I Cant Sleep?

Here's a little sumthin'...

So i cant sleep and i been watching random shit on you tube when i came across this...

I already said how much i love Common Sense and now i love him more.....

See now in the U.K we get little bits of good HipHop on tv but most of it is straight up garbage so when i see the shows that the U.S has it hurts me....untill i find it on youtube!!!

Common has to be up there with the best M.C's of all time??? people be mentioning Jigga, Pac, B.I.G. and Nas but shit!!! when is this dude gonna really get credit for the work he been putting in since 92? and probably before.

EDIT: Oh yeah thanks to a certain someone special i finaly got my hands on Common Senses Take it EZ 12" ....You think you know? but you have no idea how much i needed this record?

Why didnt they blow? #2

Zhigge

The first time i heard Zhigge i was round a friends house and i heard "harlem" I loved the fast pace of the track and soon went on to discover the rest of the album and was glad it had the same kind of feel to it all the way through.

I used to record YoMTV raps all the time and was most impressed when i got the video for "Toss It Up" as this was probably my favorite track on the album. I did have this 12" but it seems to have dissapeared? but i have found another copy online which should be with me soon.

The other 12" of the album was probably their most well known song and i can remember it getting quite a bit of play from dj's back in the day "Rakin' In The Dough" had a bit of a harder feel to it than the rest of the album and the 12" was worth its weight with quite a few remixes and an extra track. This has some how vanished from my record boxes too but luckily i have "Rakin in the dough (uptown bounce mix) " on mp3 anyways so hopefully you will get a feel for zhigge and check them out some more.

As the title says "why didnt they blow?" they were in no way gonna be major players in the game but they had the skills to at least drop a few more records our way? Ive searched the web to see if i could come across anymore on the group but there doesnt seem to be any trails to follow with zhigge? anyways i will up the remix for Toss it up as soon as my record arrives? in the meantime enjoy the video here.....

Merry xmas to one and all

Well its boxing day?

Another christmas has gone and past for me. It seems to me like its tradition for the world to lose a great human being and an inspiration to people every year? and this year i have to say we lost one hell of a legend when we said goodbye to James Brown...... The man had his positives and his negatives but no matter to all that. Legend is a word that gets used a bit too much nowadays? but James Brown = Legend

I was gonna post up a few tracks which featured james brown samples? but instead i gonna have a minute of silence for the great man.

For some great info on some hiphop that James Browns music is on check out these blogs.....

xampled

Kalumu

R.I.P

My name is...Preacher Earl

Preacher Earl

I first heard Preacher Earl on a track on the Nice & Smooth album "aint a damn thing changed"

The track was called "down The Line" and featured Gangstarr too. I used to play this track non stop! and when i came across a single by Preacher Earl i grabbed it straight away. This is one of them records that doesnt tend to show up very often so i extremely glad i got it.

I Been writing this blog for a little while now and i also been checking other blogs out to make sure i keeping mine offering something that other blogs aint got. Its hard work coming up with stuff that has not been posted anywhere else so to be honest i just gonna make my blog about shit that made me bop my head back in the day and not worry too much about other blogs.

I have noticed there seem to be a lot of the same links floating around too which to me says people stealing shit and claiming they own it just to get people reading their blogs? each to their own but all the stuff i post up i do own! I already showed you my ugly mugg with my most important bit of plastic in my collection "see A.D.O.R post" but as this such a hard to find record i thought i show you my ugly mugg again...sorry!

Anyways the 2 tracks on the 12" are "Return Of The Body Snatcha" and "Gunz"

Both produced by none other than Greg Nice

Both these tracks are straight up HipHop Bangers and if you find this single buy it straight away cos this is a must have 12"

I knew i heard Preacher Earl on another track too but it took me ages to remember what it was untill i listened to a new Tim Dog joint the other day (do not even bother downloading let alone paying for Tim's latest offering...seriously!!!)

Earl features on the track "Grab Your Gat" off the album Do Or Die.

Earl mainly sings on the intro and the end where he bursts into a rap which i wanted to hear a lot more of untill the beat cuts out! If anyone has any other earl shit please contact me by Yeedo@hotmail.com as i would love to hear it.

There was another release by Preacher earl around 97? but it was strictly a promo only so i not holding my breath to come across it.

