know the ledge

brainiac dum dums bust the scientifical

“Knowledge me,” the titular phrase from the Dr. Dre and T. Money song, was not a phrase that caught on… at least to knowledge mine. ‘Knowledge’ was often dropped along with ‘science’ and the other Dre even dropped English with the help of Ice Cube. I suppose it’s just a street adaptation of a Five-percenter-filtered version of the hick request to a potential teacher, “Learn me somethin’.”

Original Concept’s production on “Knowledge Me” was far greater than the humorous not-rapped rambling vocals. The track was elevated from ‘novelty’ status, via a remix of “Jeep Ass Niguh”. The original “JAN” from the Masta Ace Inc. album ‘Slaughtahouse’ was already a standout on an underrated album (although a certain radio host proclaimed it ‘Album of the Year’) but the OC track, based around the leisurely but unrelenting propulsion of the buzzing, almost burping, bass chug, took the Ace tune to another place.

And that place was the West Coast.

Is it a coincidence that the dominance of the West Coast Dre G-funk sound would inspire Ace to use the East Coast Dre track to evoke the booming systems of Either Coasts slow-drivers? The lyrics even address street rivalry with West Coast styled low-riders.

That East Coast novelty track, once transformed into an East Coast version of the West Coast car bump sound, is now tapped as an East Coast version of a crawling Texas beat. Murder Inc. (not to be confused with Masta Ace Inc.) has opened Ashanti’s single with Paul Wall talking about his love of… oh you know… and The Inc. lets him do it over the “Knowledge Me” chug. If it was just Meth hitting clean-up I probably wouldn’t have noticed (and the Paul Wall guest spot is more market driven than ‘slow’ driven) but damn if it doesn’t sound like a perfect track to vibrate some candy slabs during this reign of the Tex.

Original Concept - Knowledge Me (Instrumental) (yousendit) (rapidshare)
Masta Ace –Born To Roll / Jeep Ass Niguh Remix (yousendit) (rapidshare)
Ashanti, Paul Wall, Method Man – Still On It (yousendit) (rapidshare)

"houston" rocket?

Last Sunday, as I caught up on 9-to-5-Percenter stuff, I listened to (a slightly early release of) a true-and-real store-bought copy of Bun B’s ‘Trill’ like 8 times in a row. That night/the next morning I woke up around 3AM with a hacking cough that would not quit.
Luckily the med cab had the Robitussin PM.
The syrup did its thing and I eased back into slumber.
These rap records are a bad influence.
Damn I felt good good in the morning.

All that to say…
Matt, Ric, Roxy and Elle are doing it again.




Already.
And that’s a statement… not a question.

So, if trill recognize trill, holler at yer boy.

the juelz, the jeez and the weez

triple burner

Humancrackintheflesh, Snowman and Birdman Junior supply the same basic ingredients we're used to... but if cook-up is alchemy then this could be the magic recipe. Since we're getting flavors from Georgia, Harlem and New Orleans we might be tempted to call it 'soul food' but Develop serves it up with minimalism, precision and plenty of space on the plate... 'comfort' is not what they're going for here.

Fire... served sooo cold.

Juelz Santana, Young Jeezy, Lil' Wayne - Make It Work

Re-Upped by request (Alright, Ian... it's rapidshare...):
Juelz Santana, Young Jeezy, Lil' Wayne - Make It Work

I still got some cleanin’…

Kelly art in the closet... still

Battle of the patrolman twangs:
Hova’s ’99 problems’ v. R. Kelly’s ‘TITC Chapter 8’
Discuss...

The 'Trapped in the Closet' saga continues.
All tracks by R. Kelly
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8

right to wear arms

T-shirt battle?
‘Dipset / Ramones’? Ay! Ay! Oh! Let’s go!
‘Snow…man’? Thaaaaat’s riiiiight!
‘Stop snitchin’? Keep my name out ya mouf!

Let me raise the bar… and y’all can raise the barre.

In honor of Bun B hitting officially this week…
Trill shirt.

Peep it and weep.


let me see it, let me see it...

Alright… back to serving dem birds…

a flock of birds ready to hatch

tucker out / plies up

It’s probably unfair to only remember C. DeLores Tucker for her anti-‘gangsta rap’ crusades but she definitely chose an issue she knew would get her headlines. She CHOSE that path and so a certain portion of the Hip-Hop Generation (Chang-ian meaning, of course) will always give her legacy a hard look from a b-boy askance… her civil rights work will never stand without her embarrassing attempts at policing morality.


plies plexes in 'pike-istan'

So as I present some offensive and gully words of Slip-N-Slide affiliate Plies from Ft. Myers aka Plies Da Realist (and note the spelling) let us remember the dead Philly slumlord that misused public funds, teamed up with Bill Bennett (who recently suggested crime was tied to a ‘race,’ and tried to get some dough for a bad sex life (but got kicked to the curb by the court).

