There's so much going on during the seven minutes of this video that it's hard for me to pinpoint just what exactly I find so fascinating about it. Starring Mr. Dead and M. Sayyid of the Antipop Consortium, it's equal parts horror movie, kung fu flick and public access style performance video. Mixed in with all of that is a closeup of Mr. Dead eating a live boa constrictor (with a side of maggots), instructions on how to pencil fight, a cameo from MC Paul Barman and an intermission that crashes through the fourth wall to explain that the location for the video needed to be changed halfway through filming after the crew was kicked out of the original site for stealing liquor from the bar. There's even a brief blooper reel at the end. If MTV ever bothered to play videos like this, they might actually win back some of their audience share from vimeo and youtube.
Though this is the first I've heard of him, according to Brooklyn emcee Mr. Dead's biography he's been releasing albums since the 90's, originally as part of the group Metabolics, a group that Prince Paul "discovered" while recording Psychoanalysis. Prior to that, Mr. Dead worked as a makeup artist on various horror movies (I was unable to track down specifically which ones) and one of the Gravediggaz videos. Judging from both his lyrics and the artwork for his past albums, the horror genre seems to have had a rather significant influence on his work.
Of the various types of artists that have (ab)used autotune over the past few years, the one group that could have done so without being begrudged for it - unsigned artists - rarely took advantage of the software. Typically lacking the big label budget for either the required vocal training necessary to sing a proper hook, or for the fee to cover a more accomplished singer's guest appearance, autotune seemed to be a legitimate solution for unsigned rappers looking to polish up their out-of-key choruses into something more professional. Granted, even the entry level package for autotune is fairly expensive, but as anyone in the music industry should know by now, bittorrent has the magical ability to make anything affordable.
It's interesting, then, that shortly after Jay-Z's halfhearted obituary, Baltimore rapper 810 has put together one of the few autotuned songs that makes relatively good use of the software. I'll never be a big fan of autotune, but I will say that the chorus on Walking a Tite Rope, 810's entry for Buck Marley's new mixtape, is respectable. At the very least, it manages not to distract from the rest of the song, which features 810's typically solid delivery. Peep:
Produced by Philly's DCypher, the beat features a sample from Art of Noise's Moments in Love. It's been sampled by a ton of other hip hop songs, but the only one that comes to mind right now is Uncle L's Doin' It (Again).
For about the past year, I've been getting a fairly steady stream of promos from West Philly emcee Sic Osyrus (as in, "Psycho Cyrus"). More often than not the music submitted from his camp has been pretty good, but I initially dismissed him as the type of manufactured street rapper that gets polished up by the record label p.r. agencies just enough to get some play on the radio. Part of that initial impression was a result of his mixtape covers, which featured the same kind of artwork and design (and more than likely put together by the same artist) found on 90% of the mixtapes over at datpiff, and part of it came from the fact that the only sites he seemed to get featured on were Vibe's favorite blogs, the sites that get hand fed most of their material from the major labels.
My impression began to change shortly after I heard Sic on last year's I Still Love Her with Skyzoo, an ode to hip hop that was in a different lane from what I had expected to hear from the man. Last week I received the following song off of Sic's latest mixtape, Siconomics 3, featuring the homie Nico the Beast, which has convinced me that I need to start checking for more of Osyrus' material. Any rapper that has the good sense to get a guest verse from Nico can't be all bad. Peep:
I don't usually pay much attention to what the comment section over at NahRight has to say, but it was heartening to see the following reaction to Nico's verse after the song was posted over there:
"i think the second dude [Nico] is fire wanna hear more music by him if he has it"
The few times that Kosha Dillz has been featured on this site, it's resulted in mixed (to say the least) reactions to his support of Zionism and his place in hip hop. When we interviewed Kosha this past winter, he offered up a fairly coherent defense of his beliefs. Not everyone bought his argument that hip hop, as a community, should support Israel, but at the very least his responses showed that he was well aware of how divisive the subject can be, and he seemed intent on generating further positive discussions on the matter.
Knowing, then, that Kosha is pretty sharp, and certainly not naive enough to think that shouting out Israel in a hip hop song wouldn't draw some sort of reaction, I was left wondering about the thought process behind the lyrics to his latest single, Cellular Phone off of his upcoming album Beverly Dillz. In the chorus, Kosha says, "I don't need to talk no politics, I leave that stuff alone," and then follows that up with a decidedly political line about, "Jerusalem, yeah you know the city that belongs to the Jews and them." Given the 3000 years of bitter fighting over the ownership of said city, which continues to this day, it's disingenuous, to put it mildly, to drop those two lines in the same breath. Particularly within the context of the song itself, an upbeat track about nothing in particular, it's an odd verse:
I do think Kosha's a talented emcee, and I continue to think that he has the potential to make some interesting contributions if he ever decides to cut out the coy references to Israel and the baggage that comes along with that. Hip hop's been missing a voice to act as a counterpoint to the anti-Zionist rantings of Immortal Technique and his followers, and simply by being the sole emcee of Israeli heritage (that I'm aware of) Kosha Dillz is certainly in position to become that voice if he decides to embrace the role and put out songs that more directly address the issue. It's hard to take him seriously on the subject, however, when he goes from being a vocal proponent of Zionism one moment to dancing around the subject the next. Perhaps he just wants to be the type of rapper that puts out joints for the radio, but if that's the case he'll find more success if he cuts out the references to his homeland and sticks to the party raps.
