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Friday, May 21, 2010

New Kev Brown Production


New neck snapping track produced by Kev Brown. Great cuts, hook, lyrics, and production. Don't sleep. You can find out more about the Epsilon Project and their upcoming album by clicking here.
<a href="http://epsilonproject1.bandcamp.com/track/inspiration-prod-kev-brown">Inspiration Prod. Kev Brown by Epsilon Project</a>

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

Ear Drums Pop: May 2010


This series is a thinly veiled excuse for me to cram personal music preferences down my readership's collective throats. Each month I'll be posting 10 random songs from all over that I can't get enough of. I'd like to have these posts spark some sort of discussion, as I've been unsuccessful in getting people to post comments with almost every other HITS project I do. I'm aiming to focus on somewhat rare/forgotten/under-appreciated gems. If you'd like to see something from a specific artist in Ear Drums Pop, let me know.


"Deja Vu"- Nas

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One of the all-time great Nas cuts, this songs origins can be traced back to his pre-Illmatic demo album. The T.R.O.Y. Blog has done a bang-up job providing some background info on this cut, as well as posting a new, higher quality version, which you can download by clicking here.


"24-7-365" FWC feat. Lil' Keke

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Great slice of obscuro H-town rap with a nasty feature from Lil' Keke. According to Deadly Grounds, FWC was signed to Underground Records, a label under Rap-A-Lot, where they released their first and only album.


"Tour Stories"- Souls of Mischief

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One of my favorite cuts off of the Souls most recent effort, which was pretty damn good front to back. Props go to Domino for crafting this extra smooth beat.


"Smoke"- Mr. Tinimaine

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An early 2000 NO gem, I discovered this incredible weed anthem on my boy Kid Slizzard/Jib Kidder's Twankle & Glisten Blog. I don't know much about Mr. Tinimaine beyond this song, but would love for readers to help school me in Tinimaine history and current projects.


"Things I Dream"- CunninLynguists

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Although I had a hard time digesting Dirty Acres when it first came out, re-discovering cuts like "Things I Dream" have me questioning my initial impressions. In my mind, Kno is one of the great producers of the past decade, and this track is a perfect example of why.


"Hay"- Crucial Conflict

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I owe Pandora a shout for re-introducing me to this forgotten Chi-town smoke out anthem. In addition to some nice production, "Hay" contains the memorably offensive line, "That hay got me so goddamn horny, but i don't like that tramp. The only reason I'm poppin' that coochie cause the hoe had a book of food stamps."


"Po' Pimp"- Doe or Die feat Twista

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Twista dominates this beat, delivering what some consider his best verse ever. Between the smooth hook and Twista's devastating clean-up verse, this song equaled an instant hit for Do or Die when it dropped 12 years ago.


"Impossible"- Diz Gibran

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Queens producer Moonshine created a masterpiece when he utilized one of the most unlikely rap samples in recent memory for LA based MC Diz Gibran. If you're feeling this cut, make sure to download this duo's full-length in high quality MP3 format compliments of them.


"In The World"- Akinyele

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An overlooked gem from Ak's Put It In Your Mouth EP, this song owes much to its DJ Enuff production, which often gets the silver medal when put up against the Large Professor version. Personally, I like Enuff's version better.


"As The World Turns"- C-BO feat. Sherelle Fortier and Spice-1

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Vintage soulful west coast shit from an often overlooked legend. The style might take a minute to get used to, but give this a chance before writing it off.

Sunday, May 16, 2010

Big K.R.I.T.


When HipHopDX claimed, "Big K.R.I.T.’s new project K.R.I.T. Wuz Here doesn’t belong in Mixtape WrapUp. This is a full-length album that will likely go down as one of the best of 2010", I thought they were jumping the gun a bit. They weren't. Check the video for "Hometown Hero" if you don't believe me.

BIG K.R.I.T. HOMETOWN HERO from Creative Control on Vimeo.

What blows me away about this cut is how effortlessly and effectively K.R.I.T. pulls off a soul sample hook and adds chopped and screwed vocals over it. As far as I know, this is the first time anyone has ever combined those two elements so successfully on a hook.

When I first heard "Hometown Hero", I thought K.R.I.T. might be a one trick pony. Not the case...at all. His K.R.I.T. Wuz Here mix tape/album is entirely self produced, and many of the tracks are standouts. If you are a fan of soulful and sample heavy beats, K.R.I.T. will not disappoint. Even the most callous, southern-hating rap snobs I know are feeling him.

While the blog scene will undoubtedly increase K.R.I.T.'s visibility, I think word of mouth is going to make this guy huge. His music seems to burn itself into people's memory. As someone who constantly shares music with my friends and family, my experience has been that when I play K.R.I.T.'s music for someone, instead of dismissively saying "Cool" or "Nice, I like it", as they would with many other artists, they want me to burn them a copy of his CD. This is telling in an era where we are so constantly bombarded with new, quality music. It's harder than ever to grab people's attention on first listen, and K.R.I.T. seems to have that sort of effect on people.


Downloa K.R.I.T. Wuz Here by clicking here.

K.R.I.T. also has a MySpace you can check, as well as a beats only MySpace page. I was floored by his "She Comin' Down" beat. That beat needs to get made into a proper song because it'd be an instant modern classic.

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Marco Polo & Ruste Juxx's "Nobody" Video


Directed by Todd Angkasuwan

All I can say is wow. This video got me so amped when I first watched it, I thought I was going to throw my computer screen through my window and punch myself in the face. I guess there's something wrong with me though, because none of my friends seem to be feeling it like me. Story of my life.

In all honesty, this is the first time I've listened to a track from The eXXecution, Marco and Ruste's recent collaborative long player. Once payday cometh on Wednesday, i will be copping the album based on the strength of this song and video. Marco Polo is a monster beat maker and Ruste spits venom on this bad boy.

Any further thoughts or feedback on The eXXecution my interneters?

Sunday, May 2, 2010

Statik Selektah Guru Tribute


This is serious right here. Statik provides us with two mind-blowing hours of ill ass Guru rhymes and some great stories. Listen towards the end as Statik tells listeners why "Skillz" is such a sentimental record for him. Great stuff. Click the link to download.