Blaq Kush - There's Always Hope Vol.5

When a need for mind-numbing television and love of rap collide, Rhythm & Flow offers a new appreciation for memorable punchlines, especially those that arrive early. Blaq Kush answers the call with "The smoke in the room got it looking like the first level on Silent Hill." And levels there are. To begin, Silent Hill puts the gamer in the role of a father searching for his vanished daughter. The end is what you make it. With There's Always Hope volumes, we track the cover girl's expressions from shock through derangement to trauma and then watch (blankly?) as each vanishes, leaving her face as featureless as the projects themselves. You'll wish you hadn't learned where she's from. I never beat Silent Hill. Instead, I unlocked a glitch that made any kind of resolution, however disappointing, impossible. I'm writing this off the first 14 seconds of Vol.5's first song. It's also a weed rap. 

5 favorite lines from Skeleton Key

1. "I run NYC to burn calories."

2. "Vulgar like a Russian soldier but much colder."

3. "I'm a wolf. I'm aloof. I'm not cool despite what you might've assumed."

4. "These whores made voodoo dolls out the hairs of my pubis fallen from my two balls."

5. "How you get to look devilish but angelic / With my ancestors in heaven when I made man in my image / But all n*ggas ain't handsome just to be fair to the women / Up here where the air is thinner ain't no weird n*ggas or square bitches here to irritate my spirit / I'm busy creating pyramids." 

Skirt steak.

Blu Warta - Original Rugged Authentic

What's it called when you're so of something that it's as much a part of you as you are of it? As far I can tell, that was Blu Warta's relationship with hip-hop. This mixtape's title speaks to that. Coopting commercial jingles and tags was a fundamental component of the first raps, even pre-dating the phrase hip-hop. Before the orders come the advertisements. In the '80s, nobody beat the Biz. In the '90s, the Indelible MCs got their name off a marker. And in the '00s, Blu Warta lifted the title for this Smooth Denali-hosted mixtape from the only footwear arguably more synonymous with hip-hop than Adidas shell toes and Clarks Wallabees. Sadly, Warta passed away in 2005. Twenty years on, there are a number of tributes floating around. What there isn't is anything like a complete discography. So, clocking in at over 40 minutes, Original Rugged Authentic is the most comprehensive review of Blu Warta's music currently available. No false advertising, it is as described.

 

Skyzoo - "Courtesy Call" ft. Chuck D

If I can be honest with you, this post is as much an excuse to get Skyzoo on the site as it is anything else. At this point, I'm very comfortable saying he's one of the most underappreciated rappers of our generation. I remember once reading about Cage that he found himself considered too thugged out for indy rap and too intelligent for the mainstream. If Skyzoo is in a similar position, he's taken the opportunity to ghostwrite for majors while moonlighting as the one of the best rappers alive. (Hear: In Celebration of Us, All the Brilliant Things, The Mind of a Saint, and now Keep Me Company.) It's too bad the only other site I want to write for doesn't want to publish a Skyzoo interview. (Direct all hate mail here.)

516reapa - The New Prodigy

The future of music has arrived. If rap is at its best unfiltered human expression, then here it is in distillate. Have you ever seen a rapper take over a cipher without lyrics? I don't mean to say that they have wack rhymes. I mean that they may not be saying words at all. 516reapa brings that energy to every song. He also may be rapping in another language occasionally. I'm not really sure, and for that matter, I'm not really sure if it matters. For the past month or so, he was dropping music at the breakneck pace of about an album a day. That suddenly stopped, he's taken down much of his recent material, and there's still a ton! Again, I'm not sure any of this matters. For example, all that remains of recent standout TBS•••BLACKPOWERS are the following words: 

"*a righteous term for the keys of mastering neurodivergence, particularly one’s of an introverted black man in America

one of my most precious projects is yours to keep forever :) to stand free in your brain is black power! blackpowers are soul tactics to activate yourself. we black people struggle with self-harnessing, so i made black powers to give you a grip. 🖤

ci §uuf 10 lockpick!s, 10 powers videlicet;

maraboutage - power of possession

the orisha’s chant - power of the gods

lowersslf- power of one’s lower self

sight screaming - power of the eye

redmxxn - power of accession

reload!!! - power of primal rage

777made - power of the angels

refusetobeaslave - power of assertion

shikifujin - power of the reaper's cradle

chosen - power of acceptance

special thanks to dt, prodigy and zzakkatt you guys rock"

How fucking dope is that? So dope that when 516reapa tags his music "Afrofuturism" he may just succeed in taking the term back from the slough of ubiquity and in so doing, presently forge new tomorrows from a repaired past. And that's not even the half of it. Fact is, the closer you listen, the clearer it becomes that he's not just mumbling. Those are indeed words. If you ever imagined rap couldn't possibly get more abrasively dialectal than it is now, reimagine. It's a new day and from Hempstead, NY, rises The New Prodigy.

