This previously unreleased track was circa 2011, though the vibes bring me back to my youth, a little Miami Vice, a little Toni Braxton, plenty of good energy on this one. Screw your American pride, Onra is one Frenchman worth listening to.
When you’re forging a path of fire while burning yourself alive, you may want to consider how scorching Hot Sugar is right now. He was covertly inducted into the ZIF of Fame last year, which really just means we’ll post just about anything this guy is putting out. Yes, this counts.
Ras G is the #1 ranked astronaut in the Afrikan Space Program. For those of you who can’t peep your favorite cosmonaut at Low End Theory on the regular, it is a must to check in with this new and free EP, download it in it’s entirety here. Also, we are lining up some time with Open Mike Eagle to discuss his movements, including his recent trip with Ras G to Uganda, sounds ridiculously intriguing.
The title pretty much sums it up, apparently he got stoned and went on one of those creative episodes reserved for geniuses. Everything from Jimi to Black Sheep on this. Great way to start your morning, confirmed that myself on my commute today. If it becomes available for download, I’ll upload that link here, for now, get stoned and stream away.
We all need some motivation to get our cardio on, New York based soundsmith TakStar is no different, and shared the following acoustic motivation to remind him to hit that gym. As long as he keeps putting out gems like this, we could give a shit how fat he gets.
Rumor has it he has collaborated with some homies back in Gotham City, an actual project is expceted to drop soon…
When most of us start something creative, it often ends up in a dirty stack of shameful “wish I had more time” attempts in our basement somewhere. When Flying Lotus starts a song and chooses to leave it unfinished, it gets released via Twitter/Soundcloud and gets 65,000 plays in one day. Forget redistributing wealth in this country, how about we start with doling out ‘cool’ in a more equitable manner, spare time too.
This track is apparently a new remix of Frank Ocean’s “Thinking About You”, fans got pretty upset that this is clearly unfinished. FlyLo went on Twitter to apologize that he was drunk when he released the track and that it will come down soon. Yikes. Stream while you can?
Plug Research’s artist roster is more than eclectic, it’s pragmatically diverse. They cover all sorts of apparent genres, and with this EP from Matt Tammariello aka Shortcircles, they demonstrate their ability to navigate through time. This EP is a self-proclaimed throwback to 90′s R&B. The synth heavy project is laced with excellent vocal work. Anytime you blend old school rhythms into a contemporary listenable project, it is a tremendous accomplishment. Shortcircles, we have our eye on you. Stream the album, but you can cop it as well here.
When this project hit the ZIF box I was immediately doubtful about it’s merit, as I usually am with so-called “mashups”. I see music fusion en par with fusion food; a lot of hype surrounding a combination of genres forced upon the world by unqualified chemists. Even the name, Steely Chan, was a blend I approached with caution. What caught my attention were the artists used in the mashup, a series of certified hip hop artists, uncompromising ones at that, all of whom were to be fused with the raw funk sound of Dutch outfit, Lefties Soul Connection. Random to say the least, but my interest was piqued and I hit the all important download button. Here’s my favorite tracks from their project titled Left of the Golden Era.
Props Over Bam Bam (Steely Chan’s Blender Mash)
Shook Ones Chop It (Steely Chan’s Blender Mash)
How Many Welly Wanging MCs (Steely Chan’s Blender Mash)
This Canadian production duo has earned my trust with this release, enter with caution if you like, but you shall leave unscathed, this is fusion worth a listen. Plus Canadians are virtually harmless, we all know that. Download the mixtape free of charge.
When I was first introduced to Hot Sugar from a producer friend of mine, I inquired, what makes this dude so special? I figured it was another Big Apple crush, my homie is from NY and you know how they’re always propping each other up. Well, he referenced the unique nature of the sounds that Hot Sugar creates, that he’s not just sitting behind a laptop screen with a library of noises that he sifts and picks through. He harvests the sounds, I can’t remember exactly the word he used, but ‘harvest’ sounds good to me. By finding unique sounds he is able to create soundtracks that are literally prohibitively his, sonic snobbery if you will. For the fan this ensures an exclusive listening experience, it’s like watching a live birth without all the fluids and hard to pronounce anatomy. This video shows a harvesting session tracking the drums used on Addictions from the breakthrough album Moon Money which has truly propelled this sound harvestor to the forefront of blogs giving a fuck about the next great thing. Cop Moon Money with your earth money here.
