With Jurassic 5’s soon to be released 3rd full length album, Feedback (scheduled to hit the shelves 7/25), having to deal with the glaring hole in production with the absence of Cut Chemist it seems appropriate that their previous album, with only 350,000 in sales, was aptly titled Power In Numbers . It seemed like it never got its due or the group as well, at least in the United States. It also seemed as if the title foretold the near future as well. With the first single off of Feedback being a [...]
A while back, mashups were all over the place. I think it was Danger Mouse’s 2004 The Grey Album that sparked everything, but not too long ago you would see all sorts of cracked-out mashups on the net with the most unconventional pairings you could think of. The problem was, mashups weren’t that hard to create. Literally anyone with an instrumental and an acapella could throw one on top of the other on their turntables or computer, so I would say 90% of them were complete crap. I mean, [...]
Happy 4th everyone! Since it seems like everyone has a summer jams list (does VH1 have any other programs that don’t have lists in them?), I figure I’d join the bandwagon. Here are some songs that I have in the rotation this summer, whether bumpin’ in the ride or chillin’ poolside to sweatin’ under the sheets & barbequing in the streets. [MP3] Public Enemy :: Shut Em Down (Pete Rock remix) {Enough said for the retro heads...damn, I really need to stop [...]
I don’t know why, but lately I’ve been into these mellow, folksy, emo-ish songs. I really never liked this music much before, and it confuses me because I’m not really the type of guy to know about feelings other than happiness and anger. Anyways I’m not about to talk any more than that about myself, so here’s the lyrics to a kind of bittersweet song called “Long Lost Penpal†by Hello Saferide, a group from Sweden. Listening to this reminded me of how much I missed hearing lyrics that tell a story well. [...]
I don’t know why I’ve been into these mellow, folksy, emo-ish songs lately, I really never have been, and it confuses me because I’m not really the type of guy to know about feelings other than happiness and anger. Anyways I’m not about to talk any more than that about myself, so here’s the lyrics to a kind of bittersweet song called “Long Lost Penpal†by Hello Saferide, a group from Sweden. Listening to this reminded me of how much I missed hearing lyrics that tell a story well. So does [...]
I saw Beck yesterday. What a performance! All I'm gonna say is puppets & dinner table music!! :: MISTA HIPPO ::
Normally at this time of year, I’d be playing the #$% outta any hip hop albums with bangin’ beats and nice flows…it’s July, and it’s LA, so you have to have the perfect summer mix CD to accompany those sunny drives crawling through traffic on the 10 freeway on the way to the beach. And even though I’m normally pretty picky about my hip hop, in the summertime, I’ll listen to just about anything with upbeat rhymes and hard beats...I’ll even tune into 93.5 KDAY (when they at least had a decent amount of golden era hip [...]
Some things never get old or outdated. Whether it be your favorite pair of classic kicks or your favorite sweater, some things never go out of style. Midnight Marauders happens to be a quintessential example of what a classic hip hop album should be. It's one of those albums that a lot of people overlook yet it deserves the biggest props. No record sales numbers will ever define and defeat this album in terms of content and quality or degree of style and hipness. [...]
Now that summer is in full effect, I thought I’d share some of my favorite tracks that should help you make it through the hot season. This past week I went to my friend’s vinyl toy release party. Man seeing how vinyl toys have blown up, I wish I could afford more than what I got, but sometimes a mans got to make a choice between the type of vinyl: recs or toys. I tend to drift toward the 12†set. But if I had the $ I would buy a lot more toys, customized…life [...]
Congrats to the Miami Heat for taking the whole enchilada. I especially got love for the old skoolers (GP, Zo, Riles, and maybe even some for Walker). But since this is supposed to be a music blog, I can’t just talk about ball. So the next logically thing is to bring up that age-old debate, ballers who want to be rappers & rappers who want to be ballers. The connection is clear, both achieve a high level of financial success and come from humble beginnings. Now with the rappers who want to be ballers, I [...]