***12/24/24 EDIT: It's back!***

Ray Robinson - Black Suit

Do you like this? "What do you mean? Do you?" I mean, of course I do. I wouldn't do it otherwise, but there is something to be said for a second set of ears, or in this case, eyes and ears and maybe more than two. Relevant trivia from the Spiderman Wiki: the black suit started as a fan idea. Marvel bought it for cheap. Fans hated it, so Marvel decided to can it, but then fans came around to it, so Marvel kept it around for longer—or something to that effect. The point is most people don't really know what they like aside from the obvious. Then there are people who know all too well. I'm thinking of Henry Rollins living with a massive archive of vinyl and paper records, all meticulously sorted and stored in an acid-free environment, all alone. I figure the trick is landing somewhere in the middle, like creating the Long Island Hip Hop Wiki so that such a thing does exist, but not taking the time to actually build the thing by oneself. After all, I've already compiled the records. You're looking at them. Now hear this.

Lyrica - DONE DREAMIN'

"The ends justify the means" only works when the ends aren't just as fucked as the beginning. I don't want to read about the lawsuits. I want to write around the Lyrica album I've slept on since 2017. Carlin said, "It's called the American Dream because you have to be asleep to believe it." When 'woke' entered white vernacular, I daydreamed of Killarmy's "Wake Up," my alarm clock for much of my 20s, finding its way to major motion picture soundtracks, surfacing a Killa Sin solo album that never was. 

Unknogne - Long Island Reaper

Somebody ought to invent an analog instrument that can hit phonk notes without electricity. Imagine a cross between an accordion and a bass drum, a percussive wind with murderous bellows and a balaclava mouthpiece. We'll hold practice in abandoned mental asylums, shock therapy wards for orchestra pits, sheet music scrawled in garbage on the floor and graffiti on the walls. Unknogne orates from around the Gateway's Haunted halls and far beyond its seasonal attractions. Trap or play, every house is a haunt.

MF DOOM - MM..FOOD THE MOVIE

The first time I heard MM..FOOD, I was up at Emerson. One day while standing in front of WERS in between classes, I struck up a conversation with some dude a year or two older than me who ended up handing me a CD-R from his backpack. Boston in the early/mid '00s was like that. Random dudes were walking around with underground rap bootlegs. Twenty years later, DOOM has returned to Latveria and on the much-commercialized anniversary of MM..FOOD's release, I'm somehow for the first time in my life seeing this seven-year-old fan-made movie version of the album. Peace to Donwill's newsletter for being the 2024 equivalent of the random dude in front of WERS. Fun side note: the best comment ever posted here asked if I was Mr. Fantastik, and I'm not, but in addition to "Rap Snitch Knishes," you can hear him on "Par for the Course" off Kurious' new and delightfully funky album Majician via Metal Face Records. RIP Kong. 

Baibeebean - "Waiting for My Love" / "Until the Sun Comes Up" / "Perfume"

Imagine all history a beachy erotic romp. Forget literary critiques. Consider Socrates' literacy critique: "you who are the father of letters, from a paternal love of your own children have been led to attribute to them a quality which they cannot have; for this discovery of yours will create forgetfulness in the learners' souls, because they will not use their memories; they will trust to the external written characters and not remember of themselves." And in forgetting, how many across the ages have thrown it all away for a single sleepless night? No wonder even today, some consider anything written smut.

Lil Tecca - Plan A

You don't understand at 22. You were born after 9/11. We used to not have cell phones. Apps was something you got at Applebee's. I promise I'm not some out of touch old timer crying kids these days from an ivory tower. I have seen a police station go up in smoke from one, though. Forget handwringing. I'm doubling down. If there's any lesson to be learned here, it's these nouveau hillbillies will buy anything you sell them. Elitist, some say cosplaying redneck rapping Republican. How's this? Anything besides being rich is excuses. A now-46-year-old said so at 34. Take off another 12, rack up a billion streams, and make five figures on it.  What's the difference between podcasts and AM radio? This has been a public service announcement.