Hot Sugar usually plays all the instruments on his projects, so…
Remember when lyricists could also be the hardest gangster you could cite on the spot? Freddie Foxxx aka Bumpy Knuckles was/is that dude, a man known for being able to ride a Primo beat with the best of them whilst kicking you in your proverbial face for not listening. That’s the thing about DJ Premier though, his beats are obviously trademarked, everyone knows a Primo beat when you hear one. It’s the reason why young rappers on the come up still pay respect and cite the OG beatmaker anytime they get asked “who do you want to work with?” For the most part, Primo has avoided such collaborations, focusing more on mega superstars in other genres (Christina Aguilera or Limp Bizkit) or keeping his work within the family (Big Shug, Blaq Poet, Singapore Kane). This song is off the new album The Kolexxxion. Most of the beats on the album (all produced by DJ Premier except “Word Iz Bond”) are beats that were rejected by other artists, this one was too late to make Jay-Z’s Blueprint 3. Rejection never sounded so sweet.
Dubstep is dead, finished, abhorred, forgotten and buried in history. Having said that, Skream is everyone’s favorite dubstep producer, and yes, he’s still making bangers that people happily admit they’re enjoying. Fresh off all that work with Benga, he recently dropped this track on his Soundcloud. It’s been making waves in dubstep forums across the net, he also mentioned on his Twitter that it will finally get radio play today. So I said, meh, why not give it to the Safari for free. Seeing as we all hate dubstep and all.
Everybody is hype about this upcoming album from The Weeknd titled House of Balloons. Apparently that would include one half of Chiddy Bang duo Xaphoon Jones and British songstress Ellie Goulding, tell me the cover of this first track off The Weeknd album isn’t absolutely succulent, and I’ll show you where you can stuff your next thought. Shoutout to Yvette on putting me on this one.
DJ Krush, DJ Honda…Kyo Itachi? Maybe not, but this project is worth the listen, with worthy contributions from R.A. The Rugged Man, Blaq Poet, and Vinnie Paz, along with some other grimey crackpack favorites.
99 Problems/Cant Tell Me Nothing JayZ x Kanye West (Aloe Blacc Cover)
These types of remixes/ covers, what have you, usually do not do the trick for me. But Mr. Blacc has been on a remix tear of late, he truly possesses a complex musical mind. I’m not going to lie, I first heard the mix on KCRW, and when I heard the DJ shoutout the track, I proverbially SMH, and wondered why it was that the industry, even cats like Aloe Blacc can’t get off the Yeezy/Hova penis. I apologize Aloe, job well done, ZIF approved.
As the beat resonates, flashing from one ear bud to the next like the monotone on a child’s piano, I realize, Shadow is serious, he’s got to rock. Enter the sampling, ah, his personal strength, Shadow has made a living digging in crates in black holes passing off as record store basements. I’m listening to this track:
It’s the first track off DJ Shadow‘s EP, which is nothing more than a preview of some tracks featured on an LP titled The Less You Know The Better set for a September 5th release. The EP features three singles off the LP, and some remixes of the three. My personal choice is the remix for “I’ve Been Trying”, aptly called:
I’ve Been Trying (Various ‘I’m Done Trying’ Mix)
The cornucopia of sounds varying from DNB to Low End Electro reminds the listener (me) that Shadow is literally a museum of sonic knowledge. I listen to his music and all I can think is Library of Congress, a bounty of sporadic, spicy and diverse sounds. He mentioned on his website that this will hopefully stave off demand until the LP drops on September 5th, but if anything this wets an appetite, I call these releases “spring rolls”, I’m ready for my chow mein.
Here’s one more roll:
