Devin The Dude talks ‘Doobie Ashtray’

How classically Devin is this? Devin bullshits about some old doobie for a minute and a half before talking some real ass shit for about 30 seconds …… and then wrapping it up with another joke about his weed. I remember I was driving my friend home once and “Doobie Ashtray” comes on. I start trying to explain the brilliance of Devin The Dude wrapping up all this real, gut-wrenching emotion into a shell of weed talk. And it was breaking my heart that my friend just could not get past the weed surface. “It’s about weed.” “Yeah, but it’s really about how lonely and depressed dude is.” “Yeah, but …… he’s still talking about weed.” And he used that as an excuse to kinda brush it off. Eventually, he countered that even if my point was valid, he would find it hard to believe that Devin had this same sort of deep thought process in constructing the song. To him, Devin was probably just letting the weed talk for him. But here, my friend stands corrected.

Anyways, Devin is the greatest rapper, dead or alive. Link via Maurice Garland. The full “Doobie Ashtray” after the jump.

Beautiful Skin Mix

I made a mix for a girl (who we will from here on out refer to simply as Girl) for her birthday because I’m a sucker like that. I won’t exactly be sharing it with you because yknow, it’s a gift for her and not you. But I did take some time picking out the songs and sequencing them and I thought I did a pretty good job. This isn’t saying much but this is my best mix yet (thanks also in large part to Audacity, which I’m finally beginning to learn how to use). Here’s what I included in the mix and some explanation of why. It’s mostly love/girls’ songs because I generally don’t give girls enough credit to be down with hard-assed gangster rap (except Monique, who is a 5-star chick like that) and also shottas don’t make for good hollas. But it’s still generally good rappity rap regardless.

1. Ryan Leslie – How It Was Supposed To Be

Well, except for this. I don’t listen to enough R&B to be a good judge but Ryan Leslie’s album is one of the best R&B albums I’ve heard in years. And this song has been stuck in my head for months, causing me to involuntarily sing it aloud throughout the day, sometimes rocking the harmony, betraying my high school choir roots (poorly at that …… our choir really sucked). I realize throwing this in first sounds cocky like “This is how a mixtape is supposed to be done.” But it’s just that this is the only straight-up R&B joint and I didn’t know how to fit that into the mix. I decided to tack it onto either the beginning or the end. I chose the beginning because it’s upbeat and I want to start off upbeat or fun for the mix.

2. Method Man & Redman – Mrs. International

These first four songs are all songs with fun concepts. It’s no surprise that two of them are from members of the Wu-Tang, which is prone to coming up with great concepts for girl songs (e.g. “Ice Cream,” “Killa Lipstick” come to mind). “Mrs. International” fits right into that mold with a great hook and hilarity from Redman (“Weren’t you on Maury?”). The concept fits the Girl really well too because she loves travelling the globe, is very interested in world politics, and seems to value bougie worldliness in general.

3. Atmosphere – Domestic Dog

The Girl also loves Slug from Atmosphere so I wanted to work him in. This joint off Atmosphere’s very good Strictly Leakage mixtape finds Slug extolling the virtues of picking up chicks at the grocery store. He’s usually really emo so when he gets a chance to be an asshole, it’s refreshing. Great hook too. The song reminds me of my pick up lines, which Girl really enjoys when I use them to fake hit-on her.

They Called My Shit A Bucket

Hella weak. My car broke down today on the highway as I was going to work. On top of the bumper that’s hanging by a few zip-ties, the rear left signal light that don’t work, the AC that doesn’t blow through the middle vent, and the passenger window that doesn’t roll all the way down, now my radiator leaks like its going into labor or something.

Hah, but at least when I meet Devin, we’ll have an ice-breaker off the bat. Score.

Landed

It’s crazy to think that Devin used to play weed carrier to his blind rapper homie in Odd Squad. Before seeing this video, I was pretty sure Stevie here was the one lugging Devin’s weed around. Devin has come a long way–from cameoing in his own video to becoming Houston rap royalty and hipster-adored darling. If Mr. Copeland could pull rank like that maybe there’s hope of a legitimate rap career for Memphis Bleek after all (but then again, maybe not).

The Dude’s latest, Landing Gear, just dropped yesterday. It looks like Devin has probably already hit his peak with Just Tryin’ Ta Live and To Tha X-Treme, but Landing Gear is still a solid effort, rife with both hilarious and heartfelt tales of weed and women. And you know I’m all sprung on Houston rap right now. I love Houston rap so much, I wanna take it behind a middle school and get it pregnant.

DOWNLOAD: I Can’t Make It Home | I Don’t Chase ‘Em

Devin’s hitting up Angeles on October 24 at The Key Club and Diego the next night at Canes. Check out more dates on his Myspace page.