[youtube width=”525″ height=”455″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au86wouG5Hk[/youtube]
This is part one of my tour of where I grew up in the Bronx and my process in creating the turntable science. Journalists get it correct, the dawn of Hip Hop was in the 70’s!!! – Grandmaster Flash
[vimeo width=”525″ height=”425″]http://vimeo.com/5981747[/vimeo]
Poirier [PWA-RI-AY] explains his style and his roots.
Shot in Austin, TX
at Emo’s
Last Tuesday, Akwaaba Music released Akwaaba Sem Transporte (stream the album on Fairtilizer here) – a kuduro compilation “straight from the source,” Luanda, Angola. Akwaaba Music founder Benjamin Lebrave spent six weeks in Angola, earlier this year, gathering and licensing tracks from rappers and DJs, and the result is a raw, authentic, high-energy dance comp. I’m aware that notions of authenticity, especially in the global ghetto-tech and nu whirled music (â„¢ wayne&wax) discourse is quite problematic – is the kuduro coming out of Lisbon/Europe any less authentic that what’s coming out of Luanda/Africa? European kuduro has definitely received and continue to receive more shine off late in Europe and America.
[audio:http://nyc.duttyartz.com/mp3s/DredManGi-NaoTaSeEntender.mp3]Dred Man-Gi feat. Nell – Não Ta Se Entender
This one is weird, and probably the least danceable track on the compilation, but it’s the one I like best. Upbeat, yes –but with a fractured, heavy beat and a disruptive flow. The MP3 above is standard bit rate/128 – Head over to iTunes for better quality/320 kbps, so you can hear and enjoy all the bass and efx, and check out the rest of the comp, which is all very danceable– and Dutty Artz supports that kind of music!
Also, check out Ghetto Palms last week – Benjamin writes + Eddie blends.
Eve – Me-n-My (Up In The Club) (Produced by Benga and Salaam Remi)
The original beat is “E Trips” from Benga‘s 2008 album Diary of An Afro Warrior. Salaam Remi is known as Nasir Jones’ beat supplier, essentially his main/most consistent producer for the better half of this decade. Salaam links Benga and Eve together, slightly altering and reworking Benga’s beat for Eve‘s voice. It’s a perfect connection, and the result is great… but I remain a bit ambivalent for some reason. Anyway, this is the first leak (that’s what we call singles nowadays) from her long overdue album now titled Flirt.
[vimeo width=”525″ height=”325″]http://vimeo.com/5898495[/vimeo]
Audio and video are not completely in sync, but who cares, really? Especially, when the sound, visual, and message are so soulful and sexy (and she’s trying not to spell it out, but she can’t help herself…) “Milk and Honey” is deliberately sweet, seductive, and celebratory. I find the experimentation and lightheartedness here much more interesting. Props to Bedrock for the beat. I haven’t heard or seen much from Goapele since her 2000/1 song “Closer” – positive, dreamy, a bit wistful now.
On a general note -Â neo soul and alt contemporary R&B has been anemic, stale since 2001 (after D’Angelo’s Voodoo and Erykah Badu’s Mama Gun, what else is there?)Â I’ve stayed away for the most part, but very now and then, there are impressive, surprisingly great albums and songs like Erykah Badu’s “The Healer” from her 2008 offering New Amerykah Part One (4th World War). For 2009, Sa-Ra’s album Nuclear Evolution: The Age of Love is amazing and has been very enjoyable.
vimeo spotted @ TSS
= summer.
in London we have mangy urban wheat fields where one can sit and hear passing subs through the bones.
and on that topic,
stush has been around for a while now. crucially, on dollar sign produced by sticky, also on (not this) remix of that lisa maffia tune, also live, also with sway (UK sway – don’t get confused), also top 10 with groove armada (but you still nah see me), also:
in a UK funky / funky bashment style on hard house banton’s sirens riddim:
stush – we nah run (sirens riddim)
this tune sounds like (being in/driving/not driving/standing outside) cars.
[‘wheatpaste mugshot’ from Wayne & Wax’s flickr]
riffing on Lamin’s last post, I feel compelled to quote the most salient, on-point appraisal of the Skipgate affair I’ve seen. From Adam Serwer:
Gates isn’t being invited to the White House because he’s black and Ivy League. Gates is being invited to the White House because Sgt. James Crowley has become the latest totem of burgeoning white resentment against the president, which happens to be a matter so urgent that Obama felt obligated to make a dramatic gesture of reconciliation — lest racial resentment swallow his presidency. . . This is an example of white privilege — and how even a country that elects a black man president still demands that he assuage feelings of white resentment when they grow strong enough. Totems of black resentment, which Gates is not, get called racists and race hustlers. They do not get invited to the White House.
