November 30th, 2007
I…listened to all that Death Row stuff….and Lords Of The Underground, Busta Rhymes, Redman and Keith Murray, where your takes had to be so clean and ill to get off the phonetics that you were dropping. Your lines had to be crisp. Other cats don’t come from that school. It took me studying Redman, Method Man, Keith Murray and Wu-Tang. Listening to Kurupt, Daz, Jay-Z, Biggie and Snoop Dogg over and over again.-Bishop Lamont @ XXL
West Coast rappers do not listen to The Lords of the Undergrounds, let alone name-drop them as primary influences. LA is 2Pac country: rappers south of the 10 emulate him, Beverly Hills Persian kids blare “How Do U Want It,” from BMW’s, at Venice Beach, illegal sidewalk vendors sell-out of 2Pac-as-martyr towels and t-shirts. I blame the song “To Live in Die in LA.” We Angelenos are fiercely loyal to only two things: ourselves and songs written about the city of Los Angeles. If Roman Polanski had written “I Love LA,” we would’ve welcomed him back with open arms.
I have nothing against 2Pac. He’s better than his detractors think but not nearly as great as his iconographers would love to believe. In and of himself he’s fine, but his long shadow has cast a pall over a million knucklehead copycats who think being “thugged out” is an adequate substitute for being a good rapper. Then again, I can’t blame them. Being a West Coast gangster rapper is a potential cash-cow. Ice-T wrote the blueprint. N.W.A. mastered the art of turning controversy into sales, 2Pac perfected it and in this millenium, Dr. Dre and his proteges, Eminem, 50 Cent, and The Game, turned it into a well-oiled machine.
Which brings me somehow to Bishop Lamont. In all honesty, I didn’t even know who the guy was until he dropped the Caltroit mixtape two weeks ago. And I only downloaded the tape in the first place because of its producer, the Fat Beats-signed, Motown-based, Black Milk, who in addition to being a flavor of Nestle’s Quick, might just be the rightful heir to J Dilla’s departed throne. As for Bishop, I didn’t even know that he was a rapper. I’m pretty sure that I thought he was the mixtape DJ, with a name inspired by the Bishop Magic Don Juan. Anyhow, Caltroit ended up on my iPod and I ended up in the gym, listening on shuffle, doing my best to ignore Fabio doing bicep curls right next to me. This is 100 percent true. The now-aged and equine-looking Euro actually works out at my gym. Yes, I know, it’s really fucking strange.
I Now Pronounce You….Emperor of the Holy Romance Empire
Suddenly, “Goatit” slashed across my headphones, making me completely forget the surfeit of “I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter Spray” jokes cackling through my head. Minus Lamont, “Goatit” would still be a great song, Milk supplies a stomping, Dilla-haunted beat full of December Detroit grime, heartless organs and wailing gospal peals buried under layers of dirt and ice. Phat Kat, an Xzibit sound-a-like is up first. A veteran of the Detroit underground for a decade, only now is Phat Kat getting a real chance to shine and he pretty much kills it with his first verse. Next, Elzhi from Slum Village acquits himself nicely.
But when Lamont gets his chance, he doesn’t as much rap over the beat, as sprint across it like he’s fleeing a collapsing bridge or Vince Coleman stealing bases in RBI Baseball III. It’s not a particularly easy track to rhyme over either, with a bass line snapping like a rubber band and muffled pounding drums that leap at weak rappers like hurdles. Yet it seems almost too easy for Lamont, he taunts it, he pokes it in its flabby stomach and makes it cry out “do not hit me I am full of chocolate.” He drops King Hippo, Mr. Roboto, Death Star and Souls of Mischief references. It sorta’ reminded me of an early Canibus or Capitol Punishment-era Big Pun, or the pre-Slim Shady Eminem. The thing is, you probably don’t know who Bishop Lamont is yet, but you will soon. Once I got home from the gym and searched around, I found out what I probably should’ve already known, that Lamont has the next big record slated to drop on Aftermath.