LIRR Presents: The Shit Mobile

"Humans in the lobby holding crosses up, I understand the caution, but some of you just wanna see the coffin jump until the coffin jump. Then it's what I call a punk. Didn't even get to where he coughing blood and talk in tongues. Not to mention, once you hassle the hoard, it doesn't matter how much furniture you stack at the door." —Aesop Rock

 

Class A Felony – "The Night Stalker" from Class A Felony CHCL455AFEL01 on Chopped Herring Records; Elucid – "Ghoulie" from I Told Bessie BWZ778 on Backwoodz Studioz; Grym Reaper – "Graveyard Chamber" Excerpt from 6 Feet Deep (Clean Version) PRLP 6853-1 on Gee Street; Eric B. & Rakim – "Lyrics of Fury" from Follow the Leader UNI-3 on UNI Records; Darc Mind – "Rhyme Zone" from Symptomatic of a Greater Ill ABR0063 on Anticon Records; DOOM – "Cellz" from Born Like This LEX069LP on Lex Records; Aesop Rock – "Jumping Coffin" from Spirit World Field Guide RSE0314-1 on Rhymesayers Entertainment; Too Nice – "The Phantom of Hip Hop" from Cold Facts AL85-83 on Arista; Public Enemy – "Night of the Living Baseheads" from It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back FC 44303 on Def Jam Recordings; Hyenas in the Desert – "Other Side of Midnight" from Die Laughing C 67655 on Slam Jamz, Columbia; Prodigy – "Shook Ones, Part II" Excerpt from Shook Ones Part II 07863-64315-1 on Loud Records, RCA Records Label, BMG; Roc Marciano – "Wicked Days" ft. Trent Truce from Mt. Marcy FB5205 on Marci Enterprises, Art That Kills; Grandmilly & Shozae – "Pleasant Times" from Adventureland STH2397 on Stones Throw Records

Rob Cave - God Dose

"The closest I've ever come to seeing or feeling God is listening to rap music," goes a line on R.A.P. Music. Same; I've also watched a college kid on mushrooms see God in the skies over Ocean Parkway while hearing Supreme Clientele for the first time in his life in the backseat of my car. One might include both of the aforementioned albums in a list of folk-rap essentials—that is, raps rapped in rap-handed obeisance to the art of rapping. Add God Dose to said list. This is not to say Rob Cave raps about rapping. He raps about God, the nature of the universe, and all existence. It's just that he does it in such a way that it makes one suspect only rap can truly get at the crux of these matters. While we're making imaginary lists, God Dose also forms a natural triptych with previous Cave releases Respect Wildlife and The Sun Tape. The first of those projects was about the world around us, the second the world beyond us, and this third installment the world inside us.

Chow Lee - SEX DRIVE

What's good with the dude on Love Is Blind who's so afraid of getting his girl pregnant they haven't had sex yet? Does he not know condoms exist? How is this question not asked by the producers? Are we, the audience at home, meant to think that condoms are not an effective birth control measure? This is like the opposite of the no glove, no love rule. This is like the opposite of the dude on Bridgerton making pulling out look like tucking and rolling out of a moving vehicle. 

"This ain't never getting cleared so here," Lee says thrice. "Girls cum first," adds his T-shirt and various pleasure enhancement products notably sold as collector's items not intended for consumption. (Maybe the guy from Love Is Blind could use some of these.) This, of course, begs the question: What would happen if one were to consume any or multiple of said products? 

Also, {Butthead voice}, "He said wood." Also, sexy drill openly flouts the conventions of heteronormative sexual power dynamics. Do you love it?

LL Cool J - THE FORCE

Start at the top. Imagine the Kangol never came off, its removal never going-going from local apocrypha to convenient metaphor. Does Chris Dorner's manifesto begin where N.C.I.S. Los Angeles ends? Having only seen the former, I couldn't tell you. I also couldn't say what it's like to hear, "They’re after this killer cop, and he looks just like you. They’re not looking to take him alive, so you best stay indoors, or you could get caught up in something."

 

Justified by virtue of creativity for obvious reasons concerning entertainment, THE FORCE is the boss. Appropriately then, the Abstract's doing damage, channeling the unconventional spirit loops that permeate The Infamous and Reloaded into a full album in the mid-2020s by none other than Uncle L. Alternate universe rap; if someone had told you 10-20 years ago that this would happen in 2024, you wouldn't have believed them, and yet here we are. What if The Renaissance never ended?