If you want to check out all the mixes grab the zip file via sendspace here

Name: preacher earl.zip Size: 32MB Description: Preacher Earl & the ministry 12" The download link is: http://www.sendspace.com/file/gb5k43

got the cover shots there too

Damn....he fast!

MR Tung Twista /aka Twista

Way way back before Twista collabed with Kanye and joined the ROC. Twista has been around for some time. I used to work with some fool who played the kamikaze album all day everyday and it pissed me off!

Im not knocking the album because i liked it a lot... but i remember way back when he used to be Mr Tung Twist. The first time i heard "runnin' off at da mouth" i was in a state of shock that someone could be so fast and still make sence? (sort of)

Anyways I did love this album and unfortunately i dont own it but one of my good friends let me steal his copy for a day so i could rip it a while ago. i was reading a blog called twelve inchers the other day where Dj espionage posted up a track called "suicide" (check his post out) . I got to confess i didnt hear much after Runnin off at da mouth untill i heard the "is that your chick" track which he and Missy guested on for Jay Z. But Twista did have a few albums out which i am gonna have to try get hold of now.

So some traks off the Runnin off at da mouth album....

My first track is "Mr Tung Twista" this is just straight up fast as you can get messyness! good track just showing why he was the fastest rapper in the world at the time (fact)

2nd track is "none of ya'll can hang" which is slower paced...for twista anyway? this is a pretty solid track but my favourite track on the album is "No Peace Sign" I always loved the beat to this track and apparently this is on 12" somewhere so i may have to go digging for this!

So after becoming pretty huge in 2004 Twista has gone to ground a bit recently? i was kind of expecting him to push on after the success of kamikaze but i think he kinda doesnt want to be as mainstream as people see other artists that he rolls with like kanye? each to their own i suppose? but he has done a track with some U.K acts recently which i gotta give him a big big up for!!! I only wish big US stars would collab more with some UK artists then i think we could actualy see some major sales for our artists over here in the UK

I do try to keep this blog as old school as i can but i cant help but hope people who read it check out "What We Do" This is the Kray Twinz with Twista and my second favourite UK artist Lethal Bizzle!!!

And if you can find the "no peace sign" 12" you get this remix which is in the video below...Nice!

What coulda been?

A.D.O.R

Now to those that know their hiphop? everyone should know A.D.O.R ??? huh what i hear you cry lesser brained peoples?

To put it simple A.D.O.R dropped the greatest hiphop track of all time! Now i'm not open for argument about this either. The first time i heard Let it all hang out i was like woooooooooooooaaaaah!

I only know 2 people with this record and thats a sad sad thing.

I remember upping this track on a site and the link went down after about 3 minutes due to bandwith destruction! so hopefully there should be no problems with this?

Produced by the one and only Pete Rock here is A.D.O.R "Let It All Hang Out"

CLASSIC SHIT!

Now all manner of shit went down with A.D.O.R and i think there is lots of factors which lots of people will never know about why he didnt become one of the biggest m.c's of all time. but with all that considered he still managed to drop some more tunes. "Ones For The Trouble" which was made famous by that shit dance track which sampled the "back once again . its the renegade master" lyrics from the track. unfortunately A.D.O.R then kinda vanished into the hip hop underworld where he has sort of been ever since?

He released a couple albums and mixtapes over the years and now is heading up his own label TRUREIGN RECORDS which i highly recomend checking out. there is a couple of downloads available and also a track called "step up" which i think proves that hiphop missed out when they let him slide under the radar.

If you more interseted in the man himself and want to get in touch and find out why he dissapeared get his myspace here

Real HipHop

Why didnt they blow?

Shadz Of Lingo - A View To A Kill

With an album full of beats from Diamond D, Erick Sermon and Dallas Austin you have to wonder why they didnt really blow up like they should have?

The beats on this album are ,in my opinion, Diamond D's best work apart from his own shit.

The only reason i can guess for them not blowing up was the lack of originality in the lyrics department? which kinda gives this album a fairly average feel to it? but if you ignore that and just play it instead of judge it i'm sure you will nodd your head along.

