Blog (2008-2018)

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Jahdan Blakkamoore: We Are Raiders 12

The Dutty Artz family is VERY pleased to announce that we’ve just finished the first artist release for DA, Jahdan Blakkamoore’s EP entitled “We Are Raiders”. Jahdan is a Brooklyn local hero and has been doing his thing for years. From providing the ragga verse on Smif & Wessun’s hip-hop classic Sound Bwoy Buriel to singing the chorus on my tune Brooklyn Anthem (known in the hood as the Craziest Riddim) Jahdan has done a lot. Now, the next phase. Me, Rupture, Geko and Jah D have been labbed up for the past 6 months in the depths of Brooklyn recording his album for Dutty Artz under the working title Buzzrock Warrior. The album is crazy, it’s JD continuing the grimey direction he and I started in with Brooklyn Anthem and branching out in others as well. Dubstep is present, Cumbia is in the building, mad digital Dancehall is there and a lot of stuff that I don’t even know what to call it. Reggae? Sort of. Hip-hop? mmm, yeah. R+B? Kinda.
We’re calling it New York Tropical, before someone comes up with an even stupider name. When we put some audio online you’ll be the first to know and you can stick your own labels to it. In the mean-time, here’s the 12″ art. The four track 12″ will be out first followed shortly by the CD which adds the instrumentals.

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Do you ever see that stuff that be
when it get cold that is that shit you can’t see?
See that shit happens sometimes.
Yep, black ice…

some classic videos, choice quotes (italicize, without speech marks), + tunes from one of the greatest Southern rap groups (sheet, they were the first to use the words Dirty South to describe the music they create– in mid-90s ATL, Georgia.) There’s a rumor these guys were getting back together. Well, a little far-fetched, but imagine how many late-nineties rap-nerds/fan-boys/girls this reunion will make happy.

From 1995, Soul Food.

“Cell Therapy”

My mind won’t allow me to not be curious
My folk don’t understand so they don’t take it serious
But every now and then, I wonder if the gate was put up to keep crime out or to keep our asses in.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AuWB9Nhoypw[/youtube]

—

From 1998, Still Standing.

“Black Ice” feat. OutKast

Who’s that looking over the shoulders of those writing dreams?
fiendin’ for the taste of menthol, missed class, stayed in the hall
Looking for a squeeze play, better yet a holiday…

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HZ4x_eMxYxo[/youtube]

—

also,

From 1998, Still Standing.

“The Don’t Dance No Mo’”

I couldn’t find the video for the last one, but if you ever see it look for Sugar Lo, commonly known as Cee-Lo. He’s wonderful.

—

I first came across Goodie Mob in 1997/98 while I was in Guinea watching music videos from France via satellite TV, around the same time Sekouba Bambino released Kassa. I was 15 & in musical heaven.

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Mama’s Gun is one of the sexiest albums I have in my CD collection. I know, it’s a little strange. The album deals with horrific, unsexy nightmares and things like police brutality (Amadou Diallo), mental imprisonment (plus, the high rate of incarceration for black males). A large chunk of the album tackles self-esteem issues and breakups. Anyway, Miss Badu’s music is not always joyless and serious/militant/political. In fact, she’s more playful and introspective than most hiphop singers.

<pic taken by dogsivu>

[display_podcast]

This one is haunting and amazing. Produced by Madlib, it is from her new album New Amerykah Part One (4th World War) – Only Badu can present something like national delusion in such a phunky manner (“Amerykahn Promise”).

dead prez said it’s bigger than hiphop. Killah Priest said all religion ever did was divide… Erykah sez hiphop ain’t dead yet, regardless of what Nas said. hiphop is alive, uniting cultures, races, all around the world. While I don’t think hiphop could ever be bigger than religion, she might be onto something with the government part, and her gospel in general that together the ants can conquer the elephant.

& coming soon, New Amerykah Part Two (Return of the Ankh)

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I’m happy to say that it seems Grime fans are finally starting to dance again, and not just some random jumping around and gun-fingering but some real deal dancehall-style organized named dances with steps. They’ve still got a ways to go but I’m calling it a powerful positive step in the right direction. Unsurprisingly champion skanker Skepta is at the lead of the charge with his tune “Do The Rolex Sweep”. It seems this whole Grimey Electro thing is kinda popping off, I think it’s great. I’m glad the grime kids are not standing still and letting Funky eat their lunch after building up the thing for years now. The tune is clearly a response to Wiley’s “Wearing My Rolex” (featured below) so unsurprisingly Wiley is at the head of a major development in Grime, again. Big up the whole Boy Better Know camp for keeping the game flipping and coming through with another periodic fun injection to the scene. Check out more vids here.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xV6OZdxGGw[/youtube]

Also, very unrelatedly Lamin sent me a wicked XLR8R interview with Bun B after I mentioned him earlier, thanks! There’s also these excerpts where he talks about some more general stuff, which are also great.

