More Suspect Packages news - I'm currently locked onto Disorda's latest podcast - September's Suspect Packages Radio Show. It features newness from Tactical Thinking, Contact Play, Phoenix Da Icefire, Krate Krusaders, Crucifix, The Thunderclaps, Shameless, Wizard, Unfriendly Neighbours, JVF Clique, Foreign Beggars, Yosh, Danny Spice, Rapskallions, Alphabetix, Joe Blow, Orphans Of Cush, Redbeard, SonnyJim, Delusionists, MCM, Sigher The Gutter Snype and Monkey Sons. It's great to know that Disorda is constantly ahead of the game and that he'll always be supporting up-and-coming artists to the maximum.
Purveyors of one of last year's biggest UK Hip Hop club tracks The Thunderclaps are back. This time 'Judgement Day' MC Shameless takes centre stage on their next banger - 'The Man With No Shame'.
The production lives up once more to the name of it's creators and the Paddy Ragga Man drops his rhymes fiercely and without mincing any of his words - a seriously heavy track. At this rate this duo are gonna be big - people will want to hear this.
If you haven't already then I'd strongly advise you pick up a copy of Shamless's LP 'Smokers Die Younger' and the 12" of The Thunderclaps' 'Judgement Day' - two hard and related releases for you.
If it's beats you're looking for then look no further than Evil Ed's 'Edstrumentals Vol. 1'. It's 20 tracks of Evil Ed's best knon instrumentals used by Yungun ('The Art of Celebration' and 'Nico Suave'), Task Force ('The Tournament'), Tommy Evans ('Alright/OK'), The Colony ('Back Up'), Asaviour ('Field Of Dreams') Conspicuous & Shameless ('Write A Song For Me'), Ricochet aka Ric Branson ('A New Way of Thinking' & 'No Pressure') and Jehst ('Alien').
As well as known beats there are a few bonus beats thrown in for good measure and the liner notes include Ed's thoughts and recollections of each beat.
If they're good enough for those MCs then surely they're good enough for you to spit to/juggle with on your CDJs/kick back with when no words are required. Its also pretty chilling background music for Hip Hop Heads to remax to. This is probably a release that will appeal more to existing fans of Evil Ed but any beatfreak should be feeling his classic production style.
Get yersen a copy from Suspect Packages or somewhere like that. If you've not already got it, buy 'The Get Together' too, the album he did with Conspicuous not a few months back.
Here's something I'm looking forward to: Tricksta of UK Runnings and Lunatrix of HHB Radio have teamed up to put together a double disc compilation/mix CD.
Now the UK Runnings series have always hit the spot with me - up-to-date tracks from UK Hip Hop's overground and underground - so my expectations are justifiably high. ‘Flying The Flag’ features underground anthems, exclusive tracks, unreleased tracks and remixes.
The double CD features the following artists; WILEY, SKEPTA, LATE, SUPAR NOVAR, RELOAD, IRON BRAYDZ, DJ SNIPS, TB, PYRELLI, SHAMELESS, RUKUS, SKINNYMAN, DEADLY HUNTA , TINCHY STRYDER, WRETCH 32, TINIE TEMPAH, SCORCHER, BASHY, SWAY, CHIPMUNK, MILLION DAN, MC DYNAMITE, MCD, K.NERS, SKREINTAX, STIG OF THE DUMP, GIGGS, DUBBELEDGE, KYZA, BIG CAKES, M9, CHEMO, THUNDERCLAPS, GHETTO, ORIFICE VULGATRON, REGGIIMENTAL, UNFRIENDLY NEIGHBOURS, LOWKEY, SONNYJIM, MALIK, YOGI, SHADE1, 10SHOTT, SMILER, STYLAH, LETHAL & DESTRUCTION, TOR, SI PHILI, WORDSMITH, KASHMERE, JEHST, CHARLIE SLOTH, JOKER STARR, GENESIS ELIJAH, LOUDMOUTH, BABY J, RANSOM BADBONEZ, DR. SYNTAX, THE LAST SKEPTIK, TRICKSTA, JABBA THA KUT, MANNY MOSCOW and CONMAN amongst many more!
