The Black Dog & Roc C/IMAKEMADBEATS Reviews at Exclaim!

Here’s two recent reviews I wrote for Exclaim! Magazine for the Black Dog’s Further Vexations and Roc C & IMAKEMADBEATS’ The Transcontinental. Click the blurbs to read the full reviews. I’m pretty happy with the Black Dog review; it’s my first time writing about electronica!

The Transcontinental:

When he was signed to Stones Throw, Roc 'C' stood out from his labelmates with his gruff bark and street-orientated rhymes. Divorced of that context, he's just another street rapper without a distinctive mic presence. Guest spots by the likes of Prince Po of Organized Konfusion, Rapper Big Pooh, Chino XL and the formerly-MIA Mic Geronimo only serve to highlight the lackluster quality of Roc's rhymes. Weak hooks don't help matters.

Further Vexations:

The album's centerpiece is the three-part "Northern Electronic Soul" suite, which slowly builds into a monumental shifting rhythm, shadowed by burbling synthesizers. "Stempel" is all ominous strings and foreboding tick-tock rhythms. The last five tracks take a turn toward even darker venues; "Skin Clock" throbs and pulsates like its title and "Tunnels Ov Set" is an unnerving creep through industrial terrain. Further Vexations is dense but rewards repeat listens to tease out its many intricacies. Spend some time with this one.

The Organized Noize Beat Drop at Metal Lungies

I’m two days late, but I think it’s appropriate I’m posting this today – I’ve been listening to Goodie Mob’s Soul Food continuously over the last two days.For lack of a decent pic of Organized Noize, here’s a picture of most of the Dungeon Family. ONP are best known for their production for Outkast, Goodie Mob and the rest of the Dungeon Family collective, but their output goes further than that.

For the uninitiated, the Beat Drop is a regular feature on Metal Lungies, where we choose a producer and each of the site's contributor picks about 5 of their favourite beats by said producer and writes about them. This time we didn’t have any extra special guests, just several writers we respect. I’m proud of this one. My picks were "Watch For The Hook” by Cool Breeze, Goodie Mob’s“The Coming” and “Thought Process”, Outkast’s “Return of the G” and Bubba Sparxxx’s “Wonderful”. Click my blurb on “Watch For The Hook” to read the whole thing.

ONP expertly chop Merry Clayton’s cover of “Southern Man” into pieces and string snatches of its ominous keyboards and a ringing guitar riff together with these fantastic stuttering, stumbling drums. What’s incredible about “Watch For The Hook” is that the instrumental fits each emcee’s voice and flow perfectly — Witchdoctor’s blunted mumble, Cee-Lo’s helium babbling, T-Mo’s fiery bark, Big Gipp’s plain-spoken twang, Big Boi’s slick double-time spitting, Breeze’s authoritative drawl, and so forth. Of course, the lyrics to “Southern Man” share common ground with the more righteous Goodie Mob songs, too.

Marco Polo & Torae Review and Interview at Exclaim!

I recently reviewed Marco Polo and Torae's album Double Barrel over at Exclaim! and did a short interview with the duo. Click the blurb for the full article.

Marco Polo and Torae are touting Double Barrel as a return to the gritty hip-hop coming from New York in the mid-'90s, embodied by groups like Gang Starr, Onyx and the Boot Camp Clik. It's fitting that Double Barrel is being released by Duck Down Records, home of Black Moon, Smif-n-Wessun and Heltah Skeltah. The duo work closely from the blueprint the aforementioned groups originated, with expertly scratched choruses, hard drums and forceful rhyming from MC Torae. NYC-by-way-of-T-Dot producer Marco Polo provides 14 perfectly dusty boom-bap instrumentals, which Torae rips to pieces. Those introduced to the Coney Island-bred rapper through his 2008 mixtape, Daily Conversation, will be surprised by his newly aggressive delivery. When Torae's rhymes equal the intensity of Polo's tracks, the results are hard to dispute. The swirling strings and clipped horns on "But Wait" are matched perfectly with a Sticky Fingaz vocal sample and Torae's potent rhyming. "Smoke" is a blistering posse cut with exemplary tough talk from Lil' Fame from M.O.P. and Rock from Heltah Skeltah, and "Hold Up" has an insistent spy movie theme groove with verses from Sean Price and Masta Ace. Torae delivers his best performance over the ominous, creeping thump of "Lifetime," backed by DJ Revolution's jaw-dropping scratches. Tougher than a pair of old Timbs, Double Barrel is '90s revivalism done right.