The first time I watched this video, I have to admit I wasn't entirely sure whether the intent was to glorify the use of heroin. With a delivery that seems to have been inspired by Lil Fame and Billy Danze, Jim Snooka raps from the perspective of black tar heroin, almost boasting about the effects of the drug. It's the kind of song that used to have parents afraid of rap, before rap became the soundtrack to Gap and Burger King commercials.
Alternating between segments of a rather sobering documentary on heroin users (the documentary is Black Tar Heroin, if I'm not mistaken) and shots from a Hype Williams-style high energy video (shot by DJ Bless), I'd imagine this is a fair approximation of the highs and lows that a heroin addict goes through between hits.
As many songs that come out these days from internet gangsters and e-Thugs, spitting lyrics about shootouts and drug deals that could only have occurred during a session of GTA4, there seem to be just as many songs that call out the virtual 'bangers for promoting a lifestyle that they've never experienced. Quit, from former Native Guns member Bambu, is yet another entry in the latter category, however Bam's criticism has a little more weight behind it as he was in a gang during his high school years and actually understands the consequences of the lifestyle, having served time in prison as a result of his gang affiliation. It's certainly not a new argument, but it's hard to argue with Bambu's point that the glorification of gang life by rappers who have only seen Hollywood's version of it is little more than an exploitation of the real lives that have been lost to violence.
Quit was produced by Jersey City's iLLMind. The song is off of his album Exact Change, which you can cop over at cdbaby.
Over the past two months, my inbox has seen an exponential increase in submissions and, as a result, I haven't had the chance to spotlight as many of the artists as I would have liked. In an effort to catch up, here are a few of the submissions that stood out:
Scheme, who underground heads are no doubt familiar with as a member of Chicago's Molemen, came through after we put up his video for Chicano. Always cool when one of the artists stops by (even if it was just through a google vanity search!), and Scheme was kind enough to pass along the second single from his Manifesto EP, to be released on June 16th.
Lyrical Fluctuation is being billed as a "digital exclusive" (though I can't say I fully understand the significance of that label) from Foundation Media. Mainly putting it up for the new verse from Monch.
This is the first song I've ever heard from The Regiment, a Detroit-based duo signed to Rawkus, but apparently they've already released a couple of albums. Old School Vibe is off of their second album, A New Beginning.
In case you haven't gotten around to listening to it - and I'll admit I haven't - Duck Down has made the entire Double Barrel album from Marco Polo and Torae available for free, albeit in its "clean" form. You'll have to put down some money to hear the "real" version, though judging from the reviews online it sounds like it's well worth the 15 bucks.
Not a song per se, but worth checking out regardless. I don't have any kids, so I have to admit I'm not entirely in touch with the Yo Gabba Gabba! phenomenon, but my homie Mike tells me that Biz makes frequent appearances on the show. While you're over there, peep Biz's instructional video.
There are still a bunch of other songs that I hope to get around to at some point this week, including a couple of new tracks from MAGr. Hopefully I'll get a chance to put those up in the next day or two.
After a weekend spent partaking of cheap beer and listening to mixes from The Rub - in other words, a typical weekend during the summer BBQ season - the above song seemed appropriate. From the emcee/producer duo of Wax and EOM, Music and Liquor is the second single off of their album Liquid Courage (here's the first video).
For a thorough examination of Wax and EOM's album, Liquid Courage, hit up kevingnottingham.com. Or just cop it over at cdbaby, it's pretty good.
For no other reason than I was looking for some good music to play this weekend, here are a few of my favorite reggae dancehall joints. More videos after the jump from Shabba, Super Cat, Capleton, and Yellowman.
Got any favorites of your own? Leave a suggestion in the comments.
Update: My man Max has posted a great mix of classic dancehall, which you can grab here. You can find the tracklisting for the mix over in the comments section.
As I've said many times before, when it comes to Rhode Island emcee Charlie "Chachi" Carvalho it's hard for me to be objective. Nearly a decade before he was headlining shows in NYC, I used to hang with Charlie when he was just learning how to freestyle and lip synching to Wu-Tang songs in the dorms of Boston College. That's okay, though, because with all of the accolades he's been piling up as an artist recently - he's won awards from Vibe magazine, appeared multiple times on BET and shared the stage with Immortal Technique and Digable Planets - he doesn't really need me to act as his hypeman anyway.
Chachi is preparing to drop his debut album, About Time, and in advance of that he's rereleased his 2008 mixtape The Green. If you're not familiar with Chachi, the mixtape will serve as a great introduction to what he's all about as an artist. With a style that's reminiscent of hip hop from the early 90's, Chachi's music is pretty evenly split between socially conscious tracks and joints for the party. With beats that borrow heavily from classic soul records, he puts out the kind of songs that you can actually dance to like grown folks do.
And if you get a chance, please vote in The Phoenix's poll for Chachi as the "Best Hip Hop Act in Providence." 
