rip is that it’s of exceptional quality as there’s no hiss like many cassette rips have. It runs for about 1 hour and 30 minutes, so you get two sides of what a standard TDK D90 cassette would’ve recorded (old school heads know what I mean)!  It's also a great reminder of the era when you could happily listen to the radio for several hours without wishing there was a fast forward button to skip the numerous adverts, the bullshit rap or the DJ's verbal drivel.  This is just back to back quality hip hop.

All that’s left to say is - R.I.P. 98.7 Kiss FM.

Mike Check.


If using RSS, you might not see the embedded audio player.
Alternatively, download the mp3 file: https://hotfile.com/dl/156220807/f0357dd/Red_Alert.mp3.html

Show and A got the Flava!



Bronx heavyweights Showbiz & A.G. return with a new release and are back on top of their game. You may remember that back in November I spoke about their highly anticipated new LP Mugshot Music and shared some of the leaked tracks. Well the LP is still in production and scheduled for a late summer release, so to keep fans happy and to fill the interim gap they have released a free taster album called Pre Loaded.

Unlike most pre releases, this is a full length, top quality album. It’s not a mixtape, there are no DJ’s hollering all over the tunes, and its 15 tracks long. Okay, I acknowledge that most of the tracks are only 2-3 minutes long, but I’d rather it be that way than having some well known DJ shamelessly doing self promotion with an annoying voiceover.

And if you’re a die hard Show & A.G. fan that really can’t miss anything they release…. well, you can purchase a deluxe version from iTunes or Amazon. So what do you get for your extra bucks ($8.99)?  Just three more short tracks!
I’m not sure on the marketing strategy here; surely a free EP would have given listeners a greater incentive to part with their hard earned dough for the full length album. But I’ve only been buying records for 30 years, so what would I know!

Anyway, go and check out the latest offering from one of hip hop’s greatest duos, I’m sure you’ll be glad you did.

Free download: http://www.sendspace.com/file/emzn23

Mike Check.

Where have you been?

Regular followers are probably thinking that I forgot to compile my usual monthly round up of interesting discoveries that I've found on my many journey's through the information super highway.  Well the truth is, that recently I've just not found very much that has been worth sharing with you. 

With so many blogs and websites taking time out to regroup after the megaupload situation, new and interesting content has been temporarily scarce.  The good news is, that things seem to be picking up a little, and this month there are some real gems for you.  Let's hope this trend continues, but in the mean time here's my blogwatch for April:

Trophies

It’s not too often that I find myself being both excited and nostalgic - at the same time - about new music. But this week’s new release of O.C. and Apollo Brown’s new LP Trophies has done just that. I started hearing the hype about it a month or two back, and the early tracks they leaked to promote it had my ears open, but I still had my reservations as to whether this could really live up to all the hype.

Well I’m pleased to say that it’s better than I expected. Apollo Brown has successfully crafted 16 tracks that perfectly compliment O.C.’s style and flow. Many of the tracks sound like they could be unused beats from the vaults of early 90’s producers like Pete Rock, DJ Premier or Buckwild etc

O.C. is back at his best, allowing his cadence to effortlessly intertwine with Apollo’s beats. The end result is a stellar album from start to finish. And if you don’t believe me, you can check out the whole album here (which contains a couple of free download tracks). If you like it, please support the artist and head over to their bandcamp page and buy a copy (it's only $9.99). It’s also been pressed on wax for all those vinyl heads out there.

Check the album after the jump, along with the trailer for Ice-T's new documentary, a critical review of Rza's Bobby Digital and a Tupac resurection!!!