Finally watched Byron Hurt's Beyond Beats and Rhymes.
If 50 cent and Jadakiss and all those people I'd like to vote off hip hop's island are stacking bank so that they can become indie label producers, than I'll forgive them for ruining one of the liveliest sectors of contemporary music. If they are secretly planning on systematically taking down the crap that they produce, than I think they are more hip hop than the stuff I listen to.
I hope. But it's not going to happen.
Showing posts with label Crates. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Crates. Show all posts
01 April 2010
03 March 2010
Sleng Teng 25th anniversary
Feb 23, 1985. Reggae became digital.
Except preforming it as an acoustic version makes it even more awesomer.
Thank you to Wayne Smith.
Except preforming it as an acoustic version makes it even more awesomer.
Thank you to Wayne Smith.
10 February 2010
29 January 2010
17 April 2009
One mans ceiling is another mans floor.
I just got a flac encoded version of the Paul's Boutique remaster. I'd like to say that I'm "real" enough to be immune to the cheesy pseudo-pop that is this disc, but I'm not. My relisten to the remaster has made me reconsider re: how hip hop should consider itself. Beyond being a dictionary of samples. Beyond being something I've been exposed to for two decades and I have a pavlovian response to. This album has a specific place in the history of hip hop and that moment exposes many of the traps that hip hop has found itself in since hip hop was born of funk and disco in the mid 70's.
This was an era where no one had to defend their own version of what was "real." Absent are the nausiating mentions of brand names and the knee jerk obverse from the 90's. No need to choose sides on the dialectic of "jiggy" or "independent as fuck." There was no reason to mention national politics. The country was doing alright and our current president was a lowly Harvard law-student. There was no populist outrage to channel. A certain member of the band hadn't even started caring about Tibet yet. The much hyped east/west myths hadn't started yet either.
Paul's Boutique comes from a group of NY dudes who didn't care that they shouldn't be hip hop in Cali working with the guys who did Tone Lōc and Young Mc's albums. They had no support from their label, managers, former producer, or anyone. They were frat rapers to everyone else. They were either at a low point or free to rewrite history. They made an album that includes what they thought word play should be at the time. They had an incredible group of instrumentals from the Dust Brothers. They grabbed the attention of every beat maker on the planet and the lyrics were good enough to still sound pretty fresh today.
For too long we who enjoy hip hop have worried about the borders of our music. Like sheep dogs we worry about the edges: who produced the album, who paid for it, who did they sample, are they from a certain town, will they tour with other bands from their label, etc? And more insidious questions. Why aren't they doing something that I find to be "real". Either saying more or less of something than they did or did not say. You have to either be more or less street, more or less intelligent, or some thing else like that. Company Flow has too many lyrics and their beats are too slow. They are too backpacker. Wu-Tang is too street or not street enough depending on who is judging. Real hip hop is X and you are not that.
Hip hop will do fine with out you worrying about it. To use a metaphor, instead of viewing hip hop artists as a species that need herding, it should be considered an environment for different species to grow up in. Each of hip hop's subspecies are an autochthonous species of hip hop's healthy, vibrant landscape. If someone was worried that Q-Tip is too soft, Lif is too political, Aesop is too art school, Jazzy Jay is a sell out, Gangstarr is too commercial, Hawt ### FM is too violent, too misogynist, too urban, or whatever, too bad! If hip hop is an art form, rather than a derivative sub-section of pop than it has to be diverse. To be a healthy environment there has to be a balance of competing forces.
Throughout the history of Fine Art, an art form that has one style is doomed to failure. It is only those that can adapt to the environment of art that survive. Artists change style, media, etc as they see fit to make new work. If every new art student entering the art market made the same work there would be something wrong and no one would want to see the work at all. Art is an environment which allows for diverse forms to exist in it. That's one reason why trying to find a singular definition for Fine Art has always failed. It isn't a thing, its a method-thought process-idea-environment-modality-etc.
Paul's Boutique is enjoyable. Unlike Lif's new album I Heard it Today, which to me is unpleasant to say the least. I've been a fan since he was a nobody, but I can't imagine getting excited by that album. Does that mean that Lif should reconsider his career? No. It just means that I'm not interested in faux-political populist ramblings. I am living through this complicated economic environment just like everyone else is by doing what I can do. It just makes bad art to me. To quote (of all people) Ben Affleck on Rachel Maddow's show:
This was an era where no one had to defend their own version of what was "real." Absent are the nausiating mentions of brand names and the knee jerk obverse from the 90's. No need to choose sides on the dialectic of "jiggy" or "independent as fuck." There was no reason to mention national politics. The country was doing alright and our current president was a lowly Harvard law-student. There was no populist outrage to channel. A certain member of the band hadn't even started caring about Tibet yet. The much hyped east/west myths hadn't started yet either.
Paul's Boutique comes from a group of NY dudes who didn't care that they shouldn't be hip hop in Cali working with the guys who did Tone Lōc and Young Mc's albums. They had no support from their label, managers, former producer, or anyone. They were frat rapers to everyone else. They were either at a low point or free to rewrite history. They made an album that includes what they thought word play should be at the time. They had an incredible group of instrumentals from the Dust Brothers. They grabbed the attention of every beat maker on the planet and the lyrics were good enough to still sound pretty fresh today.