First track i have for you was "Mad Flavaz" produced and featuring the Green eyed bandit himself, Erick Sermon. This a typical ES beat and was a pretty hot single from what i remember.

the next 2 tracks come from a producer called Madness 4 Real who has a pretty impressive resume really but doesnt get talked about too much? "psychopathic interlude" and "view to a kill" two very impressive beats and very catchy!

The highlight of the album is obviously a D.I.T.C beat From Diamond D.

"Dont Test Da Skillz"

This track is shit hot! I would pay to hear an extended mix of this with D.I.T.C memebers on it...imagine that? sick beat full stop.

Some Casual HipHop For You

Casual - fear itself

Casual came along as a memebr of Del's Hieroglyphics crew . I rmemeber picking this album up on the basis of that alone and i think i banged this record to death! The album was as you would expect from part of del's crew but it seemed to be a little more special, Not dissing Del himself or Souls of mischief when i say that but i just think that casual was probably the most talented of the bunch. He doesnt have the easiest voice to listen to but makes up for it with amazing rhymes which he lays on every track on the album. I had a hard time picking album tracks to post up here but my first was fairly easy. "Me-O-Mi-O" this track is now pretty legendary and stands up well for itself!

Note: If you didnt like that just keep reading....Trust!!!

Other album tracks that were pretty fuckin good include "You Flunked" a bit more up tempo stuff! Then we came to the first single from the album "Thats How It Is" This was a great track and a good little head nodder. Now my final album track was possibly my favourite on the album "We Got It Like That" I dont know why? it just was???

But then.... We have now a second single from the album. This single was a Classic straight away with hiphop heads! I dont even think my copy of this will play anymore because of wear and tear??? but anyway the single was Me-O-Mi-O and this gave us 2 remixes and a extra unreleased track. This is how 12" should be!!!

The first track you get to on the 12" is "Rock On" This was an excellent unreleased track featuring Pep Love. second track off the 12" well it was 3rd actually but im saving best for last! we get to the Remix of "Thats how it is (dissishowedo remix)" This was a phat remix and one of my favourite casual songs to date.

Then we come to the title track of the 12" and this!!! this is how you do a remix. At the time on the west coast hip hop was still all g-funk with Death Row running things so its no surprise it was hard work for Del's crew to break hiphop like they should have. So i think they kind of ran a bassline heavy Evil G-Funk beat for this remix on purpose just to get some heads turning their way! It worked...This remix is a classic and should NOT be slept on. you find this you BUY IT! simple rule there...

"Me-O-Mi-O (its a me thang remix) "

One line from this track is "i'm a cool mother fucker who can rap his ass off"

Certainly is!

Who Ate All The Pies

Pudgee Tha Phat Bastard

Sorry about the shit pic but thats all i could find?

I got the album "give 'em the finger" on the basis of the 12" "checkin out the ave" This is a great track and well worth the listen and purchase if you can still find the 12" somewhere?

The album was a bit hit and miss to tell the truth. I dont know if i feel like that because of the quality of the single??? its got a bit of a D.I.T.C feel to it beatwise but it just doesnt quite match up to it.

However....This album does contain one of the greatest hip hop tracks of all time in my opinion. This is a real real gem of a track and features none other than Kool G Rap himself, You only need to hear the bassline at the begining to know this is gonna blow! the track is called "This is how we fuck it up" This tune is SICK!!!

So like i say the album doesnt really live up to these 2 tracks but hell...buy it anyway just for them alone!!!

Unsung Heroes....Da King & I

Meet Da King & I... this was one of those albums that you flick through your collection and go "damn i forgot this shit!!!" This was a pretty dope album back in the day and its aged really well too. You can whack it on a turntable still and the head nods start pretty much straight away and it continues the whole way through this good good album!

I had a friend round the other day and we started to dig out some classic shit when he found this and asked "whats this man?" obviously i grinned straight away and told him to clear away from the decks and threw it on.

The album starts with a funky little intro then bursts full pelt into a gem of a track called "Lets take a trip" my friend was like "yeah thats some good shit" so i just left the album to run through as i knew he was gonna get more impressed as it went on.

The 3rd track on the album was also a pretty sweat 12" back in the day and was what first got me onto the group in the first place "Flip Da Scrip" Now this was straight up head noddin magic! awesome beat and bassline just makes you wanna listen more to this crew.

