If Dre was the sound of G-Funk and Snoop was voice, then Nate Dogg was surely the harmony. Tying together lush production and smooth vocals with his rich, raspy melodies, Nate brought a defining quality to the music. Raised as a gospel singer in East Long Beach, he crashed onto the regional scene with his work on Mista Grimm’s “Indo Smoke” and Dr. Dre’s “Lil’ Ghetto Boy,” but it was his appearance alongside Warren G on “Regulate” that pushed him into the national spotlight. When Death Row Records collapsed under it’s own misdeeds, he took his talents from coast to coast, never failing to impress as the go to guy for that Californian vibe whilst giving career defining hits to the likes of Ludacris, Fabolous and 50 Cent. Many have tried to imitate him and some have even tried to snatch the crown as the king of the rap hook, but to no avail. They can come closer than close. Original they never could be. (more…)
As we continue on, our Sounds Like Summer series adds another volume while the humidex/heat index pushes past 100 in the north east. Somethin’ for your car, somethin’ for your hangout spot, or just somethin’ for you to chill to. Hella shouts to dirt_dog from TROY for the artwork. Download link, tracklist and links to the rest of the series after the jump.
Alongside the now popular Jay ElecHanukkah Shirt, X Is The Weapon has come with The Mos Def inspired, Love Powers Tee. Both are available at www.xistheweapon.com. The Jay Elec tee is a must for Sunday service. — Philaflava
Since my thermometer is finally crackin’ 70 this week, I thought it might be time to throw together a mix for the summer. Lets do it the right way though. 10 volumes from here to September, 16 tracks per clip. Somethin’ for your car, somethin’ for your hangout spot, or just somethin’ for you to chill to. Our A-Alike blog TROY runs a series called “Sounds like the 90s,” so we’re gonna call this one “Sounds Like Summer.” Volume uno below.
01 E-40 – Nah Nah ft Nate Dogg
02 3xKrazy – West Coast Shit
03 Da Brat and The Notorious BIG – Da B Side
04 Erick Sermon – Music
05 Snoop Dogg – Lets Get Blown
06 Kilo Ali – Love in Ya Mouth ft Big Boi
07 King Tee – Dippin (rmx)
08 Dam Funk – (My Funk Goes) On & On
09 Scritti Politti – Tinseltown to the Boogiedown ft Mos Def and Lee Majors (Ali Shaheed rmx)
10 2Pac – To Live and Die in LA
11 Ice Cube – You Know How We Do It
12 Boogiemonsters – Honeydips in Gotham (Monster rmx)
13 The Dove Shack – Summertime in the LBC
14 Big Mike – Burban & Impalas
15 Rich Boy – Boy Looka Here
16 Big Tymers – Still Fly
A few weeks ago I started a new series of mixes called Laskified, the premise was that there are a gang of rap artists that have an amazing collection of music but for one reason or another they cannot put together an album that keeps my attention. The first in the series was the rapper Mos Def who is an insanely talented rapper but might be a glue sniffer because his work is often inconsistent and erratic.Â
The goal of the series was to put on my a&r hat and take the artists collection and cherry pick from it to make a cohesive album, of not necessarily essential tracks but, tracks that would work for a complete album that keeps your interest from front to back. When conceptualizing the idea I came up with a set of rules to follow that included:
1. The music can only come from the artist album catalogue, no collaborations, guest appearances or side projects.
2. The project must flow like an album, which means if the song doesn’t fit, it doesn’t get on, I don’t care if it is their biggest hit nor has a Jay-Z or Kanye guest appearance.
3. It must not be longer than 55 minutes and 14 songs, because no album ever should be.
With today’s artist, The Roots, we went a little over out time limit but still came in at under 1 hour. I have a love hate relationship with The Roots, while I know they are extremely talented and when all things are clicking there are very few groups that can fuck with them at all. Unfortunately that rarely happens outside of their live shows. Where they excel in the live arena they tend to flounder on the studio. The Roots have released 7 studio albums, 8 if you include Organix which I do not, simply because it sucks.  All of the 7 albums contain a few good to great songs and a lot of boring filler shit. The other problem is that every album carries the same format – an intro, a few songs about rap, a few girl songs, one crossover type single that is always awful, a few experimental joints which are always surprisingly good, and a few songs of rapper Black Thought completely demolishing the mic. When it comes to just ripping the shit out of a track few can do it better than Black Thought.  Unfortunately, they get away from that too much because they have this BS formula that sucks the life out of every project. Â
It is very frustrating to see a group that is this talented avoid what they are best at.  At the same time it’s hard to argue with a group that has been releasing music for 17 years, and still remains a relevant force today. I just wish they would put out one album that puts all their strengths together, trims the fat and makes a fucking classic. Until then this will have to do.Â
Tracklist:
1. Act Won (Things Fall Apart)
2. 75 Bars (Black’s Reconstruction)
3. Here I Come
4. Act Too (The Love of My Life)
5. Panic!!!
6. The Seed (2.0)
7. Stay Cool
8. Water
9. Clones
10. Living In A New World
11. Distortion to Static
12. Thought @ Work
13. The Web
14. The Lesson, Pt. 1
I have been pretty much actively avoiding this write up since last week. Partly because by brain isn’t functioning that well due to lack of sleep and partly because I just didn’t know how to attack it. How many ways can you say “hey this thing here is great†without sounding redundant? With this album we are now 9 albums deep into our little Top Ten-est list, and like most top ten lists it seems like everything that needs to be said about an album has been said. Finding a new angle is increasingly difficult and at times pointless, but regardless I need to pull something out of my ass to finish strong.
