‘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.

Misc. Nocando raps

Wow, so it just clicked in my head that I saw Nocando battle at school once. There was a freestyle battle contest at UCLA during my third year. It was supposed to be open only to students but dude heading it up kinda realized the student rappers were really, really crap. So he brought in some rappers he knew from Project Blowed, including Nocando and Dumbfoundead. The whole thing still ended up being pretty bogus, albeit funny. Dumbfoundead eked out a victory in the final round against this hilariously wack, enormously fat chick who literally spit “It’s murder, you just a chicken nugget, I want a hamburger, I’ll eat you.” Before that, Nocando went up against this Korean preacher rapper rapping about wanting to save Nocan through Jesus. And he lost because the Korean dude brought half his congregation of big-eyed anime-looking fanatical Christian girls with balloons and flowers and shit to cheer for him.

As an apology to Nocando for the wackness of that experience, I’ll just become a bigger fan. The clip above is notable for using socio-political commentary like 9/11 racial profiling in the context of a battle rhyme. After the jump, a video of a random cipher in which Nocan brags about being broke and getting rejected by a girl. And then a music video with more dope raps about being broke (you’ll just have to deal with the bad lip-synching for that one).

Nocando – Is A Virus EP

Nocando – Is A Virus EP [via Steady Bloggin']

This whole week, I’ve pretty much been listening exclusively to the G-Side tape and also this Nocando Is A Virus EP. Nocando is an emcee from Los Angeles’ Project Blowed school of rhyme. Noz’s taste in Blowed shit would suggest that all rappers from Good Life/Blowed were either chop shop, machine gun, fast rappers or just big freaking weirdos who may or may not rap like goats from time to time. Nocando falls into neither category. He’s just a good rapper with an obnoxious dose of arrogance and an off-beat humor that is hilariously juvenile and self-deprecating. And he’s emotionally believable. A lot of rappers take on a wholly different “serious adult” persona when they make their decidely “serious adult” songs and it can come off as pretty hollow/cornball. Nocando is still the same immature bastard whether he’s just talking shit or airing out fake friends and girls.

This short, 6-song EP is full of next level B-boy beats. If you’re still interested, he released another free EP earlier this year called The Patient EP.

Busdriver can chop

I remember these two homies from school, super backpack dudes, would always tell me to get up on Busdriver. I think I finally checked out some tracks from Fear of a Black Tangent at some point but I couldn’t understand him so I abandoned it. Well recently, I saw him on that Good Life documentary that came out a few weeks ago. And of course, once I realized he was a Project Blowedian, he gained hella points in my book and piqued my interest again.

I found this music video after browsing Youtube, yknow where hip-hop lives. I still can’t understand much anything he’s saying but still, the fact that he can flow with the flute like that is straight bonkers. It reminds me of this one bit from the documentary when fellow Blowedian Mikah 9(sp?) was discussing the art of “chopping,” which is basically just rapping really ridiculously fast. Before I’d think that fast rap is cool but if you can’t understand what’s being said, what’s the point? But Mikah broke it down to be like this abstract, musical thing. It’s like what jazz musicians are doing in their solos, taking a chord and going through every single …… sequence/path (word choice?) possible within that. So chopping lets rappers explore different rhythms in the same way. Or something like that.

After the jump, I posted the sample source, Bach’s Suite No. 2-7 “Bandinerie.” Also, I threw up Busdriver’s “Nagging Nimbus,” in which he does the same thing of rhyming on top of some high art piece that they teach you about in school. It’s less immediately impressive but he is spitting pretty ably to 5/4 time. Can you name the jazz standard he hops on? …… Because I can’t for the life of me and it’s annoying my fragile ego.