Somewhere Canibus is listening to LL Cool J rapping "Molecular structure of the nucleus of his cranium / Platinum, uranium, lyrical titanium" on a four-person posse cut and feeling all types of ways: proud, regretful, absolved by history, ghostly, telekinetic. 

KAD - ALPACA

DOOM's passing put the following fragment on this website: "the dollar-bin sample selection that was in constant conversation with itself; the smorgasbord of pop culture references that mined philosophical treatises from Saturday morning cartoons and Saturday afternoon Daikaiju films." Doombot or not, KAD pads the vocab. His crates seem to recall this description of the late villain more than they do his music itself, like a hologram baseball card. I'm not saying the holographic principle is an intelligent design plant intended to get creationist text books into middle-school science classes across the Western world, but I'm also not saying it's not that. It's ALPACA, you herd?

Half Pint & MC Glamorous - 2 Queens and a Mic

From Glam to Islam to SpitSLAM, and from the Son of Bazerk to the mother of all ladies of Long Island rap team-ups, it's themmmmmmmmmm, as in the royal they. Read that with an echo chamber and hear this through gender affirming circuitry. The least expected five-song EP of the summer just might also be the most refreshing, like a 70-degree day in August while the ocean "still holds the heat" as per my neighbor. Call it community organizing rap, the cement in public service announcement.

Akari - edits vol. 2

Lucidly ill audio-machinations suffuse with skittering light drums. Does the speed of sound remain constant absent an observer? Trees' forests in the plotline take hold. Rap still? I once thought I'd reached my goal of writing liner notes. Then I read William Parker's WEBO sleeve. The experience was like swapping bodies with my 17-year-old would-be rapper self hearing Breeze Brewin for the first time, i.e., transcendent/formative—take your pick. Somebody with editing chops lay his acapella tracks over drill beats. Takers? This might be another one of those be the change you want to see in the world moments. Peace to Eight Immortals.

Dana Hilliard - Clouds / Anybody

Floating, I watched a robin soar past just overhead. And I mean just overhead, no-sudden-movements close. Next, it came at me head-on and then back the other way. As I bobbed in place, it repeated its flight pattern over and over like we were stuck in a loop. I thought that robin and I were having a moment. "It was protecting its nest," my wife tells me, "trying to intimidate you." What can I say, birdie? Maybe environmental cues aren't exactly my forte. She stays away from the nest, my wife. But it's on our property. "The bird doesn't respect the government." It believes in squatters' rights, and sure, me too, but then also maybe it was just a keen display of aerial prowess. I'd like to think that. After all, it's not as if I was climbing the tree or even touching it. I was just floating on below, well within dropping range, oblivious to my avian comrades.

AZOMALI - Music for Solo Camping Vol. 1

Trim all the fat. Cut past the meat to bone itself and arrive at the question around which all civilizations live and let die. 

Would you rather fight a bear or a shark? 

This is not a test. It's the test, fool! Well, what's it going to be? Who's the apex predator now? Music For Solo Camping Vol. 1 proffers the kind of headspace one needs to contemplate such central queries and crucial conflicts. It's a place of roaming epiphany, like the realization that "Hay" has essentially the same beat as "Millie Pulled a Pistol on Santa." Only here may one truly and completely consider the implications thereof. 

Keeping it 100, I'm no camper. I'm a beach cat not a mountain lion. In other words, I'm team shark. For one, you can just hit the shark in the nose. Like Cam's coach said, he might be pussy. Second, whereas Jaws was fiction, Grizzly Man was a goddamn documentary. You must never listen to this. You must feel it between your toes like morning dew-coated blades of grass.

If everyone is an island, and here we are—you, me, us—then living unhoused equals solo camping. 

Confines - Work Up the Blood

When I was about 15 years old, I wrote and began shooting a script for a parody of the wrestling documentary Beyond the Mat entitled Beyond the Fat: The El Grande Story. One character in the film was a wrestler named the Vigilante. For his finishing move, he would pull out a gun and shoot his opponent. Because of this, he was always on the run from the law—hence, the vigilante. (In hindsight, the fugitive probably would've been a more appropriate name, but I was 15 and super into Death Wish at the time.) The script may be lying here somewhere. When Confines drops another project, I'll dig it up. Until then, enjoy this joint from December 2021.