His debut is slated to drop in the first quarter with production from Dr. Dre, Pete Rock, Lord Finesse and Madlib (if you’re to believe the wikipedia, which you probably shouldn’t.) But who knows with Aftermath? They’re like the Bermuda Triangle of record labels. Lamont is also rumored to be all over Dr. Dre’s Chinese Detox-cracy, but who knows if that’ll ever come out either. Not to mention the fact that fellow Aftermath signee Joell Ortiz is probably supposed to factor somewhere into this equation too, especially considering it’s tough to imagine Dre released two records in ‘08 from raw, technical, throwback rhymers with little commercial potential. Maybe Dre’s had enough. Maybe he surfed Myspace and saw the army of 2Pac and 50 clones and realized that maybe it’s time for a new direction. I can’t blame him. The West needs guys like Bishop Lamont. After all, there’s only so long many times you can hear the song “How Long Will They Mourn Me” before wanting to shout back “too long.”
Download:
MP3: Bishop Lamont ft. Phat Kat & Elzhi (produced by Black Milk)-”Goatit”
ZIP: Download the Entire Caltroit Mixtape (left-click)
Posted in Are You From the Lester Bangs School of Thought? | 12 Comments »
November 29th, 2007
T.I. tells me that big things are popping. And when T.I. tells me something I listen. Once he spoke rhapsodically about “the trap” and within 15 minutes, I had rat traps planted everywhere in my apartment.
This time, the big thing poppin’ is the news that I will now be blogging for the LA Weekly’s blog Play. No, the Passion will not be going anywhere, but some of the blogs that I publish here will run concurrently on the Weekly website. I suppose it’s a sort of syndication thing, but I’d prefer not to use the term “syndication” since it reminds me of Larry King. And things that remind you of Larry King are inherently bad (except for corned beef.).
So check out Play if you’re into that sort of music bloggy thing. Hopefully, it will be more entertaining than the Moby album of the same name. And it’s definitely better than T.I. Vs. TIP.
Download:
MP3: T.I.-“Big Things Poppin’”
Posted in LA Weekly | 6 Comments »
November 29th, 2007
Granted, the twee-leaning indie pop made by the Welsh seven-piece, Los Campesinos! might not be your cup of Earl Grey, but if you hate them there is a high probability that you might be an asshole. These kids are hater-proof. Hating them is like hating the easter bunny, or wearing coats made of greyhound, or booing people at the Special Olympics. Trust me. I interviewed them before the show Tuesday night and you probably won’t find a nicer, more self-deprecating and unpretentious band existing anywhere on earth.
The band spoke with the dazed exuberance of NCAA Tournament #15 seeds finding themselves in the Sweet 16 for the first time in school history. A sort of shell shocked surrealism engendered by being in strange sunny Los Angeles, staying at a fancy hotel down the street from the Scientology Celebrity Centre, being brought complimentary platters of hummus and pita before their initial West Coast performance. It must’ve been weird.
The thing is, these guys aren’t supposed to be here. Well, technically they probably are. They’re a talented group of kids, all in their early 20’s, and they released a pretty killer first EP, Sticking Fingers in Sockets. But about a year Los Campesinos! were just a bunch of British kids away at school in Cardiff, doing what normal college kids do, drinking, studying, obsessing over music, taking gargantuan bong rips from 3-foot water pipes (maybe). One day on a whim, they decided to form a band with fame and fortune the absolute last things on their mind. Things progressed, a rough demo was cut, uploaded to Myspace and Drowned in Sound. And the next thing they knew, Los Campesinos! turned into the latest Internet’s latest darlings, called everything from the last “great indie band” to superbly crafted indie pop in practically every online music magazine.
Actual Campesinos: Huge Fans of Los Campesinos!
You get the gist, these kids are indie-to-the-core, which on paper makes them sound extraordinarily irritating. And if you listen with a cynical ear its easy to point out the possibility that Los Campesinos! may merely have stumbled onto the secret formula to winning online music crit hearts: a touch of Arcade Fire, a pinch of Architecture in Helsinki, a dash of Pavement, mixed with wry wit and a keen sense of irony . Heat. Serve.
But watching them live, any sense of resistance you have to their ADD-addled twee skronk melts away. The seven of them bash at their instruments with wiry punk-rock energy, pogo-ing across the stage in a drunken youthful stagger. Sure, they wield the by-now predictably odd array of varied instrumentation: glockenspiels, xylophones, melodicas, violin, but the thing about these guys is that they’re just trying to have fun and it’s hard not to get swept away in their sense of enthusiasm and exuberance. Of course, they do the little things right. Clever lyrics belie their inexperience, Gareth and Aleksandra Campesinos! sing some melting, gorgeous two-part harmonies and shirtless drummer Ollie Campesinos! bashes his drum kit with an electric mayhem-type abandon. Plus, they have a few really cute girls in the band and let’s be honest with ourselves, that never hurts.
