The awful truth is that rap bloggers are essentially glorified publicists. You can pick and choose who you ‘support’ or ‘expose’ but essentially all you’re doing is selecting which angle you want to roll with. Even if your blog focuses on old records, you’re essentially just promoting some European kid’s next Random Rap ebay auction. Writing reviews is basically an exercise in vanity, since 90% of the people reading the review already have the album anyway, and the only thing you might possibly achieve is ruffling the feathers of the over-sensitive artists who sent you the stuff in the first place. The idea that rap blogs are dictating radio or sales in any major way is laughable, and the theory that anyone actually values the opinion of anyone on the Rap Internets is even more of a joke. The only reason anyone visits one hip-hop site over the other is that it happens to be slightly less annoying than the other ones, or maybe doesn’t post as much crap that you hate.
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A new definition of Black Hoody Rap? Taken from the 2012: The New Beginning album.
This isn’t on Self-Induced Illness but it’s nice regardless. Beat by Shakim Allah, video by A.Jay.D.
The Smooth Assassin delivers a little self-produced somethin’-somethin’ for the day when you’re either declaring ‘I Luh Her’ or ‘Eff You, Pay Me!’ depending on your situation.
Grand Daddy I.U. - ‘Da One’
Bonus:
Grand Daddy I.U. - ‘S.W.A.T. Freestyle’
This dropped three days ago so it’s ancient history in internets time but it’s more than worthy of being dug-up from the murky depths of history… Beat courtesy of Soundahfekz.
Willie The Kid feat. Styles P - ‘Live From The Ritz’
J-Love and Meyhem are both dropping albums over the coming weeks, so I thought I’d see what they have cooked-up for us on Egotistical Maniac and Self-Induced Illness. It’s worth noting that both records are double albums, which is always something I’m in two minds about. On the one hand, the amount of songs you’re getting is great value and it allows you the luxury of choosing the best songs to load onto your ipod or whatever, but the other side of that is there’s an art to creating to a cohesive album and do I really want to listen to 40+ tracks from anybody in a row?
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New Beneficence feat. Roc Marciano. Production & cuts by Presto
Taken from Sidewalk Science, available on CD (17 tracks) and vinyl (12 tracks) March 3rd. This is what I’m talking about…CRC status. “Everything I spit sound Golden Era..”
Beneficence feat. Roc Marciano - ‘Monetary Policy’
Kool Kim breaks down why conscious rap can’t win. Produced by Daniel Carey For EOM beats.
Taken from PEMG presents CRUDE Oil f/ NYOIL, released 24 February 2010.
Some new G Rap in anticipation of his next album. That ALC/Havoc snippet is worth the effort at least…
Kool G Rap – Offer You Can’t Refuse EP
There’s few things more entertaining than upsetting white folks. It’s like shooting fish in a barrel, and when the fish in this particular barrel happen to be mountain climbers who play electric guitar (aka A&R’s) then it gets even more amusing. What could be better than some good old fashioned songs about ‘Devils’? (excluding Jay-Z’s ‘D’Evils’ which is disappointingly free of anti-cracker sentiment).
Produced by Nickel Plated, taken from the forth-coming Egotistical Maniac LP.
I seem to be having a bad run of pissing-off Double-O and Naledge from Kidz In The Hall in recent years. First I accused them of the crime of Hipster Rap, to which they responded on an UGHH.com video, and now it seems that I’ve thrown them under the bus again in my latest guest post for XXL:
I’m assuming ‘lol’ is some kind of code for ‘we’re going to get our bodyguard to put you in a yoke when we find you’, although that may be considered bad karma since the same thing happened to Double-O at that nightclub in Tempe, AZ back in 2008. Since I’ll be living in a cardboard box somewhere in Flushing Meadows Corona Park, I’m sure the money I might make from any resulting lawsuit will come in handy for when I need to buy myself a couple of Ghetto Big Macs.
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Hardknocks delivered something unique when they dropped the School of Hard Knocks album in 1992. It stood-out both musically and lyrically as a sophisticated blend of hardcore rhymes and groove-heavy beats that sounded nothing like any other record of the era. Then they promptly vanished…leaving a lot of unanswered questions for rap fanatics who knew little about the crew itself, save for their earlier incarnation as 3 Da Hard Way. While I’d always assumed that The Spearchuckas, who were credited as the producers, were in fact Hardhead and Stoneface, it turns out I was wrong. When I had the chance to speak to J-1, who was half of the Spearchucka team, I jumped at the opportunity to fill in some of the blanks regarding this outstanding album.
Robbie: How did you start out?
J-1: I’ve been involved in music ever since I was 9 or 10. I played drums, my father played drums, played bass guitar…my family was musically involved. As far as hip-hop is concerned, I was in New York deejaying from 1978 all the way until about five years ago. I grew-up in Long Island. We did all those block parties. The C.B.S. crew. I moved to Atlanta in 1984. I started meeting people and this guy Mike California knew Henry Lee, who was from Noon Time Music. He helped us get started. Now he does Jazzy Pha and Ciara and that kind of stuff.
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