Best of 2009: Beat Drop Leftovers

Here are a few more beats that stood out to me this year but that I didn’t submit to the Beat Drop for one reason or another, none of which had anything to do with the actual enjoyability of the beats.

G-Side “Rising Sun” [prod. Block Beattaz]
I knew Brandon would pick this one and he writes way better than me so I figured I better not even try lest I sound completely retarded in comparison. He pretty much covers it in the Beat Drop and on No Trivia. But one detail I’m partial to is the times during ST’s verse when Block Beattaz throw a quick effect onto the end of his line. Like when ST raps “Methadone music, crack gone rap/Syrup in a song,” the word “rap” has this screwed up effect which morphs into a chipmunk effect for “syrup,” signifying Southern rap music and its reliance on drugs as a topic and as an aesthetic. They use the same effect when ST spits “You ain’t a G, you a dude(?) do boy, I’m a W-2 boy” and “W-2 boy” is screwed. It’s like trying to usurp the musical language of crack rap for the purposes of responsible hustler rap. Obviously, I’m overthinking it but it was a small detail that I appreciated nonetheless.

Mos Def ft. Slick Rick “Auditorium” [prod. Madlib]
Another joint I figured Brandon might choose. Not much to this here, it just happens to be this extremely dope, Mid-Eastern, trek-across-deserts sample, wrapped in as much mystery as Madlib himself. I actually kinda want to hear Rakim on this since he’s got this similar mysterious, mythological vibe emanating from him. Definitely would’ve been better than anything on The Seventh Seal, but I digress.

Why DJ Enuff, Hot97, and mainstream radio ain’t playing Jay Electronica

DJ Enuff from Hot 97 sparked a minor controversy over the weekend when he put up a short, somewhat emotional post struggling with the dilemma of whether or not to play Jay Electronica’s “Exhibit C” on his radio show. This is a pretty old debate about the nature of radio and the responsibility of the DJ but it’s worth revisiting because, well, the nature of radio has changed in the past decade and both sides need to realize this.

The two sides of the debate boil down to: 1. “real” hip-hop fans claiming it’s the DJ’s (moral?) responsibility to play “good” music, to be a filter for the ears of listeners; and 2. radio heads claiming that it’s all a business and that if there’s no support for this “good” music, radio won’t play it.

And that’s true to an extent. Contrary to what many music fans think, radio jocks do try out new songs very sparingly and then track each song’s feedback (ie. requests) very minutely (an intern at the radio station might spend an entire shift tallying the song requests from the prior week). If the stats aren’t there, they won’t play that song again. It is actually pretty democratic.

But of course, even if a group of friends launched a massive phone request campaign to get “Exhibit C” on the radio, that still probably wouldn’t work. For one thing, these campaigns try to give the illusion of a song’s hit power but the illusion is see-through and the radio station won’t count those requests in the stats. But more importantly, sad to say, hardcore music fans are not the target demographic of radio, at least not anymore. Casual music fans are. And with good reason.

Metal Lungies: Beat Drop – Best of 2009

Metal Lungies hosted a massive two-part (and possibly three-part) Beat Drop to wrap up the year. All contributors chose their 5 favorite beats of the year and just gushed over them. I chose the first 5 that came to mind …… which coincidentally all come from albums off my Best Rap Albums of 2009 list (yes, you are correct, I’ve really only listened to like 3 and a half albums all year, I’m a simple man). I chose Alchemist’s “That’ll Work,” G-Side’s “In The Rain,” Juicy J’s “Purple Kush,” Diamond District’s “Who I Be,” and DJ Quik’s “Do You Know,” though the last one didn’t make the cut (I guess ML thought my 140-character write-up was just plain lazy and they’d be right). There’s lots of good writing in the entire piece and plenty more good music to be heard that I’ve only barely scratched the surface myself. Here’s what I wrote for the Alchemist joint:

Three 6 Mafia is perfect for this track because this Alchemist beat is along the same lines of Satanic hip-hop that Three 6 came up on earlier in their career (and the style they went back to this year). The difference being that Three 6 beats sound like gargoyles, church steeples, and bloody goblets and shit. This beat sounds like a record being played backwards, twisting a nice sunny melody into a secret message from Lucifer.

