Official confirmation still awaits, but judging from reliable Twitter accounts, the legendary hip-hop and graf pioneer has passed. Weirdly enough, I was listening to this song last night while writing a feature on art rap and Open Mike Eagle — and there is no art rap without Rammellzee. The concept of a hip-hop avant-garde dates back to the uptown/downtown interactions of the early 80s, as seen in Wild Style, and for my dub’s worth, nothing from the period holds up as well as “Beat Bop,” with its labyrinthine abstractions and unstructured format heralding a futurism that feels more ahead of the curve than almost anything you will hear today. Plus, anyone who throws around the term “gothic futurism” is a friend of mine.
Obits will surely pour in from more qualified sources than I, but in the meantime, it’s worth devoting the next ten ten minutes of your time to his most famous song and reading this interview at 149st. No style was wilder.–Weiss
Edit: Updated with Rammellzee videos below the jump.
Download:
MP3: K-Rob & Rammellzee – “Beat Bop” (Left-Click)
6 comments
Ivan says:
June 29, 2010 at 4:19 pm (UTC -7)
T.R.O.Y.
Twitter Trackbacks for Passion of the Weiss » Blog Archive » R.I.P. Rammellzee (1960 - 2010) [passionweiss.com] on Topsy.com says:
June 29, 2010 at 4:43 pm (UTC -7)
[...] Passion of the Weiss » Blog Archive » R.I.P. Rammellzee (1960 – 2010) passionweiss.com/2010/06/29/rip-rammellzee-1960-2010/ – view page – cached Official confirmation still awaits, but judging from reliable Twitter accounts, the legendary hip-hop and graf pioneer has passed. Weirdly enough, I was listening to this song last night while writing a feature on art rap and Open Mike Eagle — and there is no art rap without Rammellzee. The concept of a hip-hop avant-garde dates back to the uptown/downtown interactions of the early 80s,… Read moreOfficial confirmation still awaits, but judging from reliable Twitter accounts, the legendary hip-hop and graf pioneer has passed. Weirdly enough, I was listening to this song last night while writing a feature on art rap and Open Mike Eagle — and there is no art rap without Rammellzee. The concept of a hip-hop avant-garde dates back to the uptown/downtown interactions of the early 80s, as seen in Wild Style, and for my dub’s worth, nothing from the period holds up as well as “Beat Bop,” with its labyrinthine abstractions and unstructured format heralding a futurism that feels more real than almost anything you will hear today. Plus, anyone who throws around the term “gothic futurism” is a friend of mine. View page Tweets about this link [...]
JPop says:
June 29, 2010 at 5:25 pm (UTC -7)
He had a couple of tracks on Material’s Intonarumori about 10-12 years ago. That and Wildstyle were my introduction to his work.
Sach says:
June 29, 2010 at 6:37 pm (UTC -7)
I really wanted to include Beat Bop in my Summerjamz but there was absolutely no way to fit the track in. It was just too different and out there compared to the others. And in my mind, that alone makes it worthy of the highest praise. R.I.P
R.I.P RAMMELLZEE (1960 – 2010) says:
June 30, 2010 at 5:55 am (UTC -7)
[...] his classic track: RAMMELLZEE + K-Rob – Beat Bop [big up to passion of the weiss for the [...]
elmattic says:
July 2, 2010 at 2:27 am (UTC -7)
R.I.P. R:L:Z.
For those that only ever heard Beat Bop, some more of his cuts here:
http://tinyurl.com/33rvtfw