hiphoplives

Mos Def. He promised us a new album this fall, and 08 is almost gone. As the months and days wound down, so did my hope of seeing a new record from Mr. Bize. But just as the year took it’s last gasps, a new song has finally surfaced. “Life In Marvelous Times” is the first peek we have of The Ecstatic, Mos’s fourth solo album, and it’s just what I needed to ease my worried mind. The new release date for the album is Feb 09, and the anticipation is again gaining momentum.

The song itself is phenomenal. The orchestration of the track, the break downs, the different parts of the song keep the ear active in it’s listening. And Mos’s penchant for poetics keeps the mind swirling with the imagery and grace his words convey. It’s top quality, high grade material, all the way. Those privileged few who belong to the mailing list have been enjoying this song since last week, and we are now ready to share with the rest of the world. Enjoy.

Bright moments always come back vivid, the Fifth greatness epics, city wide test pressure, the pre-crack era, mr showman, what a prick, attitude match his wardrobe uglier than sin, this is Bed-Stuy ‘82, 9th Floor, 3 tiny rooms, 1 view, Bucktown, Roosevelt House, your green grass was green, our green grass was brown, shots rang my phone wasn’t touch tone, heavy beef in the street, ET had to flee, great heavens, good grief, hungry bellies bright gold on their teeth, the windows on the ave look like sad eyes, they fix a sharp gaze on ya when ya pass by, and if ya dare to stand, you can see em cry, you can watch em scowl, can feel em prowl, while they steady sizing every inch about you, fast math measure up what you amount to, the laughter, the screams, the number roll, the song of psalms, the book of dreams, ends don’t meet where the arms can’t reach, mean streets, even when it’s free it ain’t cheap, on going saga, terminal diagnosis, basic survival requires super heroics, no space in the budget for a cape, soon you gotta fly by night to save the day, crash landings routinely happen, some survive, others never rise from the ashes, watch and ask for and observe when the savage creates an Ecstatic and there ya have it, from teenage love, praying in tongues, strange fruit, riot boots, and native drums, from hence I come, to here we go, signs and wonders all along the road, some lines open some lines closed, some stretch this road with no lines at all, some riders don’t know what they riding for, hands on the wheel and they mind is gone, what ever you ride, whatever ya lane, this road called life is a beautiful thing, and we are alive in amazing times, delicate hearts, diabolical minds, revelations, hatred, love and war, and more and more and more and more, and more of less than ever before, it’s just too much more for your mind to absorb, it’s scary like hell, but there’s no doubt, we can’t be alive in no time, but, NOW!!!

It’s just another shot to the heart, it’s just a sure shot in the dark, it’s just another place in the stars. Wonders all over inside, life in marvelous times. Life in Marvelous Times.       

Do you love music? Do you have a sense of humor? Do you know about Flight of the Conchords? If you don’t, you need to get hip. These guys are the truth. Not only are the characters they’ve created for their HBO show hilarious, they are also brilliant musicians. The songs they create for the show aren’t only funnier than Weird Al’s greatest gag records, they’re musically interesting and often even innovative in a way. It’s like the perfect storm of artsy humor.

The first season ended with a bang. Murray, the hapless manager of the band had a huge hit on his hands with his other group, Bret and Jermaine’s old bandmates The Crazy Dogggz. He was finding it hard to find time for his old New Zealand homies.

Well it’s finally time for Season 2, and HBO has been nice enough to allow the web community, and by extension you, join in the festivities of the show’s premier. So without further ado, here is Episode 1 or Season 2 of Flight of The Conchords.

I’m not sure who’s the alien and who’s the predator, but I know that Free and Busta both kill things on this tape. The 4th in the series from Dj King Flow, this one features some of the month of madness songs from Freeway next to Busta’s leaks and warm ups to Back on My BS. The two artist’s sounds blend well together, and the mix actually seems to have a lot of cohesion. I was pretty impressed overall.

Now, in fairness. I’m a big Busta fan. Since Leaders of the New School, I bought all of his albums until I stopped buying albums. And then I bought The Big Bang when I only bought albums as a token symbol of my support for an artist. And I’ve also always either got a bootleg or stole an official copy of every album Freeway’s released as well, so I’m admitting my bias. (Just for clarity, that isn’t a diss towards Freeway, I just never bought his albums because I was exercising my Muslim privilege to hear what the Ak had to say. Plus I’d always throw an extra fever in the zakat, which I figure was what he would get for it anyway, so reverso chango, we’re even.)

But there’s no moral ambiguity in the download of this free mixtape. You want your copy, just send an email to hiphoplivesmixtapes@gmail.com and I’ll send you an MP3 copy so you can floss some new hotness for your New Year’s Eve party. Just picture this playing when the ball drops.