On “We Throw Parties, You Throw Knives!” Gareth Campesino! sings about “a balance between pretentious and pop” with a British marble-mouthed yell. Indeed, it’s this blend of self-awareness without inhibition, intelligence without self-righteous snark that makes Los Campesinos! so likeable. They’re the underdogs and they know it, but rather than worry, they’re laughing at their miraculous fortune and just trying to have a good time. Change is good for bands. Everyone needs to evolve. But I hope that no matter how big Los Campesinos! get they maintain their sense of innocence and wonder at actually getting paid to make music for a living. Their first full-length drops on Arts and Crafts in February and it’ll be interesting to see whether or not, they’re able to build on their impressive debut. Either way, I’ll be rooting for them. Way more than that fraud the Easter Bunny.
Buy Sticking Fingers Into Sockets EP
Download:
MP3: Los Campesinos!-”We Throw Parties, You Throw Knives”
Posted in Beards, Blazers, & Glasses | 2 Comments »
November 28th, 2007
It’s a full-time job just trying to keep up with all the rap records that leaked over the past week. I mean, The Wu, Scarface, Beanie Sigel, Styles P and now Ghost. Fuck. It’s a lot to handle. It’s enough to make a blogger want to call his local herbal dispensary to re-up for the winter.
In the meantime, I’m through a first few cursory listens of The Big Dough Rehab and I’m really liking what I’m hearing. I’m not sure how good it is yet, and I’ll save the hyperbole for the inevitable full review (I’m actually trying to exercise a bit of restraint this year…I know….I know…how un-bloggerly of me). But “Yolanda’s House” featuring Meth and Rae is currently floating it’s way around the web and if you haven’t heard it yet, you should. It’s pretty great. Though I’m still not sure if it can top Pharoahe Monch’s “Never Walk Again,” which rocks that same sample. Discuss.
Download:
MP3: Ghostface Killah ft. Raekwon and Method Man-”Yolanda’s House”
MP3: Pharoahe Monch-”Never Walk Again”
Posted in Miscellany | 6 Comments »
November 28th, 2007
About three weeks ago when I was in New York, Tal Rosenberg pretty much gushed non-stop about the Burial record’s brilliance. At the time, I didn’t even know that the London-based Dub Step producer had a new album coming out, which isn’t much of a surprise considering fewer than ten people know his actual identity, he doesn’t do shows and he’s not exactly known as being PR friendly. Apparently, his eponymous first record was named last year’s Album of the Year by The Wire, but since I have a hard-time justifying spending ten bucks on an issue of a music magazine, I don’t read The Wire.
In fact, other than a spectacular track called “Unite” on a Dubstep primer I own, it’s safe to say that all I knew about Burial three weeks prior was that “Ceremonial burial” was a crucial and awesome civilization advance in the greatest computer game ever made.
Since then, its been hard not to read about Burial, with every music magazine from London to Brooklyn to E. Brooklyn, rushing to heap it with praise. So I’m a little hesitant to even bother wasting any more words on an album that basically everyone knows is great and at this point, it feels almost bandwagonesque to even chime in, but fuck it.
The thing is, I was pretty underwhelmed by Untrue on the first few listens. It’s not the sort of record that makes much sense in supine, sun-stunned Los Angeles. It’s a bleak record, ideal for wintertime New York or London, a druggy drunken stagger through black drizzle and an incinerating 5:00 a.m freeze. It’s as asphyxiating and claustrophobic as it is austere and beautiful, a mess of of gurgling vaporous soul samples and popping, crackling, two-step drums. Tal called it the sound of the world eating you alive and that’s as accurate a description as I’ve read. Download the MP3’s below, but you’re better off buying the record and waiting for the right time to let Burial’s melancholy, menacing mood music warp its way through the contours of your mind.