Other great tracks from Da King & I were "Krak Da Weazel" ... "Lost My Mind" And also the singles released from this album gave us 2 great remixes "Krak Da Weazel (remix) " and the amazing " Tears (remix)" I prefer the album version but i'm sure you will check it for yourself after hearing these tracks!

Unfortunately this was about it from this crew??? not quite sure what happened which is a shame! I did a lot of digging to find out some more about Da King & I but didnt come across much untill i came across (by accident too) the myspace page of Dj Majesty hope you like this album as much as i do? Oh yeah 1993 if you was wondering.

#1 Chief rocka

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah as i have said before 1993 was a great year for hip hop!

Here come the lords was the debut album from Lords of the underground. A crew from Newark who caused a major buzz on the scene with the singles "psycho" then "Check it"

The album came out shortly after and in now way did it let down expectant fans.

This was a solid debut and had soem extremely catchy beats and some well thought out lyrics to boot! not surprisingly they hammered the album to death and released 6 singles...yes 6? (thats where moby got his ideas from)

A tad bit of a rip off too for fans (or muggs) as the singles were pretty lame value for money too! dont get me wrong...they were all great tracks but you expect a remix if you gonna get into collecting records? while a lot of the singles claim to have remixes on them they werent actually that different from the originals except for the "flow on" single which was blessed with a fairly lazy Pete Rock remix.....now pete rock is a laid back chap but this remix was zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz (definately not his best effort!)

but without the singles i suppose the Lords would not have hade their hip hop anthems bashed to bits in the clubs as much...and that just about sums the lords up. Some great cuts on this album and probably everyone in hip hop has nodded their head to "chief rocka" at least 80,000 times!

other tracks were "funky child" and the title track "here come the lords"

So if you are one of the odd few hip hop heads that dont got this album do yourself a favour and get it. you forget how good this album is then 10 years later you find yourself in your front room miming to the whole of psycho while your turntables tremble like a bitch!

u may have to let this one load a bit but it does work

Hey Mr president

So after all the controversy surrounding Ice T/body counts "cop killer" track.

Along came the rapper paris with his secon album "sleeping with the enemy" with the even more controversial "bush killa".

If you think George Bush jnr is a hated man right now you have no idea about how much Paris hated Bush senior!!!

But ignore the track itself! This album is a fuckin 5* classic in my view. This album has just about everything you want....Great beats (some supplied by a very young DJ Shadow by the way) lyrics that pull you into a world that paris Needs to get out of him! some scratching that you will not believe??? this is defiantely a timeless record and the fact it was allowed to be released at all is a miracle....well not really?

After the fact that no one would touch it with a 2,000,000 mile barge pole Paris just released it by himself! no mean feat back in the day!

Anyone at all interested in political hip hop should check out this and paris's other albums, i myself wont be after i bought the follow up album i kinda got the impression Paris was losing the plot a bit (my opinion and i'm entitled to it)

The 3rd album

I am very sad to say was a terrible follow up to what i thought was a start of something big in hip hop... ,no doubt the man is still doing his thing today and power to him, but for me this album just fell off so much it was ridiculous!

Released at the time of the Dre induced G funk era paris broke away from his gritty hard hitting beats and tried to use the same g funk format but someone forgot to tell him that his gritty rhymes didnt quite go well???

Shame.....

But no doubt anyone with a serious head nod infection and a need to punch george bush needs his "sleeping with the enemy" album! just get it!

Other worthwhile tracks include "The devil made me do it" " make way for a panther" "sleeping with the enemy" and "The days of old"

While i may think the man has slightly lost the plot? he is still doing his thing and his website is a very interesting read. Covers a lot of social issues and problems that communitys in america is still struggling with. It also has some "interesting" views on recent events such as 9/11 but i not going into that fuckin can of worms. but feel free to check out Paris's work and that includes Sleeping with the enemy!

And then there was Blunt...not james

The infamous Phillie Blunt! this aint gonna be a long post.....

Songs explaining the phenomenom

Redman "how to roll a blunt" and redman never stopped rollin?

KRS ONE "cant wake up" Genius track right here!

Nuff said

Unsung Heroes....Deadly Threat **** re-up****

***DOWNLOAD***
Threat - Sickinnahead

For those that listened to west coast gangsta rap in the earlt 90's there is a big possibility you heard Threat rhyme on someones track?