HHBRADIO & UK RUNNINGS Present ‘FLYING THE FLAG’ is out on RGS Entertainment March 2009.
It snowed here on the westside of Yorkshire and as a result I got a day off work! I nearly didn't mind you, but at the last minute the call came through.
So I fired up the computer and itunes played me some tunes - a nice selection I must say. Here are 4:
Thirdly, something new: 'Burning Bush' ft. Redman by 88-Keys - from his new album 'Death of Adam', this is pretty funky but I do hope Red has learnt from his foolish mistake. (What's the betting this gets taken down?)
Fourthly, something mashed up: 'No Hats (In The Curry House)' by Baby J - a mashup of the Shameless track 'No Hats (No Trainers)' and the Kaiser Chiefs track 'Ruby'.
If the aim of ‘Food 4 Da Brain Second Serving’ wasn’t to serve up a platter of perfectly complementing flavours then I’ll eat my hat. If that is what they set out to do then they’ve royally achieved it. The menu offers up tracks from the finest chefs on either side of the UK Hip Hop/Grime divide; in fact it tastily demonstrates the breaking down of the boundary.
With artists like Ghetto and Virus Syndicate represent Grime, rappers and producers such as Kashmere, Verb T, M9 and Jon Phonics provide the Hip Hop and MCs like Skinnyman, Klashnekoff, Mr Ti2bs and Shameless defy pigeon holing altogether.
MCD sets things off with a self-produced, firmly on the grime side, dubplate proving he has progressed and embraced newer, but rooted in older, music styles. Beat Butcha follows up with his remix of Terra Firma’s ‘Git Down’ and it’s just what you’d expect from that collaboration. Chemo then pops up as producer of Manage’s thriller ‘No One Needs To Know’ featuring LeEo. Mr Ti2bs, Virus Syndicate and Ghetto continue to provide quality platters of goodness, all challenging the listener to label it as either Grime or Hip Hop.
Skinnyman and Deadly Hunta serve one of the albums most delicious tracks – ‘Ballistic Affair’ which also comes in the form of a cool animated video on the accompanying DVD. Invisible Inc then provides a rest between courses with their ‘Invisible’ (or is it ‘Invisible Inc Theme’? It’s the same track that’s on 'Rapsploitation Sessions').
Supar Novar and Big Ben heat things up again and Jon Phonics follows with a remix of M9’s ‘Strange Fruit’ (possibly better than the album version?). Deadly Hunta brings a few more raga vibes on ‘Valley of Death’ and Foreign Beggars come with some electro-funk and Pharrell-esque vocals. Shameless, Bruza and Ghetto finish the sitting with some hard-as-nails riddims.
I can see what the guys behind this have done: they’re on a mission, a mission to blur the boundaries, to lure Hip Hop heads over to the Grime side and vice-versa. This is all about the music, and despite my review, it’s not about genre. This is, actually, what Hip Hop was – the combination of other music forms, a new way of expression that utilises the sounds around it. So whatever you’re preference, buy this and think about the message it not so subtly puts across, ask yourself: ‘Am I open minded?’ Let’s hope so.
At 15 tracks deep, coming in at just over 50 minutes, ‘The Get Together’ is no hard slog. I’ve already listened to it a few times today and am beginning again; it doesn’t get boring despite the outwardly conventional Hip Hop template.
Evil Ed is known for having produced for Jehst, Yungun and a whole host of other UK names. His production LP ‘The Enthusiast’ featured vocals from Kyza, the Colony, Doc Brown, Tommy Evans and Asaviour amongst others. Conspicuous (aka Conspicuous the Coroner aka Cons) a member of The Colony along with Willo Wispa, Grimlok and Sir Smurf Lil’, has previously dropped two albums, ‘Backgammon’ in ’05 and ‘The Family Photo Album’ last year.