As I write, the beers are in the presidential fridge. After their drink, Gates will go back to Harvard, Crowley will return to the force, Obama will stay in the White House. Nothing about law or race, not even the national conversation, will have changed. And Troy Davis will remain on death row. For now the only beer he can expect will be with his last meal. And he will be drinking alone.
READ MORE of Beer and Sympathy by Gary Younge @ The Nation
*
The Gates arrest gave the president ample opportunity to stimulate a broad national discussion about police and community relations and the role of race and ethnicity when these relations become contentious. Such a conversation would have been a politically risky endeavor, no doubt. But discussion would have been far more valuable than a brewski photo-op, which is how the Gates case will likely be remembered.
READ MORE of Obama flunks his “teachable moment” by Mark Anthony Neal @ The Grio
Extra props to MAN and his particularly interesting and essential blog.
This is probably the craziest rap video you’ll see all year. I saw the preview for it, but slept on the actual video. Thanks to The Times writer Caramanica for the reminder. You might remember Pill from my Recession Rap Jams. Juvenile’s “Ha” immediately comes to mind, as a point of reference and, to a lesser extent, and so does Goodie Mob’s “Cell Therapy” to a certain extent – using the rap video purposefully, to unmask black poverty and show real human suffering that we rarely see in mainstream American media. Also, look for the Amnesty International “JUSTICE FOR TROY DAVIS” poster.
[vimeo width=”500″ height=”400″]http://vimeo.com/5282853[/vimeo]
Having only been away from the states for nine months I’m amazed at the diversity of produce available at the grocery store. I’m equally excited about the excellent shows laced up and down the best coast these next few weeks.
First up is Tim Turbo from Seen (aka the non-hippie reggae and dance hall site) and Danny Scrilla doing dates down California and then over into Texas… “equipped with black duffle bags, brimful with Ghetto Lazerbass.”
Turbo and Scrilla Tour Mix Tracklist HERE
[audio:http://www.seen-site.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/Tim-Turbo-Danny-Scrilla-Lazerdaze-Tourmix-2009-hosted-by-Prince-Zimboo.mp3]August 5th, San Francisco @ Vessel Nightclub
August 6th, Santa Barbara @ EOS Lounge
August 7th, L.A. @ Lot 613
August 8th, San Diego @ The W Hotel
August 12th, Dallas @ Zubar
August 13th, Austin @Â Barcelona
I really wish they could have joined me up in Cascadia- where I’ve got a few things going on in the next week.
I’ll be dropping down to Portland for a party this Saturday- August 8- with the Various crew at Branx… You can listen to the exclusive mix “DefinatelyMaybe” I did for them HERE.
Next week, the 13th, I’ll be up in Vancouver with the Thursday Ting! Crew at The Woods Studio @ 2nd and Ontario
Come through!
OK we’re going in again. This time it’s me and Rupture, Solar Life Raft, the new mix album dropping November 11th on The Agriculture. For those of you that caught Uproot and enjoyed it we’re taking the format and going in deeper, wider, rougher. Me and /R have been cooking up tracks together for a while, some of which are appearing on Jahdan’s album and some on SLR. It’s our first official thing together with our names on it which is pretty exciting. It’s got a bunch of unreleased exclusive new collabo instrumentals plus excluse remixes of Telepathe and Gang Gang Dance. Mad I know. Expect to hear a lot more about it here soon.
“With the release of Solar Life Raft, DJ /rupture and Matt Shadetek emerge from the shores of Brooklyn bearing gifts from the future. A rich blend of bass, beats, and space, rocked by a tropical wind out of the west, Solar Life Raft is an arresting testament to the fruit that grows at the margins, free from genre orthodoxy and pulsing with gentle mutant energy. Created by two individuals with a shared appreciation for engaging with streetwise dance music from a ground-up, participatory perspective, as well as more experimental sounds, Solar Life Raft, the duo’s first extended project together, features tracks blended on three decks into a complete hypnotic and gripping narrative. ”
from alt.sounds.
Early on this year, Wayne (you already know – wayneandwax.com) introduced us to Skeat’s “Dumelang” – a jam which I think gets played at every New York Tropical, and I’ve heard Geko Jones and Uproot Andy played it several times at Que Bajo?! and other parties, and needless to say, it destroys the dance every time. Big up Wayne & Botswana’s Ruff Riddims for unleashing that, and this “brand new dirrty south african hip-hop” by Double Jay.
This is what happens when the screensaver drops acid and starts thinking that it’s not real any more.
“Lollipop” has been sampled by David Banner, covered by rock and country musicians, and now versioned by a mysterious Swedish pop outfit, with a radical lyrical shift, a stretch, an expansion – bottles are replaced with pills, and shawty is getting high on her own supply. The same aesthetics, but more drugs and less sex. Either way, Wayne, Jonsin, and Static will be/would be proud.