The fact that i chose him to be my first unsung hero is down to the fact that i can hardly find a thing about the dude on the net anywhere??? its not surprising but at the same time its a shame as this was a solid as hell album...okay it was exactly like all other west coast album out there.....guns, bitches and low riders? But how this album never shipped major units is beyond me?

Threat was sort of an un-official member ife Ice cubes lench mob andguest rapped on some all time west coast hip hop classics. None better than Ice Cubes "color blind" which featured a who's who of west coast rappers on the album "death certifidate"

He had a good voice and his rhymes were very well thought out and his beats were pretty sweet for the time. other collabs included the great track " Peep game" with 2pac and " A hoe b4 the homie" on King Tee's Trifflin album.

This aint a classic album like "Straight outta compton" but this is a great addition to anyones cd collection and chances are...you probably get it cheap somewhere too. be sure to check it out.

*******************************
So after the re-up i come with a little more info on threat. Ive just listened to this album again and it still amazes me how he didnt make a bigger name for himself? such a good dude with serious skills?

so anyways i have since found out that threat was a member of a group called " Black Menace " ive not checked out their stuff yet but am definitely gonna delve into it.

i found a link available for some of their stuff over on Deadly Grounds Website
I'm gonna get this album and see if i can track down the oither stuff so keep your eyes open for some stuff soon :)

B4 Comm lost his Sense?!?!?

So the year is like....1993 and everyone just getting over the shock of Dr. Dre's Chronic album just appearing from nowhere just before christmas in 92? and usualy around that time there is a lack of albums coming out in the start of a year that are any good but..........1993 was a good year for hip hop!!!

it started with a bang for me... i grabbed a copy of 2pacs Strictly for my niggaz

Then came one of my favourite albums of all time Above the law's black mafia life

And then i saw the video for Common Sense's Take it easy track on Yo mtv! and from then on i was hooked.

Next time i went diggin for records i grabbed his first album can i borrow a dollar

I loved this album so much....sorry used past tense then...i STILL love this fuckin album!

I was hooked on common's flow straight away and while a lot of my friends shunned this at the time i banged this album to death. I made it a mission to collect every common track i could from the moment i heard it. So i got the singles as soon as they left the man stacking the shelves hand!!!

Now ive looked and looked for the first single "take it E Z" but no matter what i read i dont believe this exsists and it has kinda become my holy grail of records! i would pay top top dollar for this single!!!

But as you can see i grabbed everything else that came out and this is still pride of place in my collection. Common is still one of my favourite rappers and i am glad i can say i heard his shit before he blew up and become the M.C he is now!

A lot of people are probably hearing his stuff for the first time in the last 2 years or so thanks to collabs with people like Kanye but those that know? know this is one M.C that has been on top of his game since.......well since he first hit the shelves!

Some stand out tracks from the time he was still know as Common Sense are definately "Soul by the pound (thump mix)" ........" I used to love H.E.R." and the amazing "In my own world (check the method)" also another great track which never featured on any of the albums was "Can i bust" which was released on the Breaker 1/9 single. This track is superb and not many have heard it??? check em out.

So its fairly safe to say i shall be blogging sometime about common when he lost his sense from his name but that will come soon.....enjoy

My introduction......

My introduction to hip hop.....

ok so its only fair i start up with the whole reason this blog is being made....DE LA SOUL

like them or not? they have to be one of the most original groups of all time... and that means all types of music.

before my school trip i had heard the obvious "THE MAGIC NUMBER" played around on radio and stuff. But it didnt come to me properly until i heard the whole album about 4 times in a row on the minibus to wales. sounds repetitive but i assure you if you take time out to listen to this album it will probably/hopefully have the same effect on you?

Other great tracks that had good success were " EYE KNOW " & " SAY NO GO "

it was the first time i heard an album that kinda had a story to it. and the more you listened along the more you heard and laughed at some of the outrageous things being said in the story.

DE LA have always to this day made light hearted music that sounds easy to the ear but underneath, sometimes anyways, tells a darker story to life in the streets and if broken down properly is probably as hardcore as other rappers like "PUBLIC ENEMY" + "N.W.A. "

Their tales are just as gritty but DE LA always managed to have that easy listening sound to them.