Blaq Kush - There's Always Hope Vol. 4

Blaq Kush's mom speaks my language when she opens this album proclaiming "I can't tell you anything about this business, I don't know anything about it." This has essentially been my pitch to Kush to put a tape out on Long Island Rap Records for the past three years. To be fair, it was also my pitch when he contacted me eight years ago asking me to be his publicist. I'm nothing if not persistent. Hell, with my swimmer's ear, I may as well be the proprietor of "Deaf Man Records." "But I can tell you" that any new Blaq Kush release is practically guaranteed to get run back like "the hottest record in New York City" according to Flex on any given Thursday night. What I'm saying is this: We live in a time and place where Cash Cobain and KRS One share programming blocks. The game is a wrap. Tonight, I googled Blaq Kush and found out about his experimental noise project, This is not Blaq Kush. It's over. We won. Everything from here on out is a bonus track. Let's put two volumes on each side and call it the definitive edition.

Biz Markie & TJ Swan - Live in Boston, 1987

Talks out of turn. Doesn't listen to instruction. Tastes too niche for the mainstream and too common for the collectors. Can't figure out how to get Bing to acknowledge his website's existence. Remains largely unresponsive. Doesn't play well with others? Certainly won't beg anyone to attend the cookout. 

If you read this, I appreciate you. But please understand that as much as I hope you enjoy doing so, it's besides the point. This is all for me and mine, always has been. Your presence is not required. See the comments section for almost every post. Do note the absence of snake oil-selling spambots while you're at it.

In conclusion, "Anybody that don't got the AIDS or ain't on crack, throw your hands up in the air."

Shape - Midnight Geometry

"As long as I've been back and forth from Jerse to Long Island, I can get a crowd response equal to 'South Bronx'" — Tame One, "Detox the Ghetto"

And in the latest chapter of the New Jersey-Long Island cultural exchange program, we bring you Midnight Geometry, the new producer album from Ian "Shape" Morrison. A lazy writer fishing for an easy hook could do worse than pitch the Karma Kids-Smokers Cough sixth borough circuit featured here as the epicenter of outsider rap (and as a lazy writer, you might even work an Outsidaz pun in there somehow). I, on the other hand, will simply point out that the Karma crew has been on quite the pandemic-era album run these past few years such that Midnight Geometry had me revisiting Teddy Brown Brown for the umpteenth time on the ride home this evening and now I'm about to run back Tap on the Glass. Peace to C$Burns for making everything sound right. Peace to Yung Daddy for outrapping all her peers.

AZOMALI & Blu - "Bodega"

"Egg" means two eggs scrambled unless it means two fried. "Cheese" means melted American. A Kaiser roll is the default. If they ask how you want your eggs cooked, it's not going to be good. If they ask what kind of bread or cheese you want, it's not going to be good. If it costs more than $5, it's going to be fucking awful. If you get one egg, call the cops. The hot lunch should look insane. Azomali's right to recommend the fried plantain. The rice and beans also knock. Do the ribs look gooey? Is the person behind the glass cutting them with a knife that looks almost machete like? Does its every chop echo in your bones? If so, you can't go wrong.

Jay Dottt - HEAVEN SENT

It's a bacchanal! Call me Joey. Call me Donny. Call me any of Kool Keith's 58 aliases, except Exotron Geiger Counter One Plus Megatron, unless, of course, you want this to end prematurely. Speaking of, if HEAVEN SENT were to ever get a vinyl release, (I would cop and) it should have one of those Funky Ass Records center labels—you know the ones. While we're on the subject of ifs and/or butt, if Cardi B had ghostwritten "Swimming Pool (Drank)," it'd share thematic ground with HEAVEN SENT. Sexy drill is a pornocore renaissance akin to HBO Late Night with Oscar-worthy writing and full penetration. If you don't love it, I don't know what to tell you. Maybe try one of those gas station pills.

DJ Surrup & Makeda Iroquois - Demo (Chopped Not Slopped)

It's been nearly seven years since #BarcelonaBrazy3 dropped. Though long gone from the internet, the genre-defying mixtape has stayed in heavy rotation 'round here. Oh, you don't rip streams so you can return to them long past their DMCA-allotted shelf life? That's wild to me. It's been almost three years since Zero Klique songstress Makeda Iroquois released her Demo album and over two since DJ Surrup gave it his Chopped Not Slopped treatment. You could say we slept 'round here. But then, you might also say all time begins and ends with zeroes — what goes around comes around like. 