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Rupture put up his verdict and covered a lot of ground, so I’ll just say a big THANKS to everyone who came out. I loved the party, I haven’t had that much fun on decks in a while. We had a great time and if the heaving dancefloor was any indication I hope you all did as well.

 

Here’s a few pics from the night, more soon(ish) (Thanks Karla!).

 

MARIANA FROM ARGENTINA PERFORMING:

 

Mariana from Argentina performing at Dutty Artz Tropical Dance GEKO JONES ON DECK:

Geko Jones

 

MATT SHADETEK (ME) ON DECK:

 

MATT SHADETEK ON DECK AT GLASSLANDS, 3/21

 

DJ /RUPTURE IN DEEP CONCENTRATION:

DJ RUPTURE AT GLASSLANDS RAVERS:

glasslands 3/21

MORE PHOTOS, THANKS TOM:

 

 

 

 

 

 

NO WAIT!!! LISTEN TO MY HARMONICA!!!!!!! I AM NOT JUST SOME RANDOM HARMONICA GUY! GIVE ME A MIC! PLUG IN TEH HEADPHONES! SERIOUSLY!

 

 

AZIKIWE LAUGHS CRAZILY:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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A few days ago I came across the Grime encyclopedia, an excellent resource for anyone interested in the music. You are free to look around and find what you like, but they offer links to the most popular pages, to the leaders in the field. Topnotch Grime DJ Logan Sama, who has a legal grime radio show on Kiss 100, offers free rips of tracks from his show. Hmm.. there’s also a wider array of free downloads here.

Doc1

Doctor – Rise The Temprature (Produced by Cotti) (Logan Sama Grimepedia rip)

I’ve had this tiny tune here on repeat for days.

Martin Clark wrote about Doctor and his yard roots in his montly Grime/Dubstep column for Pitchfork in 2005;

“Take Doctor. for example. Save Skepta, he’s probably the hottest MC on road right now. Accepted by the East MC camp, he’s a talented South London lyricist with a distinctive enough voice to put him in Trim or Kano’s league. The difference between Doctor and those others, however, is that he makes a feature of his yard roots[Flowing like you’re from “yard” usually means you’re black with Jamaican heritage]. He regularly switches from London chat to Jamaican slang and back, most prominently “Gotta Man?”.”

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I love Bun B. His last album “Trill” was sick, and I’m sure “II Trill” the new joint will be great. Here he is courtesy of the Fader talking about sociological dimensions of the hood, Barack, and 4 minutes worth of other stuff. This dude basically holds Houston down singlehandedly (if you never read his excellent polemic against the critics of southern rap, it’s sick) and is in my opinion almost everything you want from an MC, smart, articulate, ill with the flow and advises people to “defend your blocks/ and turn your projects into fort knox”.

edit: embed code is breaking my formatting, sorry, follow the link.

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Tropical-Puzzle

Big shoutout to everybody who came thru and got down last nite! even the dude who kept shouting at me “WE’VE GOT SO MUCH IN COMMON, I UNDERSTAND YOU MUSICALLY SO LET ME PLAY MY HARMONICA RIGHT NOW.” The fact that he was so ridiculous really underscored what great vibes the rest of the crowd was bringing. Color everywhere.

And yes, independent pollsters & U.N. bystanders confirmed that we achieved a female-majority gender ratio.

Special shout out to guest vocalist Mariana from Buenos Aires — “beauty so sudden for this time of year” — she’s in town recording for a few weeks and graced us w/ a little live PA action, muchisimas gracias!

The place was rammed, but i spotted: Carolina, Jah Dan, Leif, Broklyn, Kingdom, Mr Lee G (who said my Architecture in Helsinki rmx w/ him is blowing up… in Trinidad!), Abena, the lovely Team Moji, Nokea, and lotzzz more, too many to hyperlink & mention.

fotos & vid & DA TV en español coming soon.

Geko & I were running around the Heights getting chop+play gems for the next Dance this afternoon, no time waste, too many waists to dutty wine

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THIS IS YOUR FRIDAY NIGHT REMINDER:

dutty artz flyah

Dutty Arts Fam, listen up:

DJ Rupture, Matt Shadetek, and Geko Jones Dutty Arts Dance is TONITE in N.Y.C.

DUTTY ARTZ TROPICAL DANCE
Fri. March 21. 10pm-late
Glasslands, Williamsburg NYC

$2 b4 11, $6 after.
289 Kent ave. Cheap drinks all nite

*dancehall*cumbia*hood-electro

*grime*dubstep*tropical

————

$2 before 11pm, only six bucks after… cheap drinks & all the dutty wine and tropical shakers you could ask for!

We’re doing two sets each, early playing slow and low sweet warm up music and late molten lava bangerism, so come early if you want to catch both.