There’s a huge white-on-black ‘Plies’ t-shirt that shows up at the end of the Trina and Lil’ Wayne video for ‘Don’t Trip.’ and it sort of took me off guard. Also surprising, is his appearance on Trina’s album for the song ‘So Fresh.’ I know, it’s all Slip-N-Slide fam but when I heard his ‘Freestyle’ I thought he was going to hit the airwaves much darker and harder.

‘Freestyle’ exploits an electric bass, a Casio-type high hat, a dramatic synth tone and something sounding like an over-torqued screw gun (?) to maximum gutter effect. The beat comes in but seems to get scared away by Plies vocals. Claiming to be the hottest in Florida it’s clear that Plies is not lacking in ego. He is also not lacking in the ‘gangsta rap’ hat trick of messages: ‘Don’t be fake’, ‘Carry a gun’ and ‘For some reason my hood is plagued with society’s ills.’

Although he promotes ‘pikin’ a gun and staying mum with dem ‘jike’ boys, Plies doesn’t claim that his hood, nicknamed ‘Pike-istan,’ is harder than yours and suggests that your hood ain’t no harder than his. But he does question both the ‘gangsta-ism’ of Bin Laden as well as the attention paid to the victims of 9/11.

…And in the hood we weren’t too impressed by 9/11
Cause everyday in the hood is fuckin’ 9/11
When 9/11 happened it was just a couple killers
You’ll find more killers around this bitch in the church, nigga…

…A plane gotta hit the world trade a couple more times
To catch up with all these motherfuckers ‘round here dyin’
And God, I want you to stop me if you think I’m lyin’
I bet there ten-thousand open cases right now…

Alright so the content isn’t going to gain ‘gangsta’ any new fans but Plies has a ‘nice’ belligerent tone and the kind of gruff voice and stylized drawl that you can always hear across the room… regardless of how loud everyone else is.

All joints by Plies...
Freestyle
Bond Money
36 Ounces
How I’m Livin’
Don’t Worry Bout Y’all
Get Ya AK (‘Go DJ’ Beat)
Confessions (‘Confessions Pt. 2’ Beat)
Never Turn on My Dawgs Featuring Trick Daddy

...except...
Deuce Poppi featuring Plies and Pitbull - Down South

cuizin’ art

abstract attitudinist

Just had to big-up Nick Barat’s Cuizinier profile ‘Pimpin’ all over the world’ in the already-old Royal Purple Fader. You would think it impossible to top the Cuizi quote in the article, “The next level is pure attitude music” but the final line is simultaneously the years most enlightened assessment of current hip-hop as well as the most disturbing. Cuizi describes a future song construction as “… a Dipset song, throw away the verses, and maybe just keep the AY!s and YEAH!s and THAT”S RIGHT!s, the crazy clothes and the dance moves, the way Juelz Santana wears his hat. That’s the future of rap, total abstraction.”
Cuizi’s focus on ad-libbed interjections could explain Young Jeezy’s rise to rap royalty while still confounding many rap fans that think his lyrics and flow are ‘too simple.’ Juelz, another contemporary MC icon that is almost impossible to explain to fans of more traditional lyrical prowess, is granted as much weight for his fashion-sense as for his lyrical-style. But how does a French kid reach the same lyrical moment as black ‘product’ dealers from Atlanta and Harlem? I suppose it might be difficult to explain how Jeezy and Juelz reached similar ‘attitude’ moments in different locations. But kids have always latched onto other moments in hip-hop’s history and spun it out into a local imitation (at least) and a local sound (at best). Sometimes it seems as if the Dipset phrases are part of an isolated language-form known only to them. In some instances, I’m guessing, Juelz’ language can be as foreign to me as they are to a French kid… or as familiar.
The Cuizi / Dipset connection continues in the mixtape track selection. At times the selection of extremely ‘soft’ music (‘3 Wishes’ / ‘Girls Just Wanna Have Fun’ respectively) look like counterintuitive choices for a group trying to come off as ‘hard’ but the mistake is the assumption that rappers still associate ‘real’ with ‘hard’ or can’t express humor with a dry dead-eyed ice grill... or pure silliness. The between song banter is almost worth the price of the mixtape (the fact that they are spoken in a beautifully broken American slang interpolation only adds to the entertainment… and Dipset allusions). The intro of Ciara’s ‘Oh’ has The Genevan Heathen dropping some of the best timed pauses since Special Ed (“You burn me……. Really?”).