Kai Fortyfive - Dinner at Lonely's

The sun is an 865,000-mile ball of gas 93 million miles away from the Earth. The moon is a 2,159.2-mile ball of rocks 238,900 miles away from the Earth. It just so happens that our moon is one 400th of the size of the sun and one 400th as far away from us. This is essentially the definition of a cosmic coincidence, true for no other no other planet's moon(s) across the solar system. Try telling all that to the average human walking the Earth 400 years ago. In 2024, doomsday prophecy still makes for an easier sell than math and science. As for me, I'm just thinking back on Stop 20 solo visits—late night burgers and early morning Benedicts, with only the Criterion Channel for companionship.

Chuck D on the struggles of Black and American Indian peoples, mixed with commentary from a renowned Indigenous Canadian writer, soundtracked by an international dub outfit, later remixed by Mad Professor

Sometimes, the title says it all. Sometimes, it says a lot and there's still more. 

In 1988, a man named Pat Andrade produced and put out a cassette titled The Secret War Against The Black Panthers And The Indian Movement In America. It was one of the first releases on Maya Music Group, an independent label based in Canada, founded by Andrade and the Spirit Voice aboriginal radio collective. Andrade himself is Canadian-Jamaican, but had enjoyed a formative stay on the Havasupai Indian Reservation in Arizona. The music of The Secret War is dub-reggae, performed primarily by a group called the Neo-Mafia (likely this Neo Mafia), with drums recorded in Budapest, Hungary, and guitar and harp in Ottawa, Canada. The vocals are spoken word from Indigenous authors Lee Maracle and Ward Churchill and yes, Chuck D. Where his vocals come from is unclear, but the record label's radio origins suggest it might've been an on-air interview. (Indeed, one might be tempted to take all this a step further, drawing some interesting parallels between Chuck D and Pat Andrade's broadcasting backgrounds.) At any rate, Maracle and Chuck D's voices appear together over two Neo-Mafia tracks on this release. However, only one, "Are You Comfortable," appears to be floating around the internet. And in fact, the version that's out there is taken from another Maya Music Group tape, 1989's Your Silence Will Not Protect You Volume 1. In 1991, "Are You Comfortable" is remixed by dub great Mad Professor, given the much more revealing title "At Least American Indian People Know Exactly How They've Been Fucked Around," and released on a 12" of the same name. Both tracks appear below.

 

That's all I've got. For more about Andrade and Maya Music Group, check out "Radical Rhythms: 'Dancing on John Wayne's Head'" from the September-October 1995 issue of Against the Current.  

BAIBEEBEAN - "Dream" / "Safe & Sound"

Sports bar physicists double down on IQ-genics like the guy who runs that other Long Island rap site isn't illiterate. How's that for Double Negative?

Then again, if I'd said "is literate" instead, cornhole league mathematicians might've come around screaming about an anagram for Israelite.

What did Wesley tell Woody? You can have a view of me, but you can't see me.

The view looks something like this, like Wednesday night at McMurphy's after too many $4 Millers and ¢25 wings. If only the library would stay open so late.

Roc Marciano - Marciology

Less than seven months ago, John Caramanica authored an article titled, "Sean Combs Doesn't Need to Ask Anyone for Anything." Talk about aging horribly. 

While some may have been shocked to learn of the latest allegations against the artist who recently changed his middle name to Love, one Long Island Rap Records source was not. "Remember when he mentally tortured people on national television, and everybody was like, 'Oh, he just knows what it takes to make it in music, he's just making DA BAND," recalled the source. That reminded us of the time Combs turned a song about stalking a woman into an ode to his dead employee. And, of course, who can forget how he tarnished both of said employee's only two studio albums by saying "Uh-huh, yeah" and "Take that, take that, take that" on every song therein? 

To be fair, Caramanica is at least half-right insofar as he did write, "Combs Doesn't [...] Ask Anyone for Anything." And as far as mankind's oldest profession goes, even Robert DeNiro was once questioned in connection with a French prostitution ring. Of course, contrary to what internet conspiracy theorists would have you believe, he was never charged. DHS hasn't raided his Tribeca penthouse. 

The moral of the story? If you're going to engage in sex trafficking, at least check everyone's ID at the door. Leave all grooming to Merrick Road's pet pampering sector. And avoid incorporating reality-bending psychedelics into the mix. Toad venom and all-ages parties a happy marriage don't make.

Hundred block.