For too long we who enjoy hip hop have worried about the borders of our music. Like sheep dogs we worry about the edges: who produced the album, who paid for it, who did they sample, are they from a certain town, will they tour with other bands from their label, etc? And more insidious questions. Why aren't they doing something that I find to be "real". Either saying more or less of something than they did or did not say. You have to either be more or less street, more or less intelligent, or some thing else like that. Company Flow has too many lyrics and their beats are too slow. They are too backpacker. Wu-Tang is too street or not street enough depending on who is judging. Real hip hop is X and you are not that.
Hip hop will do fine with out you worrying about it. To use a metaphor, instead of viewing hip hop artists as a species that need herding, it should be considered an environment for different species to grow up in. Each of hip hop's subspecies are an autochthonous species of hip hop's healthy, vibrant landscape. If someone was worried that Q-Tip is too soft, Lif is too political, Aesop is too art school, Jazzy Jay is a sell out, Gangstarr is too commercial, Hawt ### FM is too violent, too misogynist, too urban, or whatever, too bad! If hip hop is an art form, rather than a derivative sub-section of pop than it has to be diverse. To be a healthy environment there has to be a balance of competing forces.
Throughout the history of Fine Art, an art form that has one style is doomed to failure. It is only those that can adapt to the environment of art that survive. Artists change style, media, etc as they see fit to make new work. If every new art student entering the art market made the same work there would be something wrong and no one would want to see the work at all. Art is an environment which allows for diverse forms to exist in it. That's one reason why trying to find a singular definition for Fine Art has always failed. It isn't a thing, its a method-thought process-idea-environment-modality-etc.
Paul's Boutique is enjoyable. Unlike Lif's new album I Heard it Today, which to me is unpleasant to say the least. I've been a fan since he was a nobody, but I can't imagine getting excited by that album. Does that mean that Lif should reconsider his career? No. It just means that I'm not interested in faux-political populist ramblings. I am living through this complicated economic environment just like everyone else is by doing what I can do. It just makes bad art to me. To quote (of all people) Ben Affleck on Rachel Maddow's show:
I think it can be really tricky because I think you have to think of it as a storyteller first. Because, I think when it becomes didactic, you know, it is off-putting. And I think you have to tell a good story. I think at the root of good stories is humanity. And if you‘re telling stories that have a kind of humanity in it, I think, those naturally play - I think - play to the values inherent to liberal democracy, which value people - which empathizes with the struggles of people who work for a living and cares about the value of human life.And you know, to me, that kind of dovetails with the kind of values I care about. I think when you start banging on it too hard and, you know, you want to re-make the jungle, it feels a little bit like - it can feel a little strident.
I think doing documentaries, for example, is sort of a better way to get at that. Michael Moore, obviously, has been very effective at doing that. There are a lot of different ways to, you know, kind of use artistic expression to effect social change.
I do think that‘s an appropriate way to do it as an artist. And I think it‘s a way that we can kind of fit in. I‘ve tried to do that making documentaries and making movies but only in ways where I think it can be effective.
03 February 2009
02 February 2009
Digging suggestions
I love 1970, 1972, and 1974. Why?
1970-
1970-
- Hubert Laws- Afro Classic
- Grant Green- Alive
- Curtis Mayfield- Curtis
- Maceo and All the King's Men- Doing Their Own Thing
- Donald Byrd- Electric Byrd
- Quincy Jones- Gula Matari
- King Hebert- King Hebert and the Knights with Jack Harden
- Miles Davis- Live Evil
- Mandrill- Mandrill
- Airto Moreira- Natural Feelings
- Dizzy Gillespie- The Real Thing
- Freddie Hubbard- Red Clay
- Freddie Hubbard- Straight Life
- Galt MacDermot- Two Gentlemen of Verona
- Brothers Unlimited- Who's for the Young?
- Black Heat- Black Heat
- Esther Phillips- Alone Again Naturally
- Eumir Deodato- Prelude
- Fred Wesley & the J.B.'s- Food for Thought
- Freddie Hubbard- Sky Dive
- Funk Inc. Chicken Lickin'
- The Jimmy Castor Band- It's Just Begun
- The Jimmy Castor Band- Phase Two
- Jimmy Smith- Root Down
- The Lafayette Afro Rock Band- Malik
- Les McCann- Layers
- Mandrill- Mandrill Is
- Osibisa- Heads
- The Politicians- Psycha-Soula-Funkadelic
- Randy Weston- Blue Moses
- Airto Moreira- Virgin Land
- Bill Withers- +'Justments
- Eddie Russ- Fresh Out
- Grover Washington- Mister Magic
- Herbie Hancock- Dedication
- Herbie Hancock- Thrust
- Idris Muhammad- Power of Soul
- Joe Farrell- Upon this Rock
- O'Donel Levy- Dawn of a New Day
27 January 2009
Abstract Innovations
Q-Tip seems like he is in every music blog right now. The Renaissance has quickly taken on "classic" status. I like it, so don't expect me to hate on it here. But I just listened to Abstract Innovations, and it's also pretty good. If I have all my information right, it is a mix tape put together by Dub MD and came out a minute ago. So I get caught sleeping again.
You'll find that the tape sounds kinda like a certain recent release from Q-Tip. Three of the songs get worked on here and developed after this mixtape into The Renaissance versions that were released late last year. But wait, not only are there pre-production versions of songs you already know, there are also some sweet tracks on here that you probably haven't heard. Poetry with Erykah Badu for example or I Got Rhythm Ft Royce The 5' 9 & Lena Horne. Go find it.
In fact, let me introduce you to Capt. Crawl. He's your new best friend. Remember MP3's suck and if you can go buy the vinyl you'll be happier and the artist you like will be able to buy dinner tonight. So listen to the free download and then go support the artists.[/soapbox]
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