Oh!… That’s right, Oh!... It’s what you say, girl… When you see Luda-Cuiz… Walking down the streets of Paris… With his brand new hat….

A good friend recently said he wished that T.I. rapped in a different language so that he could just enjoy the flow without the content. With the French language barrier I face, it is true that I can enjoy most of the Cuizinier mixtape ‘Pour Les Filles’ only in the abstract… but, luckily, that’s more than enough.
Sadly my friend also speaks French so the chances of the Cuizi content offending, I would guess, are pretty high.

Here’s an ancient interview with the TTC crew worth reading for folk out there that would say ‘Yessss!’ after Cuzi answers the question “What's the forthcoming album called and what can we expect?

I was out of town for the TTC show at the Knitting Factory and for my folk that also missed it here’s some joints from the mixtape. ‘Walking on Thin Ice’ put ‘Ça Continue’ up awhile ago and it might be the essential song off of the mixtape so it’s re-upped here. I’m including ‘Catalogue’ the TTC interpretation of a C&S track which sounds nothing like Texas but achieves some of the ‘scary’ sound of a Screwed track without the laid-back aspect… and possibly creates a whole new genre (‘CuisinArt?). ‘Elle Me Saoule’ is to give you sense of the textural variety of the collection with an R-Kellyish free-floating vocal melody. Note to Cam’ron: This track has your name all over it!

All from Cuizinier Pour Les Filles (Street Tape Volume 01)
Ça Continue featuring Craiz
Catalogue (Screwed and Chopped by DJ Raze)
Elle Me Saoule

Ree’s up, gang!

Guess who’s bizzack?...sort of…
Snake Pliskin-like rumors of my demise have probably been minimal and only slightly exaggerated.

Main reason for the semi-resurrection: If anybody has a BB Kings Ghostface ‘+1’ or an extra ticket, please... do whatever people did before chirping and holler at yers boy truly. I’ll gladly cover the cost and even cover drankin’ patnaz expense at the BB bar.

Bunch of shiz I missed out on since I bounced out Left and then got swamped with my lessons in the Nine-to-five-percent nation aka the Real World (call me Neo Rocket). So I’m gonna make like Feezy and switch up to bullet points… click-clack… OK, I’m Ree loaded. Some stuff might deserve a full post in due time but, right now, I’m just playin’ like Dres and going to Hail Mary’s... run-and-gun steez.

- Is it a contradiction or just waay too predictable that my mixtapes of the year might be by The Re-Up Gang and Cuizinier? Probably indicates my social irresponsibility… or my love of concept albums…

- I guess Lorrie Heasley couldn’t get her snowman tee but she should have chose the ‘stop snitching’ t-shirt instead. Her fellow passengers would have been a little shook.

- The M1 / Styles P collabo has the elements on paper... but none of the urgency in sound (see Ghost / Kiss ‘Run’).

- ‘History of Violence’ doesn’t critique violence via genre as well as ‘Unforgiven’ and it doesn’t have the socially incorrect justified blood-revenge by an auteur of ‘Four Brothers’... but I still dug it... as a B-movie not an art-film.

- Speaking of ‘socially incorrect’…Plies! Has anyone else posted about his stuff? I’ll definitely be back with more on that dude. (Please don't scoop me)

- It always bothered me when LL did ‘The Wop’ in the ‘I’m Bad’ video... when he says “Make you say ‘Go LL!’ and do the wop!” maybe he was saying he'll make YOU do the wop but HE does this move that had none of the swing that was really required for a proper wop (check out the girls in Doug E’s ‘All The Way to Heaven’ video and you’ll be getting’ the real deal). But, on the VH1 Hip-Hop Honors, when Nelly did the exact stiff upper-body swing after the criss-cross that Cool James did back then, I thought it was fucking genius. The ‘My hat is like a sharksfin’ move had me gigglin’ like Big Daddy Kane in the balcony seats.

- Haven’t picked up Fiona yet but the ladies are doin’ pretty good on my albums list this year. Keyshia. Teairra. Feist even.

- Trent took ‘Hurt’ back from Mr. Cash way back at that New Orleans awareness raiser. And Fiona shut the haters up for at least a few minutes.

- The Pharell / Gwen joints bassline makes me think ‘Know The Ledge’ and so it suffers in comparison. And why does P mention girl-Nelly on a song with Gwen?

- Will anyone confirm or deny my theory that 'sadiddy' mutated from 'high society'? You know... 'high society' to 'hossydiddy' to 'sadiddy'.

- Someone please start posting up some Short Dawg joints (no not the 'Freaky Tales' man).