See also ex-Stylus editor Todd Burns’ review in the LA Weekly
Buy Burial-Untrue
Download:
MP3: Burial-”Archangel”
MP3: Burial-”Ghost Hardware”
Bonus: From Box of Dub (Dub Step and Future Dub)
MP3: Burial-”Unite”
Posted in Album Reviews | 6 Comments »
November 27th, 2007
If home is where you hang your hat then Silverlake is rapidly turning into the world’s largest hat rack. Over the past 12 months, it has become de rigueur in hipster courting rituals for male hipsters (homo habilus hipstericus) to trot out increasingly ridiculous pieces of vintage head-ware in an effort to woo the female species of hipster (homo habilus hipstripesicus). A trend once confined to the deepest recesses of the Cha Cha Lounge has spread like wildfire, consuming most of Hollywood and threatening as far west as the Fairfax district. As a native Angeleno dedicated to the preservation of a sane, safe city, I have decided to compile a guide designed to help ameliorate this obvious hipster identity crisis. If you or anyone you know has this problem, please take them to the nearest Lids as rapidly as possible.
The Fedora:
Unless you’re a chain-smoking, hard-as-nails 1940s gumshoe who can say the phrase “private dick” with a straight face, you probably shouldn’t be wearing a fedora. I know half of you guys went to private school with people named Humphrey and/or Dashiell, but unless you’ve actually solved at least one mystery in your life then you are forbidden from fedora-ing. And, no figuring out to the plot to Mullholland Drive doesn’t count as a mystery. Of course, there is also the fact that Will I Am wears fedoras. And nothing Will I Am does can ever be cool. Nothing.
The Derby
If I wanted to see a walking, talking, ball of hair in a derby hat, I’d just go watch an episode of The Addams Family.
The Che
Fight the revolution! One $3.00 organic fair trade cup of coffee at a time.
The Newsboy Cap
Repeat after me: just because I know every word to every song in Newsies does not give me the right to wear a newsboy cap. Sorry to be the bearer of ill tidings, you don’t look like Dave Chappelle, you look more like the guy on the couch.
The Top Hat
Okay fine, so I’ve never actually seen anyone on the streets of Silverlake wearing a top hat. But I’ve been doing a lot of thinking lately and have concluded that the Mad Hatter from Alice in Wonderland very well might be the proto-hipster. Think about it. Garish color schemes, check. Shaggy unkempt mane, check. Penchant for spewing pretentious gibberish, check. Indie-rock style snug trousers, you betcha. And most importantly, the Mad Hatter had no real job and spent all day every day having tea parties with his friends. Give that man a laptop, stick him at the Intelligentsia Cafe, and he’d be in hog fucking heaven.
The Trilby Hat
Pros: You have a 0.01 percent chance of getting Kate Moss.
Cons: You have to tell people you’re wearing something called a trilby hat. Also, may bring back vivid childhood flashbacks of the Scatman.
The Beret
You know what would be the coolest thing ever? If an indie rock band started writing protest songs and had like eight people on-stage, two of whom were playing the violin and one of one of which was playing the glockenschpiel. And they could be influenced by Modest Mouse and The Talking Heads and Joy Division, with a touch of the Arcade Fire and they could all dress up in military fatigues and they could call themselves The Green Berets. It all starts with the beret. It all starts with the beret.
The Trucker Hat
Sorry brah, last time I checked this wasn’t 1999. Don’t you have a taped episode of That 70’s Show to go home and watch?
Download:
MP3: Fresh Cherries From Yakima-”Sailor Hats & Cigarettes”
MP3: Cold War Kids-”Passing the Hat”
The Tell ‘Em Why You Mad Bonus Track
MP3: The Notorious BIG-”Kick in the Door”
Top Photo via 2 Live Looks
Posted in Best Of, It Got Weird, Didn't It? | 17 Comments »
November 26th, 2007
My Morning Jacket’s cover of “Blue Moon” sounds pretty wonderful on this crisp Fall evening. Perhaps you agree.
Download:
MP3: My Morning Jacket-”Blue Moon”
Posted in Miscellany | 1 Comment »
November 26th, 2007
Sometime after 50 arrived, the art of the narrative wandered into a blizzard of coke raps, artificial hood mythologizing and pandering simplicity. Complexity no longer moved units, and with sales sliding, Scarface xeroxes and ringtone rappers became the safe bets. You can’t blame the suits either. They’re just trying to save their jobs and besides, Young Jeezy went platinum, Rick Ross nearly did, and Mims, The Shop Boyz and Soulja Boy had the most popular singles of 07.