When today’s album dropped, friends kept telling me I needed to check it, The Source gave it 5 mics, the world seemed geeked on it, but I just could not give it the respect it deserved because I my east coast bias was so strong. Their accents threw me as did their style. I loved SouthernPlaylisticCadillacMusic, when it dropped but there was still something decidedly familiar about that album, even the videos had a whole DPG meets Souls of Mischief vibe to them. Granted neither of those groups were east coast but they were familiar enough that I could get my head around it.
Atliens on the other hand turned me off completely, I hated the whole aesthetic. Of course now I can look back and see that there was some genuinely brilliant rap music on that album, but it was still an uneven effort and sounds incredibly dated. You can tell that they were on to something but it wasn’t fully clicking.
After a few months of non-stop brow beating Aquemini finally clicked with me thanks to my friend Big Ben who played the album endless when we were driving around Manhattan and Brooklyn in his Nissan Pathfinder doing things we probably shouldn’t have been while driving and messing with girls that could best be describe as “if she was your daughter you would feel ashamed of yourselfâ€.
It was in that car and in that altered state of mind that I really started to appreciate the album. The production was original, thick and layered. The drums patterns were unique and amorphous, and the lyrical performances were tremendous. Big Boi is easily the best second fiddle not named Prince Po and Andre is just brilliant. His patterns are some of the best ever and continue to amaze even today. His content managed to remain entertaining even when being, for lack of a better term, conscious. He draws you in where others come across as pretentious (see Mos Def) or semi retarded (see Dead Prez). He is also the only MC right now that if feel has a chance to make an honest and entertaining album well into his late 30s and 40s.
Outkast has 4 albums that you can claim as their best, however the only one they would be correct about would be Aquemini.
I have recently been thinking about artists that show potential but never reach it for whatever reason. This phenomenom tends to be of epidemic proportions in rap music and I am not sure why. It could be the culture in the record industry demanding quick turn over and a follow the leader approach to marketing the music. It could be that most rappers do not have the musical background to understand what it takes to make a strong record. it could be that there isnt a lot of guidance other than the “make sure you have the x, y and z” style songs on your album. Or it could just be that some rappers are either too self indulgent or lazy to ever get the best from them.
I started thinking about this because of the artist Mos Def. Obviously a talented rapper. His work in the late 90s with Black Star was brilliant. His first solo album Black on Both Side, though uneven showed immense promise. Sadly that promise was never reached. It was a combination of him being bored with rap, trying to do too much, acting, getting hammered by Christopher Hitchens on Bill Maher, etc.
The point is he was unable to keep focus for a full album and his works became increasingly, how can I say this without being insulting, shitty.
With Mos there are always amazing moments.
When he is on, it is exactly what I want to hear when I listen to rap music, but when he is off it is exactly everything I hate when I listen. So this got me thinking, what if some one like Mos, or The Roots, or Ras Kass had a strong personality with an ear for what makes a great record pushing them to do so? Would it work. Would we get what we always hoped for from them? Sadly we will never know because the music industry has pretty much eliminated the true A&R position for quick profits and disposable artists. So I decided to try on my A&R hat and see if I couldnt put together a great album from the material that is already out there. I set a few rules in place to avoid just turning this into a best off type deal:
1. The music can only come from the artist album catalogue, no collaborations, guest appearances or side projects.
2. The project must flow like an album, which means if the song doesnt fit, it doesnt get on, I dont care if it is their biggest hit or has a Jay-Z or Kanye guest appearance.
3. It must not be longer than 55 minutes and 14 songs, because no album ever should be.
So lets see how this little experiment worked out. Mos Def, you are about to be Laskified.
Mos Def – Laskified
Track Listing
1. Champion Requiem
2. Mr. Nigga
3. Murder of a Teenage Life
4. Ghetto Rock
5. Quiet Dog Bite Hard
6. Undeniable
7. White Drapes
8. Sex, Love, and Money
9. Napoleon Dynamite
10. Close Edge
11. Umi Says
12. History feat. Talib Kweli
13. Brooklyn
Here is a recent show with Jay Electronica, Talib Kweli, Mos Def & P.Diddy all performing “Exhibit C” live. It wasn’t too long ago Puffy was considered a hack rapper and to many the rap anti-Christ. Now he’s embraced by all and is suddenly in his creative zone making music backpackers will soon enjoy. Hip-Hop really is 360. -Philaflava