Up until I heard Cool Calm Pete I’d been pretty cynical when it came to hip hop. I can’t even remember the last time I heard a hip hop album I could rock from start to finish, and even though I dig Ghostface, Lupe Fiasco, and Aceyalone, none of them could renew my faith that real (at least as I knew it) hip hop still had a bright future. In comes Cool Calm Pete’s Lost . Yeah, I admit, I’ve definitely been sleepin on what’s new in hip hop since apparently this album [...]
With all the buzz surrounding Thom Yorke's solo debut The Eraser , I'd like to share some really cool music that some of you Radiohead heads might not know about. Here are two of my favorite tracks from pianist Christopher O'Riley's True Love Waits album. Basically, he covered some of Radiohead's best and unlike Kenny G's "easy listening" spoofs of current artists (i.e. Outkast's "The Way You Move"), O'Riley's versions resonate with the depth of the originals. More like a well done Unplugged. And of course for all you Exclusive Heads, I threw a cherry [...]
Have you ever heard any album where you thought, "Damn, am I the only one who diggs this"?Well every month, I'm going try to drop an album that I thought was slept on like this. For the first installment, it's Nelly Furtado's Folklore album back in 2003. Everyone knows her debut album Whoa Nelly! , with the big hits "I'm Like A Bird" and "Turn Off The Light" (the later being what Timbaland did a remix for) and the new album, Loose , which drops next Tues. is bound to blow up with the smash hit [...]
After listening to Cut Chemist’s “The Garden,†I decided I had to put up a post on Brazilian music. Well, maybe not quite Brazilian music, but perhaps less traditional adaptations of this incredibly rich musical culture. What draws me to these tracks, and to Brazilian music in general, is the lightness of the vocals and the gentle rhythms. For me, there’s something eternally warm and sweet about the vocals on these tracks that makes them perfect for a summer drive or just relaxing on a lazy Los Angeles day. WhileI can’t say [...]
I’ve recently become a fan of scores and soundtracks, and few filmmakers know how to use music to set the atmosphere and tone of a scene quite like Wong Kar Wai. Of course, Quentin Tarantino and Spike Lee are damn good, but there’s something about how Wong’s music becomes more than an accompaniment to a movie but an integral part of the story and its characters that sets him apart. Like In the Mood for Love , [...]
WELL HERE IT IS FOLKS. The song for the summer, Gnarls Barkley's "Crazy." Everyone should already have it (or at least heard it by now). But, here is the original song in full. It comes from the 1968 movie soundtrack for Preparati la Bara! THE WHOLE DANG ENCHILADA! Enjoy. [MP3] Gnarls Barkey :: Crazy [MP3] Gianfranco Reverberi :: Nel Cimitero Di Tucson [...]
Everyone likes to shake it to Busta Rhymes' "Touch It." It's a club banger produced by Swizz Beatz. But it's tracks like "Blow This Head Off" featuring Ghostface Killah & "Been Through The Storm" featuring Stevie Wonder that have me looking forward to the release of Big Bang this Tuesday. I haven't had this much anticipation for a Busta album since he was sampling Galt McDermott and Seals & Crofts back in the late '90s. [MP3] Busta Rhymes :: Blow This Head Off [...]
So I decided that even though a good music blog would present more obscure, rare, and unreleased tracks, I’m sadly not enough of a music nerd to be so on top of things. While I’d love to have a blog like that, I think it’d be easier and more fun to blog about music I like in general, even if it is old, has been blogged about before, or even been played on the radio (did I just say that?). With that in mind, I’m putting up [...]
Now that the NBA playoffs on TNT are over, for NBA fans like myself, that means no more Inside The NBA until next fall, no more of Kenny Smith's "Gone Fishing" pics, Charles Barkley's wisecracks, or the special camaraderie between EJ, Barkley, Kenny and Magic that makes the show so dope. But fortunately, this also means we dont have to hear any more of Fort Minor's "Remember The Name" from the Rising Tied album. "Remember The Name" has been the theme song for "40 Games In 40 Nights" and is also a featured track on the [...]
get down
Bison - Quill
Neutral Milk Hotel- Aeroplane Over the Sea
Shinichi Osawa – Big Beach Mix 2012
Mr Fogg - Eleven