The daughter of legendary Rock Steady icon Derrick Morgan, Queen Ifrica is today’s Sunday Meditation. Being raised in a Reggae family has it’s benefits, and you can hear the tradition in the songs she sings. When she first burst on the scene back in 98, she was known as a gifted performer. When she took over the airwaves in 07 with “Below the Waist”, people began to take note of her ability as a recording artist as well. Her follow ups “Daddy” and “Nah Rub” both hit the radio and the dancehalls with a fury. Soon she was known as the Fyah Muma, and the people were crowning her as the new queen.

The best thing about Queen Ifrica is her ability to talk about things that really impact her listeners. She doesn’t shy away from topics that might offend someone. But you don’t get the impression that she is doing it for shock value, but rather that she just feels obligated to speak upon issues she believes in. So while you listen to her music, remember that she made it to uplift, not to pull down, your spirit and your heart.

This shit has gotten out of hand. I mean at first it was the novelty of the whole thing. If such and such had beef with their former hype man, not only could you read about it on the blogs, you could actually see YouTube clips of the offended parties telling their side of the story. Then MC’s started getting a little to in love with seeing themselves on the computer. Pretty soon, a day didn’t go by without another MC trying to get there name in the headlines by releasing a straight to YouTube diss video. The worst of these is the alleged confrontation caught on tape. It’s always some grainy video shot from a distance where you can’t tell who it is, but there’s always a circle around some guy getting sucker punched. We’ve seen Saigon vs Prodigy, Max B. vs Jimmy Jones, Papoose vs. Everybody. I mean some of these guys have more YouTube videos than actually song releases (I’m lookin at you Biggavel).

But I can’t help it, everytime I see one linked on a message board I always click on it. I can’t help myself. It’s like I know that it won’t be worth my time. I know I won’t see anything that enriches my life at all. I know that once it’s done in fact, I’ll swear off beef videos for good. But as soon as I see one, damn it, I watch it again. “Oh shit, Frenchy Montana has something bad to say about Freeky Zeeky, what could it be?” That’s why internet beef is this week’s Guilty Pleasure.

Like a lot of successful producer/song writers in the game today, Sean Garrett wasn’t satisfied with the money and industry credibility that a hit maker receives after writing single after single that smashes the charts. He wanted hockey moms and Walmart greeters to know his name too. So he undertook the tremendous journey to that of an artist. That’s him on the Luda single “What Them Girls Like”. He also dropped a solo album and caught a little bubble from his single “Grippin”.

But ultimately, he’s still being profiled as a song writer in my world. Why you ask? Because the songs he’s written are still more famous then he is. Songs like “Yeah” and “Run It” for the Ushers and Chris Browns of the world, “London Bridge” and “Buttons” of the Fergie and Pussycat Doll variety, and even “Bossy” and “Like This” for your Kelis and Kelly Rowland type singers. In other words, he’s got R&B on smash.

The music he makes is typically a collaborative effort. Though he does produce, some of his biggest hits were songs he wrote to beats by other producers. Polow Da Don, Swizz Beats, Bangladesh, Lil Jon, Timbaland, Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis, Mr. Collipark, and Scott Storch have all produced songs that Sean has written. So why isn’t he satisfied?

I guess it’s the drive that makes men and women achieve greatness that also won’t allow them to feel satisfied with their accomplishments. I don’t know whether Sean will achieve the solo success he’s looking for or not, but I do know he’s already earned at least a little recognition from those of us who consider ourselves music aficionados.

To those who are celebrating today and the next couple weeks, happy holidays. Some of my happiest Christmas memories involve the Hip Hop CD’s I would receive each year as a gift. I remember trying to find CD’s without parental advisory stickers to ask my Grandma to buy me, and arguing with my mom about why Slick Rick’s Behind Bars was actually not a gangsta rap record, and didn’t completely go against everything Christmas stood for like she said. I know kids don’t ask for CDs anymore, but hopefully they will include some Hip Hop downloads with those Itunes and Zune giftcards they get. Keep the tradition alive. And now, in honor of the holiday, a special Christmas edition of Historical Weed Sessions.

Ganja Ice Weed (It’s winter time, it only seemed right. Plus this bud makes everyone jolly.)

Location FAO Schwarz on 5th Ave in New York (Every kid’s dream come true, unsupervised fun in a toy store)

Participants

Ishmael Reed (Teacher, Poet, Author, Essayist, Oaksterdam resident, Ishmael Reed is one of my favorite authors of all time. Every year around Christmas I read his novels The Terrible Two’s and The Terrible Three’s. They are about Christmas, but so much more. If you haven’t read anything by him, do yourself a favor, and pick these classics up.)

Washington Irving (Also an author, his book The Sketchbook of Geoffrey Crayon is credited with inventing many of the traditions that started the modern American celebration of the holiday. Prior to his time, Christmas wasn’t really celebrated here, and when it was, it was a raucous carnival event, not a wholesome family holiday)

Chevy Chase (Just as influential, in my opinion, as Washington Irving on the current culture of Christmas through his National Lampoon movie.)