Jens Lekman's 2009 Summer Mix Tape: "The Summer Never Ends"

Jens Lekman is one of my favourite singer/songwriters, and also probably the nicest guy ever. He graciously replied to a fan email I sent him a year ago, which grants him an eternal spot in my good book. If you're not familiar with Jen's work, he's a Swedish troubadour known for his sweet, hilarious lyrics who builds his songs out of samples. Jens put together a little mix for the warm weather, you can pick it up here (right click). You can also cop the other summer mix he put together a few years back here.

Here's the track listing:

1. “The Summer Never Ends” (excerpt)
2. “I Really Think That We Can Make It Girl”
3. Nicolette Larsson - “Lotta Love”
4. The Embassy - “State 08”
5. “New Directions” (excerpt)
6. Coke Escovedo - “I Wouldn't Change A Thing”
7. Filippo Trecca - “La Morte Dell'erminia”
8. “His name is Mikael Carlsson, her name is Alicia Keys”
9. Lamont Dozier - “Blue Sky and Silver Bird”
10. Cat Stevens - “If You Want To Sing Out, Sing Out”
11. Jeff Perry - “Love Don't Come No Stronger”
12. Good News - “Australia”
13. Baby's Gang - “America”
14. American Breed - “Always You”

For good measure, here's the great video for "Sipping On The Sweet Nectar", off 2007's Night Falls Over Kortedala.

I'm working on my own summer mixtape at the moment; so far I've got a lot of Brazilian pop, some reggae and Trick Daddy (natch). Stay tuned, I'll post it when it's done.

"On The Show, You're A Dope": Letterman Deconstructs Reality TV.

I've been forced to watch The Hills exactly once. I think the show's success signals the decline of North American culture* but we are culturally compensated for it when the "stars" of the show appear on The Late Show. These appearances are a deep, plentiful vein of uncomfortable humour which, at its best, surpasses the greatest episodes of Curb Your Enthusiasm or the U.K. version of The Office. Letterman refuses to simply give reality TV stars the privilege to be considered celebrities; he toys with them and forces them to justify their presence on his couch. In his interviews with Lauren Conrad, Dave balances a clear infatuation with Conrad with a bemused sense of wonder that these people are being paid money for what they do.

Even better is Dave's interview with Spencer Pratt, where he makes no attempt to hide his utter contempt for Pratt as a human being.

Dave: What do you do, exactly?

The lack of any self-awareness on the part of the show's cast members takes the comedy to a level of high absurdity. I hope The Hills lasts for another 5 seasons just so Dave can continue to interview members of the cast.

*replace this with any other statement calling popular culture stupid here.

R. L. Stine, Trailer.

My fellow late 80s and 90s babies, I trust you remember R.L. Stine? This is a trailer for a fake biopic of Stine, brilliantly skewing all the classic biopic cliches. The Gene Shalit quote kills me.

You're scaring the children!

They're scaring me!

Related: Troy Steele has been steadily reviewing every single Goosebumps book at Blogger Beware. His reviews are hilarious and awesome, and I can't do them justice. Start here.

Exclaim! Magazine: Krumbsnatcha - "Hidden Scriptures" Review

This review will be printed in the April issue of Exclaim! This will actually be my first piece of writing to get into print, exciting times! This album is actually not that bad. The best tracks are really good. Krumb's flow seems to have weakened a bit since the days of Moment of Truth.

It's been 11 years since Krumbsnatcha's career-making appearance on Gang Starr's "Make 'Em Pay" and five years since the Boston MC's last album. While Scriptures features no DJ Premier beats, the presence of Mr. Walt (of Da Beatminerz), Pete Rock, Large Professor and Statik Selektah behind the boards makes up for it. Unfortunately the rest of the album's production is handled by unpromising no-names. For his part, Krumb is blessed with a throaty voice and a steady flow, and spits consistent, straightforward lyrics in the vein of fellow Bostonians Akrobatik and Ed O.G. Scriptures is hurt by its excessive one-hour-plus runtime and weak hooks, but the hits make up for the misses. "L.O.V.E." is a sincere dedication to hip-hop that succeeds despite its familiar sample. "Feeling" features Krumb flowing nicely over a smooth Mr. Walt beat, accompanied by a catchy Kanye vocal sample. Pete Rock's two contributions," Begins" and "Yesterday," see Krumb promising a fresh start and acknowledging past mistakes over engaging Pete beats. While the album is uneven and overlong, Hidden Scriptures' highlights present a strong argument for Krumbsnatcha's relevance in 2009. Let's hope we don't have to wait another five years for the follow-up. (Str8 Up)

Here's the video for album highlight, "Feeling":