from a YG’s perspective

Only enough time to say “Gott’ damn that bumps!” Old but newish to me and I don’t recognize the beat as being jacked which would be the only reason to keep it off of the album, right? Attempting to separate Gotti’s distinctive voice from his typically solid flow is a useless exercise... but still, I'm inclined to give that flow a special mention for this one.

Yo Gotti – Da Truth
(Apologies for this mixtape version cutting off so abrubtly)

'gang' re-up

I don’t know why State Property never got the proper commercial push-package. Maybe because every hip-hop fan I knew at the time hated every MC in the group (except Beanie). I thought I was losing my mind thinking 'Freeway is the future' and telling folk “One of the Young Gunz is really dope... he freestyled on the radio the other night and Jay couldn’t even follow him” type ish. And then Peedi joined SP... but folk thought he was more annoying than Freeway.
Alright so the first album didn’t have hits other than ‘Mic Check’ and the second… well, what exactly happened with that one, Dame? There were at least a couple street joints on there.
With all the drama involved with the break-up of the Roc and Beanie’s post-bid issues with SP members, I don’t know where ‘The Gang Is All Here’ is coming from. I’ll assume these are a bunch of tracks from Dame’s vault that got thrown together for some pocket change… I honestly have no idea. A few tracks may have shown up on mixtapes but all in all, there is really no logical reason to expect this collection to be anything approaching 'good.' But it may, in fact, be the best of the bunch… with all due respect to an absent Omillio.

Young Chris - Around My Old Way
Young Gunz, Peedi Crakk. Pooda Brown - What Up
Beanie Sigel, Peedi Crakk, Young Chris - Killn That

escobar season

Timbaland is rumored to be producing a movie about Pablo Escobar (and skipping the Missy movie). Huh? Maybe it will compete with the adaptation of Mark Bowden’s book ‘Killing Pablo.’ And maybe Benicio Del Toro… or Vince Chase in the lead?

molding Ca$his clay

For now I’m typing ‘SHIFT 4’ but we’ll see if young Ca$his’ maintains enough respect to continue that practice. He won’t be the new kid on the Shady block forever. I’ve come to realize I like the oddly spelled MC names if only for researching on the web. Properly spelled research can take you to a French disco (respect to TTC) or Spiritual Jew MCs or maybe even to the proper MC…
I haven’t heard his Renegadez work but it’s almost like being reborn when hooking up with one of the Renegades.
It’s always interesting to hear mixtape styles (‘I’m Ca$his’) contrasted with carefully constructed pop shots. ‘Serenade My Life’ is an obvious mad doctor hybrid but it comes off less Dre and more Moreau (‘see, there’s the Fifty plus Em plus emo style production and hook!’). It’s the conflicted inner-monologue woe-is-me wallowing we often love from the Shady camp. Ca$his content is not yet as revealing as Marshall’s moods or as fascinatingly dead-eye as Fifty’s paranoia. But I’m sure the camp is working on it…
His freestyle lets in more casual hubris and pronunciation contortions than ‘Serenade’. It remind me of a good, if simplified, cross-breed of the clipped-and-clenched vocal mode of Kurupt and Jay-Z.
But it looks like Shady has tweaked their approach and instead they lead with ‘Talkin’ all that Shit’ and you can immediately hear why. That is, if you enjoy the dark, deliberate sound of a threat. Plies captured brilliant belligerence on his stylistic breakthrough ‘Freestyle (aka Takeoff)’ and ‘Talkin’ has a pace and bass that succeeds with similar sonics. Ca$his raises the bar however by embracing just enough lyricism and not just a bad attitude. In this case it’s a good thing. None of these tunes form a complete picture of the MC though. Barely a sketch, the Ca$his persona will most likely be as well crafted as one of his backing tracks.
The pressure is always on for Shady rookies to knock it out the box but especially since certain affiliates learned to play The Game so well.

Ca$his – Serenade My Life
Ca$his – I’m Ca$his
Ca$his – Talkin’ All That Shit

I love this game

I got a preview of the ‘NBA 2K7’ album that, I guess, goes along with the upcoming video game (not really my area of expertise). The album’s producer, The Automator, likes to play ‘Name The Vocalist’ with all his new albums…

Before they rapped their names here’s who I could identify:

Slim Thug
E-40
Casual and Del (although both voices sounded a bit different... and we didn’t get to the A-Plus verse)
Chali Tuna
Ghostface
Fabolous
Mos Def
Tribe Called Quest (particularly easy since it was ‘only’ a remix of 'Lyrics To Go’)

And here’s who I couldn’t ID:

Rhymefest
San Quinn (on the track with E-40)
Evidence and Lupe Fiasco (on the same track)
Rakka and Aceyalone
AG (on the track with Ghostface)… my excuse is that his voice sounds much deeper now.
Anwar Superstar (on the track with Mos)
Zion I

We were later joined by Russell Simins, Automator’s co-hort in the embarrassing-to-Google project Men Without Pants. On a personal and sad note, they never went with my suggested band slogan: “We take no shorts!”

There was a rumor that we might stop by Just Blaze’s studio but he was, ahem, still working on someone’s comeback album. ‘Nuff said.

non-event

Dude, not a problem.

(..although I'm more inclined to agree with Jay and embrace that old Lauryn Hill defensive declaration after winning a slew of R&B Grammy's and album of the year: "This is hip-hop music.")

America’s most wanted

The internets thwarted my patriotic duty of posting some flag-waving joint yesterday. And y’know, typically on July Fourth my MP3 thoughts run towards the Dead Prez and Tahir side of things, or at least some version of Trick Daddy’s classic or maybe an El-P mustard gas reference and if I’m feeling oddly patriotic Prince might get a spin but let’s call this counter-counter-programming and I’ll hope the non-ironic fairly shallow embrace of the good ol’ US of A sentiment is excused since it IS a Timbaland track and the deepest thoughts are about the open road, sunscreen and a stack of CDs (how quaint!). C’mon you know you like a little American cheese every once in a while? Is Tim Mosely a national treasure yet?

Kiley Dean – America (produced by Timbaland)

easier to google

Presenter of reality, Plies from Ft. Myers (aka the Slip-N-Slide dude Jay-Z may have overlooked because of co-hort Rick Ross' hugeness) was arrested because of involvement of his entourage in a shooting. But the real news is his government... ALGERNOD LANIER WASHINGTON.