These lyrics aren’t new, so don’t expect anything you haven’t heard already. But maybe it is something you haven’t fully appreciated yet. The song is “NY Weather Report” off Kweli’s Eardrum.

The song was actually second on the record, but it really served as a jump start for the album. The track is crazy, the hook is crazy, and Talib is really at his best lyrically. His ability to paint a picture is in full effect, as well as his ability to relate that picture to the listeners experience. He doesn’t just show you something, he shows you something you knew already, but in a way that makes it part of the tragic yet beautiful fabric of human existence, rather than just your own lonely circumstances. And if that was too wordy for ya, he makes your troubles seem easier by letting you know he feels your pain. Plus his wordplay is superb. This is a perfect example. Peep

Futuristic lyricist, straight from the renaissance
Top of the supper chain, rap’s upper echelons
My people sufferin’, slave to another chain
This voyage is maiden, like my mother other name
Is this your first trip to hell? We venture capitalists
If it’s a product, then we got it for sale
When I first started to spell, my words fell into rhymes
Turned into songs, everything else fell into line
I painted pictures you could see, the people bleed in my bars
When I was a teen I was mean, about to reach for the stars
So if I fell, I fell right in the cloud, tighten the valve
Niggas is watered down, used to be no bitin’ allowed
Now they gangstas, no cryin’ allowed
You probably see a fight on the stage before you see a fight in the crowd
I send this out to my people facin’ the storm, homey we ridin’ it out
You inspire what I’m writin’ about

I’m not a judge, but I’m handin’ out sentences
For political prisoners, and regular inmates with no visitors
Niggas in the street outside the reach of the ministers
Not those that say “spiritual,” but actual practitioners
Rap listeners who be openin’ Black businesses
This underground shit with samples that lack clearances
Once you get past appearances, you can tell whose shit is fake
Or whose shit is based on past experience
You really been to war hand to hand like crack sales
Building man to man, they tryna kill off the black male
Females left to raise up her son, from the day he was one
Til he twenty and he raise up a gun
And get to blazin’ for his place in the sun
The smoke grazin’ his lung, young in his years and he facin’ a ton
None of his peers wanna share the role of child care provider
But they’ll hit a nigga blunt and share saliva
You ain’t a rider and you hustlin’ backwards
Too many equate success with imitating these crackers
So our kids lookin’ up to drug dealers and rappers
We takin’ all the work away from the Black actors
Revelation is first and Armageddon is after
Tsunamis and hurricanes, natural disasters
The fast food culture, speed is always a factor
Instant gratification, they want the cash faster

The South side of Chicago. The place where Mo Town ain’t got nothin to do with singing. The part of the windy city where the wild hundreds lurks like a jungle on the edge of the suburbs, and the working class dreams of upward mobility fight against the realities of ever increasing rents and utility prices. Generations of people under the same roof. Under the same pressure. Under the same cold Chicago sky.

It’s a place Gemstones knows. And the music that he makes sounds like Chicago to me. It reminds me of so many people I’ve known and spent time with. It reminds me of so many places I’ve spent time in and learned from. It reminds me of myself. A hungry young man looking for a way, any way, to have his voice heard through all the madness.  So Gemstones raps, sings, writes poems, produces, manages, and whatever the fuck else he can do to express his art. He’s even created a convenient sample track that highlights his work on Lupe’s albums.
So if you never heard of Gemini or Gemstones, now you know. You feel like you need a little more info? His phone number is 773-840-7925. Give him a call. His mixtapes are available including Fahrenheit 1st N 15 Volume 6, and Coast to Coast Exclusives Vol 3. for my mailing list members, and for the rest, here’s a taste.

Unlearn is one of those MC’s who still make me listen to Hip Hop with optimism. Not only are his lyrics on point, they are often poignant. He’s a New York MC, and he follows in the grand tradition of intelligent shit talkers from the World’s capital. His flow is versatile, and really shows his Uptown roots. Though he’s from Washington Heights, he reminds me a lot of Harlem’s Big L or BX’s Pun in delivery, but in his own way. And his subject matter is more revolutionary like Immortal Technique. Either way, he’s definitely giving you that other side of the Uptown movement.

On top of that, he’s also got production from some of the hottest new producers in the game including Jake One, Wyldfyre, and Fresh Airez. It’s really a street album, not a mixtape, and the polished nature of the recordings make this a real pleasurable listen. Not a lot of people know about Unlearn, so this should serve as a great first impression for new fans. It’s a quality project full of dope songs, and I highly recommend checking it out. For your free MP3 copy, send an email to hiphoplivesmixtapes@gmail.com, and as always, a sample is provided below for your enjoyment.