We have deep record crates and a lot of new heat to share. hosted by Ladidadi, crazed color-art by Artz Atak, plus low-end reggae soundsystem reinforcements for that extra bump.

keywords: FUN MISTAKES

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And the pendulum swings again. The kids are dancing to a new (old) beat. Since the police in London have decided to criminalise Grime and ban it’s fans and artists from holding any sort of public performances in their home city, the kids have started to fulfill their itch to drink, dance, bubble at clubs playing what is called “Funky”. Originally short for Funky House the rise in popularity in the scene has triggered a wave of new producers, many of them former grime heads to start making this new stuff. Some say that the rise in popularity of Funky is due to it’s explicit dancfloor focus and the fact that girls do not seem to want to go to grime raves at all any more. This leads to a mass movement of guys following the girls leaving (including most of the big grime artists) and ending up in “Funky Dances” wearing button down shirts, shoes and drinking champagne. While the scene is still in it’s early “what do you call it?” type phase and things are being hammered out, a few tunes have arisen that people are pointing to and saying, “that there, that’s it”. One of the guys making many of these tunes is the man with the most google-handicapped name ever: Apple. Not helping things by calling his tune Mr. Bean (who appeared in an ad for apple computers, search engine camouflage), he’s making these stripped, rugged, post-grime/sort of soca-ish house tunes, which I am digging.

Check out two tunes from Apple:

APPLE – MR BEAN

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uENOY2cSRcA[/youtube]

APPLE – DE SIEGALIZER

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJ-C-ID61EA[/youtube]

Also check out his myspace to hear more, last I checked I was digging “SAMPLE of wots to come”. Grimy, swinging and dark, I hope it is indeed a sign of what’s to come.

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which gamelan is the craziest? some performers of the javanese style told me (and would no doubt tell you) that balinese gamelan is noisy, rough and too fast. great. (de)-tuned drums, 88 and more.

Balinese Legong / from

…and the dance. watch the eyes. “I was a bit hesitant to upload this video because I find the dancers’ movements to be somewhat unrefined and a bit too frenetic.”

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c11F8O6E93E[/youtube]

london’s 23 Skidoo started out in the late 70s playing industrial/post-punk and moved into dub and breaks before forming ronin records (one of the best UK hiphop labels). inbetween this, the band spent a lot of time in indonesia… and released a record called urban gamelan. wot u call it? police cars with gongs on the roof rack clang across the intersection.

23 Skidoo – Sirens

 

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[[voices keep multiplying in here. welcome LAMIN to the DA blog.  — Rupture]]

howdy!

well, Rupture left the gate open (sort of) & so, here I am.

I found it particularly interesting that The Roots decided to call their upcoming album Rising Down. The title alone sounds dark, cynical, and intriguing too, especially in this atmosphere, this election year (liberal identity politics nightmare aside, for a second) as Obama keeps on shutting ’em down, the cynics. Then I heard “75 Bars (Black’s Reconstruction)“, a relentless, anti-bullshit rap-a-thon accompanied by only drums + tuba, plus very limited efx. Now this drawing:

The Roots - Rising Down Cover

?uestlove explains;

“this drawing is entitled NEGRO RULE. and it pretty much sums up the
feeling of the Confederate Union towards the newly freed slaves and
the idea that if given power they would reek havoc and chaos on the
country.”

Now, look at this; “If Obama was a white man…”

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XNPeG-WtXt4&feature=related[/youtube]

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I love this tune. Wiley & Bless Beats doing electro-house. Not much to say, just listen, drink, dance, bubble.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fGyq8DqhuuE[/youtube]

I’ll definitely play this at the Dutty Artz Tropical Dance next Friday (3/21) in Williamsburg at Glasslands, so get ready. I’ve been pondering what I am gonna play and I think among a few select things like this made by other people I am gonna go hard on my own material, which I haven’t done in a while. Want to hear what’s coming out the lab this year? Come listen. We’re doing two sets each, warm up and prime time, so there’s room for a range of stuff to get played. I’m happy about this because really, who wants to listen to the promoters cousin and 900 opening djs you’ve never heard of? Definitely not me. I can play for two hours easy, why would I even want anyone else playing at my party? I’ll probably play reggae early and shadetek bangers, grime, dancehall, dutty beats late.  And yes, I know there are 10 million other parties that night in NYC, and good ones too, but ours is dirty and cheap so after you pay your 6 bucks you can actually afford to buy a few drinks and make some fun mistakes on a friday night, like you’re supposed to.

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NOTE THE PALM TREES.

me: can you send me the mix? whats going on? i heard u got bodyslammed at seabreeze, (T & i left b4 u showed up) zuperb.

Kingdom: urg yes. i was nearly bedridden for 2 days. the big girl in the glowing tee (pictured below) singled me out danced with me, threw me on the ground, and then jumped off the railing with full weight landing on my pelvis.

dancehallrave

honestly it was worth it. the whole scene was so fuckin dancehallrave it was crazy, also love that sexy dancing goes to the level of WWF