Jezebel Music: Best Rap Albums of 2009

I posted my list of top 10 rap albums of the year up at Jezebel Music in two parts. There’s plenty of unnecessary writing but the list rundown and links are below. Looks like I skewed towards regional rap and pretty obscure shit. But then isn’t everything besides like Jay-Z, Eminem, and Raekwon pretty obscure these days? My apologies for the duplicated intro paragraphs on both parts 1 and 2. I didn’t think there needed to be an intro for part 2 but I guess my homie did. Download links provided for the album-mixtapes that were released as free downloads by the artists themselves:

Best Rap Albums, Part 1:
10. Lil Wayne & Juelz Santana – My Face Can’t Be Felt [Download]
9. Alchemist – Chemical Warfare
8. Raekwon – Only Built 4 Cuban Linx … pt. II
7. Gucci Mane – The Movie 3-D: The Burrprint [Download]
6. Ghostface Killah – Ghostdini: The Wizard of Poetry in Emerald City

Best Rap Albums, Part 2:
5. Juicy J – Hustle Till I Die
4. Playboy Tre – Liquor Store Mascot [Download]
3. Diamond District – In The Ruff
2. DJ Quik & Kurupt – BlaQKout
1. G-Side – Huntsville International [Download]

Live show experiences of Nosaj Thing vs. Waka Flocka Flame

Insomnia triumphs again. Anyways, so I was thinking about making it up to LA tomorrow night (or tonight, I guess, Wednesday night) to check out this Low End Theory glitch-hop scene for the first time. But thankfully, I checked it out on Youtube first. And wow, that shit looks boring.

It just made me think how ridiculous it is that “intelligent” music listeners might be down for this glitch-hop style, or at least they respect glitch-hop dudes like Nosaj Thing and Flying Lotus as real artistes. But then someone like Waka Flocka Flame is unequivocably denied any sort of serious artistic consideration.

‘On a scale of one to ten, you a skeleton’ – Orko

Random songs from San Diego rap legend, Orko The Sycotik Alien/Orko Eloheim/Orko Eloheem, that I grabbed off of Youtube. Orko comes from the mid- to late-90′s generation of Project Blowedians, forming a group called Global Phlowtations with other Blowedians before going solo (he was also in an SD group called Masters of the Universe earlier). I’m glad that even after being a super-scientifical, “Fuck the mainstream” backpack rapper went out of style (or I guess you could say, it got co-opted, but that’s another argument), Orko still kept doing his thing and maybe even responded by getting even crazier and shouting his anti-establishment battle raps even harder. His intense shout-rap style probably had some influence on the newfound rapping intensity of another SD legend, Black Mikey*. For most of this decade, Orko’s been delving further and further into drum-n-bass experiments, which I don’t like because it drowns out his voice (on top of there being less rapping in the first place). But here are some of his more rappity-rap tracks, much of it from the 90s. Shouts to BeRLiNGSTAR. More after the jump.

*Actually, it looks like Orko’s having a really huge influence on Black Mikey these days. Rumor has it that Mikey’s doing a whole album produced by Orko’s BFF, Mr. Ridley of the Anti-Citizens.

50 Cent presents … The Thuggie!!!

I’m just so freaking obsessed with Snuggies right now.

G Mane – Sunday On Da Porch

G Mane – Sunday On Da Porch

Well, it’s still Sunday on the West Coast so I’ll run with it. I finally got around to checking out G Mane’s mixtape, Sunday On Da Porch, and it’s some really solid country rap tunes. Like his Huntsville brethren G-Side (hmmm, I wonder what the G’s mean), G Mane is a reformed hustler trying to spread the wisdom he’s accumulated by experience to lead others into a better direction. Except his lyrics are set to some decidely country rap beats (courtesy of Mick Vegas), guitars whining and twanging and everything, almost like he’s the missing link between UGK and G-Side. G Mane even sounds a lot like Bun B with his deep bass voice and accent. It definitely hit the spot on a quiet, contemplative Sunday afternoon.