Of course, hip-hop isn’t dead, but it’s hard not to deny that over the last decade, the major label system has done an abysmal job of putting on talented young rappers. Outkast know this. Their latest song leaked from DJ Drama’s upcoming Gangsta Grillz album is called “The Art of Storytelling, Part 4″ and from the title alone, you knew it was going to be special, considering the first 2 are vital organs of Aquemini, with Volume 3, a remix aided by Slick Rick, arguably the greatest storyteller of them all. On the surface level, it’s easy autobiography, Andre kicking a stream-of-consciousness rant about groupies. Big Boi playing Outkast’s id, offering menacing backhands and boasts about the hierarchy of his harem. But that’s just the frame.
Inside the lines, Andre subtly indicts the hair-metal excess of contemporary hip-hop (how dare I throw it on the floor when people are poor”), re-affirming his outsider status in spite of the 30-plus million sold and drawing from the wellspring of self-righteous anger and terminal hunger that feeds so many great artists. The most played-out cliche in hip-hop is “the game needs [insert rapper’s name here]. But if the game needs anyone, it’s Outkast. Not the bullshit neo-Prince of The Love Below, the moody, cynical brilliance of their prime. Outkast were the last of a breed. The last great weirdos allowed to sneak through the gates, before they shuttered in a sober gray clangor.
10 11 Years Gone
“Part 4″ finds Andre searching for the moral compass that hip-hop lost sometime in the late 90s when greed no longer became good, it became necessary. Jay-Z’s rant on American Gangster was right. It’s stupid to blame hip-hop when Tila Tequila’s bi-sexual dating show, ultra-violent films, and geo-political ambition often seem like America’s chief exports. Without lapsing into strident protest, Andre points out the boring desperation of most rappers that desperately try to think of new permutations of the same tired tropes (”these ain’t these same old rhymes to have you dancing in some club”.)
Extraordinarily self-aware, Andre knows we’re listening. How can he not? This is Outkast after all, the guys responsible for the best selling hip-hop album of all time (and arguably, the best). Yet rather than pathetically bitching and moaning about Internet rumors (not to name any names), Andre has spent his comeback year decimating every beat thrown his way. If it feels like he’s taunting us it’s because he is, with his lyrics and flow rust-proof, despite frittering away a half-decade presumably taking liquid acid and watching Purple Rain on repeat.
“Da’ Art of Storytellin’” is a challenge to all-comers, a dare to the rap world to see if anyone stronger has emerged since Andre got bored with hip-hop sometime around the millennium. It’s that all-too-rare, adrenaline-racing, boombox monstrosity that whip-saws you to attention and makes you remember why you loved hip-hop so much in the first place. In an ideal rap world, this song would get at the very least as much burn on car stereos as “Soulja Girl” (notice, Andre’s bumping 100 Miles And Running). The sort of thing you’d hope would shift some teenage rapper’s paradigm from the obscene commercialism of the newest school, to the line of storytellers descended from Slick Rick and Kool G Rap, This should be required rewind listening for all aspiring rappers. Fuck being a motivational speaker, an actor, or a “brand,” rappers should want to tell stories, not be them.
Download:
MP3: Outkast-”Da Art of Storytellin’ Pt. 4″
Posted in Miscellany, Best Of | 10 Comments »
November 24th, 2007
This is going to take a while to unravel, but on first listen, it’s clear that at the very least, 8 Diagrams > Iron Flag.
Your thoughts?
Download:
MP3: Wu-Tang Clan-”Take It Back”
Posted in News | 15 Comments »
November 23rd, 2007
It’s impossible for Thanksgiving weekend to feel like Thanksgiving when it’s 70 degrees out and sunny and you randomly found yourself last night in a vaguely “trendy” Los Angeles bar watching a fedora-clad couple make out like they were trying to empirically decipher what the other had for Thanksgiving. (Seriously, do these people find each other on online fedora dating services?)
To palliate my sorrows after this grotesque incident and from my trytophan overdose, I’ve been listening to reggae all morning. Not in the mood to write anything right now, so I’ll save the blather. I hope you all had a fantastic Thanksgiving and that these lilting sunny-day jams make everything a bit warmer wherever you are. Godspeed. Or something.
Download:
From Kaya
MP3: Bob Marley & The Wailers-”Easy Skanking”
MP3: Bob Marley & The Wailers-”Misty Morning”
From Marcus Garvey
MP3: Burning Spear-”Marcus Garvey”
From Forward The Bass: Dub From Randy’s 1972-1975
MP3: “Impact All Stars-”Extraordinary Version”
Posted in Miscellany | 3 Comments »