Cons is on point with some carefully constructed verses that proudly display his rhyming ability (probably the reason why ‘81’s Favourite Son’ was sequenced first). The guests contribute only pure fire too, there are no duff appearances and no-one steals anyone else’s shine. It’s not just ‘BBQ’ that has a brotherly BBQ-ish feel; the whole album is like one relaxed cipher. Ed’s production is of a high quality, there are no hastily looped breaks here, no drums slapped on top of some old soul; this is sampling at its most professional and top that, it’ll keep your head nodding all the while.
Stand out tracks come in the form of UK/US posse cut ‘Ill-Out’ and ‘Big Headed’. The former for its jazziness, cuts, contrasting accents and sick lyrics. The latter for the pianos, Willo Wispa’s inimitable slackness and Mudmowth’s mentalness.
‘The Get Together’ serves as a great follow-up album for both artists. With a multitude of big guests, including some from over the pond, the duo has crafted a comprehensive body of work that should garner many spins by any Hip Hop head fortunate to pick up a copy of this.
Go here to download free stuff from the mans who brought you the epic 'Judgement Day'. All you MCs can get the 'Judgement Day' instrumental, you can download the video, a mix they did for Pyroradio, a track called 'Put Em In Their Place (Grime Remix)' and some other things.
Here's the video to the apocalyptic 'Judgement Day' featuring Orifice Vulgatron, Ghetto and Shameless. It features loads and millions and then some more clips of your favourite films. You should watch it and spot them all. I think even the guy off the anti-piracy ad makes an appearance!
Oh my word! Banger of the year? It could well be, nothing else this heavy springs to mind. The Thunderclaps have chosen their name with such precision that one of the only ways you can describe 'Judgement Day' is thunderous, that's if you can pick your jaw up from the floor and form words.
The Thunderclaps are a British production outfit and their new track 'Judgement Day' features Orifice Vulgatron (of the legendary Foreign Beggars), Shameless and Ghetto. This is the UK version of a collaboration (imaginary of course) between M.O.P., Busta Rhymes and DMX at their most ferocious. Musically The Thunderclaps give Carl Orff a marathon for his money. This is epic, cinematic, screw-your-face-up, full scale drama on wax.
The combination of these three MC's couldn't get any better - it transcends UK genre and produces something more powerful than either side could create on their own. Ghetto is THE best, nay, the ONLY MC worth listening to in the new wave of British MC's with Grime roots. Orifice has fully paid his dues and has always done things differently to others. Shameless has recently brought the rock and live influence into UK Rap. They are all hungry, vicious rappers and together they make this track blisteringly terrifying (in the nicest possible way!).
Baby J has rapidly become well known in Hip Hop, mainly in the UK but as a result of working with Wu-Affiliate Shabazz the Disciple, Brand Nubian and Dead Prez and others there are some in the US who will also know his name. His knack for sampling already insanely catchy songs and matching them up to MC's and singers who are actually decent has seen him score a few successes. 'Young, Gifted & Black' featuring Dynamite MC got loads of Radio 1 airplay, he produced a good few tracks on Skinnyman's album debut 'Council Estate of Mind' and entirely produced Blade's last ever album 'Guerrilla Tactics'. He has had two great 'Mixtapes' (F.T.P. & FTP2: Fight The Power) that are really more like production albums featuring the likes of Fallacy, Mr Ti2bs, Rukus, Yogi, Ty, Klashnekoff, A-Alikes and Moorish Delta 7 as well as others.
Now, Baby J has 'Fix The Problem: FTP The Mixtape pt.2' which slightly confused me because I didn't even know the first one existed (it does, it's called 'For The People: FTP The Mixtape' and if anyone wants to send me a copy, be my guest). Anyway, 'Fix The Problem' seems to follow along the lines of the first mixtape in that it's got hundreds of tracks, each one a verse from a different rapper.
Actually it's got 'MORE THEN 60 OF THE WORLDS BEST BLACK MUSIC ARTISTS, PERFORMING OVER BABY J'S GREATEST INSTRUMENTALS' - and this is where I take my only issue with this CD. In that one sentence, emblazoned (well not quite, but it's there) across the front there are 2 errors that annoy me and something else that just nags me. First, 'MORE THEN' - it's 'More than' and secondly, 'WORLDS BEST' when it should have an apostrophe - 'World's best'. Now I know that sounds fussy but if you want to be professional, spelling and grammar is important. The third thing that gets my goat is 'BLACK MUSIC ARTISTS'. I don't like that as an umbrella name for Hip Hop, Grime, R'n'B and whatever else it encompasses, especially when half of the folks on here are white! Gripe done.
