Posts in: Music
- On rocking the mic
- And so, in the revised entry for rock included in the O.E.D.’s June 2010 update, Melle Mel trumps Big Bank Hank as the earliest known M.C. to “rock the mic.” Though fresh evidence could always push the usage back even further, there’s a certain justice to setting the record straight, more than three decades after [...] [11 Jul 2010]
- Qusai’s “The Job”: A sample of Saudi hip-hop
- Lyrics are in English and Arabic. His English verse is kind of wack, but interesting for its look at contemporary Saudi culture and economy. I can’t judge his Arabic verse, because I’m monolingual like that. But that beat? Lovin’ it. Learn more about Qusai on his MySpace page. [Via Saudi Jeans.] [4 Feb 2010]
- On black men loving black women
- I love black women always Disrespect ain’t the way Let’s start our family today Hip-hop hooray! — Treach from Naughty By Nature’s “Hip-Hop Hooray.” Naughty By Nature is performing at Atlanta’s Luckie Lounge tonight. V-103 played this song this morning. Aside: We sure wore some ugly sh*t in the 1990s. [11 Dec 2009]
- On digging in the crates
- My folks don’t have actual crates, but they do have a pretty dope collection of 1970s vinyl albums. I got into a couple of Parliament albums my dad owned. And I just about wore out my dad’s copy of James Brown’s “Hot Pants.” Beyond that, however, I never appreciated these records growing up. As an [...] [29 Nov 2009]
- Jay Smooth on Ashley Dupri and the Music Biz
- Original post [17 Mar 2008]
- Before you say anything about “Stop Snitching”
- Ask yourself: Didn’t you hate tattletales as a little kid? Don’t criminals of every color adhere to a stop snitching ethos? So how is this a black thing? If snitching could get you and/or your family members KILLED, would you do it? Unless you can say with whole-hearted honesty that you would die to help [...] [28 Apr 2007]
- Rap All-Stars on Arsenio Hall
- Watch before it gets snatched down. Featuring Yo-yo, MC Lyte, KRS-One, A Tribe Called Quest, Wu-Tang Clan, CL Smooth, the Fu-Schnickens, and Mad Lion. Possibly interesting tidbit: Mad Lion was the prom date of a girl in my high school class. When I heard Mad Lion was going to be there, I got all hyped [...] [5 Mar 2007]
- Throw some cheese on it …
- You knew it was coming. By “(sand)Wich Boy.” And the original Throw Some D’s for reference. [1 Feb 2007]
- Music classification and iTunes (or Cape Verde ain’t nowhere near Latin America)
- I bought two CDs (yeah, I still do that ) by Cape Verdean artists* today, Rogamar by the legendary Cesaria Evora and Balancê by Sara Tavares. Now, for the geography-challenged, Cape Verde is waaaay over on the other side of the Atlantic, off the coast of Africa (roughly Senegal). Yet, weirdly, when it comes to [...] [29 Jan 2007]
- Thoughts on Jay-Z’s “Kingdom Come”
- Okay, I’m a latecomer to Jay-Z fandom, entering somewhere around his MTV-Unplugged album. Despite owning albums two, three and four (or maybe it was three, four and five), before his poetry reading, I never really got into Jay-Z beyond his radio singles. They just took up space in my CD rack. I’ve got most of [...] [28 Nov 2006]