Crack Val - Rap for Ordinary People

Nowadays, everyone's extraordinary. We all have beautiful homes, giant televisions, and luxury vehicles. Or, at least, we can all convince each other that we have these things. But long ago, in the 2000s, we had only our aspirations. This isn't some social critique of influencer anti-culture or late-capitalist lamentation for the American dream. It's a blurb for a mixtape that never was. 

If Crack Killz Vol. 1 ever was released, Crack Val isn't around to tell us about it. The I.G.T. co-founder passed away seven years ago this month. He left online about a dozen solo tracks. Most are about money and women, especially the joys they bring and the fearful pain of losing them. Most have beats with the kind of 2000s mixtape-era magic today's producers yearn to recapture. The beats on here that don't fit that description are still ahead of their time. All of these songs are best described in Crack Val's own immortal words as "rap for ordinary people." I present them to you here in a continuous mix, with the blessing of Val's longtime partner in rhyme, Lagato Shine. Be grateful for everything and everyone in your life, with the understanding that all we ever really have is us.

1. Caviar

2. Bentley

3. Hate Yourself

4. R.O.A.E.

5. She Know

6. Top Notch

7. Rope-a-dope

8. Get Money

9. I Live It

10. Opposite of Found

12. In My Zone

$cottLaRock - If Love Could Kill

Symbol cheating like an unscrupulous Scrabble player, $cottLaRock remains the first name in Long Island Rap. Say what you will about board game night. 

If Love Could Kill, it would. (Would.) Imagine the body count. It would rap under the name Mass Grave. Peace to YoungBeenDead. It would say something dramatic before doing the deed. "If I can't have you, no one will!" And then, my friend, you die. It would assassinate, denoting the stature of its victim. It would slam the door behind it. 

If only...

Whirlwind D - Long Island Pioneers Hip Hop Show

Great Britain's affinity for Long Island hip-hop goes back decades, to the 1987 Def Jam tour if not longer. I dare say the connection has roots in the culture's progenitors. Indeed, recent posts here waxed philosophical on genre- and medium-spanning cross-pond collaborations, like Rakim's with Art of Noise or De La Soul's with the Grey Organisation. In our current century, Roc Marciano has produced an entire EP for UK rap duo The Planets and received nothing short of a hero's welcome on English tour stops. I even remember hearing somewhere that the famously purist P Brothers, who'd featured Roc on their 2008 Gas album, held Long Island up beside the Bronx in terms of hip-hop bona fides. I say all of this to say that much like the Germans go nuts for obscure Southern horrorcore and West Coast g-funk, the Brits love them some Long Island rap. Now, Salisbury, UK rapper/DJ Whirlwind D has compiled all that respect and admiration into a multi-decade history lesson of a megamix for the Pioneers Hip Hop Show on England's 103.7 Kane FM. Regular readers will no doubt recognize that Long Island Rap Records postings and musings served as a big source of inspiration for this mix. That said, regular readers may in fact be Whirlwind D and his fellow countrymen, and to them I say cheers, bruv, dun know.

 

Fire Arson - "His Apartment" ft. Kiko

How destructive rages Fire Arson? Not even the DATPIFF Hip-Hop Mixtapes Archive could salvage her releases. Instead, the lasting embers of her discography flicker about long-dormant Soundcloud and YouTube playlists titled FireHouse Classics and firearson, respectively. Yet this jewel survives neither. "His Apartment" sprays resource-guarding affirmations in the vein of "Territorial Pissings." Hell, as it happens, one of her mixtapes is called Nirvana. The Godmother reigns silent. The ocean is on fire.

Ray Robinson - Yasiin Ray

Placing Talking Book and In Control, Volume 1 toward the front of their respective stacks for the first-time shoppers, filing the Juggaknots single in its rightful place, the 12-inch crate, not pulling it or The Leon Thomas Album just to claim doubles: a man got to have a code-type beats.

There are no windows, but every LP in the room costs $5. These are the breaks? To be clear, I don't work here: a man got to have a hobby-type beats. 

Dust settles like collective unconscious. Day vanishes. Emerge into evening like a time traveler. Head home: a man got to eat-type beats.

(See also Essentials.) 