It's a great collection of guest verses (there are 65 tracks/verses) from the likes of Million Dan, Jehst, Shameless, Brotherman, Asher D, Young Max, Yungun and Dynamite MC and obviously, a flippin' truckload more. Consider this a starter course for Baby J's 'Baby Food' album, scheduled to drop in October.
The big single off 'Baby Food' is 'Lies', a simplistic track that features Asher D (going by his real name - Ashley Walters - trying to shake off the old So Solid/jailed for gun crime associations?). For you Americans, he's the guy who played one of Marcus's mates in 50 Cent's 'Get Rich or Try Dying' film (y'know he got shot and was in hospital and that). It also features UK R'nB 'sensation' Nathan. It's a really catchy,insanely radio friendly, modern sounding piece of slick UK Hip Hop; it's destined to attract teenyboppers/radio listeners and props to Baby for that! It's got a nice, light summery vibe to it too; it'll be unoffensive to your ears as you sit back in your hammock this August.
Check back here in the autumn/fall for a review of 'Baby Food'. As a fan who has actually bought his previous work (Gasp! People buy music?!), I'm really looking forward to it especially since I know it's going to feature guests old and new: Million Dan and Farma G (of Task Force) being my most anticipated collaborations!
One of the biggest tunes from this end of the year has got to be 'Black Boys' by Bashy. I've posted this track before but since then there has been an abundance of remixes and a video shoot. If you were to listen to all of the remixes you'd hear verses from the very cutting edge of UK Hip Hop and Grime. You could hear Ty, Wretch 32, Durrty Goodz, Skepta, Swiss, Sincere, Nolay, Chipmunk, Dynamite, Reggie Yates, Scorcher, Ghetto, J2K, Alaye, Big Narstie, Bigz, Mike GLC, Styla and more! Rumours of the inclusion of L.Man, Skinnyman, Klashnekoff and Lethal B are also flying around although I've not heard these ones yet!
According to Ed Strong of The IRS the video has been banned from MTV because it is apparently too racist. So it's focussed mainly on black role models but as a white person I don't feel like I'm being racially discriminated against. If I can say this, massive companies like MTV should be supporting stuff like this. Everyone is always complaining about the negative effect of 'Urban' music on the youth of our country. The basis of this song is that there are positive role models who aren't glamourising gun culture, drug peddling, misogyny and the like. Artists like this are who the youth need, it is ridiculous that they are banning this and still playing the Snoop vids, the G-Unit vids and the Dipset vids. Someone with absolutely no grip on reality must be in charge of the playlist at MTV. Is the word 'Black' still such a negative thing? Are ignorant people stilled scared of it?
Bashy also features on the excellent remix of 'Punctuation' by Wretch 32 alongside Shameless and Scorcher. It's so good to see young UK blood doing something creative. UK artists, especially young up-and-coming ones are still relying too heavily on the street narrative, grimey life tales kind of lyrics. Punctuation is an innovative way for Bashy et al to say "I'm great". The very nature in which they do this supports their message; they are great because they have come up with concept and pulled it off very well. This is one of my favourite tracks this year full stop.
More Suspect Packages news - I'm currently locked onto Disorda's latest podcast - September's Suspect Packages Radio Show. It features newness from Tactical Thinking, Contact Play, Phoenix Da Icefire, Krate Krusaders, Crucifix, The Thunderclaps, Shameless, Wizard, Unfriendly Neighbours, JVF Clique, Foreign Beggars, Yosh, Danny Spice, Rapskallions, Alphabetix, Joe Blow, Orphans Of Cush, Redbeard, SonnyJim, Delusionists, MCM, Sigher The Gutter Snype and Monkey Sons. It's great to know that Disorda is constantly ahead of the game and that he'll always be supporting up-and-coming artists to the maximum.
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