Rakim's Clothing Line, Urban Expedition

Two Rakim weeks ago, I covered Rakim's Rap City appearance, on which he promoted his clothing company, UBX.  About that: UBX stood for Urban Expedition. Rather than an independent clothing brand owned by Rakim, UBX was a label created by I.C. Isaacs & Company, Inc., a jeans and sportwear company founded in 1913. From then until the 1980s, the company primarily sold riding wear for the horse racing industry. In the 1980s, they were purchased by investors, started selling general men's and women's apparel, and made their way into J.C. Penney department stores. It was around this time that they also acquired Boss. By 1996, Boss become their best-selling line, accounting for more than 70% of annual sales. The acquisitions continued piling up, and in September 1999, I.C. Isaacs & Company announced the launch of UBX, an overt attempt to cash in on the streetwear trend that helped fuel Boss' rise. Or, as CEO Robert Arno put it, "The launch of Urban Expedition gives us the opportunity to capitalize on what we do best, providing style-conscious customers with cutting-edge fashions. By offering up-scale streetwear collections under a fresh new brand, we have an opportunity to capture a share of the audience who appreciates fashion-forward urban styling." The company hired Rakim to promote the line and even threw a party with Universal Records in November 1999 at NYC’s Metronome Restaurant & Lounge to celebrate the UBX launch along with the release of The Master. Also on the night's agenda: a preview of the Nelson George documentary A Great Day In Hip-Hop.

The only problem was that I.C. Isaacs was already running into financial trouble, had been since going public a couple years prior. UBX was discontinued in 2001. By 2011, I.C. Isaacs had completely divested from manufacturing and changed its name to Passport Brands Inc. 

Above: a selection of vintage UBX jackets, shirts and jeans floating around the resale market in recent years. Still unlocated: the Funkmaster Flex Great Day In Hip-Hop mix, a snippet of which accompanied the Rakim promo CD single handed out as an invite to The Master/UBX launch party.

Your Forecaster: Rakim (As Told by Art Of Noise)

Art of Noise were big in New York in the 1980s. How big? Getting played in clubs big, no doubt. But also pre-record-deal Public Enemy rapping over their songs big, Harry Allen doing spoken word sermons over their songs big. Did those WBAU airings make their way across the pond back then? Rakim definitely did. See: the UK-smash Coldcut remix to "Paid in Full." From there, Coldcut starts Ninja Tune. Ninja Tune begets trip-hop. And when Art of Noise return from a nine-year hiatus with Lol Creme (yes, that Lol Creme) in tow for high-concept comeback album The Seduction of Claude Debussy, it's Rakim, they ping to provide lead vocals on lead single "Metaforce."

Rakim had previously collaborated with Art Of Noise producer Trevor Horn on 1998's "Buffalo Gals (Back to School)," a reworking of Malcom McLaren and the World Famous Supreme Team's 1983 classic, and it's there that today's brief oral history lesson begins. 

Trevor Horn: "He remembered all the early hip-hop stuff I’d done with Malcolm McLaren like ‘Hobo Scratch’ but told me his favourite track was ‘Moments In Love.’"

Ann Dudley: "As soon as Rakim came up with the immortal rhyme 'Aerodynamic in the Evening Air' we knew that we had it!"

Paul Morley: "We just sent Rakim some information, thinking it wouldn't mean much to him, and he did this fabulous rap, throwing things out of context all over the shop."

Dudley: "He was very interested in it – the whole idea of what we were doing."

Morley: "We sent him this big raft of stuff about Charles Baudelaire, who’s one of my favorite poets. It was kind of interesting because one of the thrills of the whole thing was that he totally got inside the spirit of the record and didn’t lop anything on top of it that came from his world. [He] went inside what we were trying to do with the record and gave it something that then inspired us to cover other areas as well. It was a fabulous thing that he did. There’s some great images in there."

Dudley: "It seemed like Rakim represented the modern poet, the poet at the end of the 20th century, rapping about Charles Baudelaire, the poet at the end of the 19th century, and I've never heard those sort of rhymes in a rap."

Morley: "It was a wonderful moment. It’s like 'Splatter my wisdom in a design,' is a great way to describe painting. We were absolutely thrilled."

Sources

"The Noise are back in town," The Guardian, June 20, 1999; "Art of Noise makes a new impression with 'Debussy,'" CNN, September 27, 1999; "The Art Of Noise: Do You Dream in Color?" Ink19, October 15, 1999; "Anne Dudley and Paul Morley discuss The Art Of Noise," Chaos Control Digizine, 1999; "Does Rock ‘N’ Roll Kill Braincells?! – Trevor Horn," NME, November 11, 2021.

Additional reading: "Somebody Down There Loathes Me," The Observer, August 31, 2002; "The Velvet Revolution of Claude Debussy," The New Yorker, October 22, 2018.