Playlist : May 31st - June 4th, 2010

It's 2am Friday (kinda) night at the moment and I thought I'd make an early start. So here goes:

• Leonard Cohen - Songs of Love and Hate : A morbid and deeply depressing LP, I know, but such lyrics and such folk guitar trickery and such a voice. Without Leonard, there'd be no Nick Cave, there'd be no 50,000 cover versions of Hallelujah. Only one of those things I would miss...

• Alice In Chains - Dirt : Thanks to DR Adams for the record of the Week last week. I used to listen to this album all the time, but it's been ages. Let's see how it holds up.
  

• Dave Rawlings Machine - Friend of a Friend : After hearing these guys play a cover of To Be Young and a few tracks of this album, I had to check it out. As a vocalist, Rawlings makes a great guitarist for his sweetheart Gillian Welch, but these songs are well written.

• Gillian Welch - Soul Journey : And what is Dave Rawlings without Gillian? Wayside/Back In Time and Wrecking Ball are 5 star songs on my iPod. All my fingers are crossed that the Machine visits Perth and brings Ms Welch along.
  

• Soundgarden - A-Sides : Matches with Alice In Chains like red wine and cheese. Soundgarden were the first bit of 'grunge' I heard. I remember telling my metal-loving mates that I loved metal now after hearing Jesus Christ Pose. Metal was the only reference I had for Cornell screaming at the top of his lungs over grinding guitars - until Nirvana came along later.

• The Whispertown 2000 - Swim : And just to make this week's playlist completely Acony Records friendly, Rawlings and Welch's labelmates the WT2K - crazy indie freak-folk country kids with a bit of The Muffs about them.
  

• Rickie Lee Jones - Rickie Lee Jones : Still sore about not getting organised and going to the Octagon show last week, I am playing this in tribute. There's something about Chuck E's In Love that still makes me feel really good. It may be I remember fondly sitting on the loungeroom floor as a 7yr old immersed in the film clip every Sunday on Countdown for all those weeks it was #1 But I have sinced come to love this album just as much for the beatnik tales and pure jazz of songs like Night Train and Young Blood.
  

• De La Soul - Stakes Is High : I fell off De La after 3 Feet High and Rising; so I missed this album when it was new. I've since discovered it is brilliant. De La Soul at their absolute peak for mine.

• Beastie Boys - To The 5 Boroughs : Looking for some more Hip Hop/Rap to add to the list and feeling in an NY mood after choosing RLJ, I went with this underrated and unappreciated solid Beasties set from 2004.

• Paul Kelly - Ways & Means : Great double album of folky old time stories from the master of Australian songwriting.
  

Well, that ought to tide me over for a busy week and take us right into the long weekend. Enjoy your weeks peeps. Right on.

Song of the Week 28/05/2010

Jace Everett - Bad Things

Email:

Happy iPad Day! Well, except to those who already have theirs :P

In celebration of the impending arrival of my new toy - and my subsequent obsession with it, I'm sure - I give you the theme song from another obsession, True Blood. Yes, I want to do bad things with iPad. Mmmm iPad... :) I bought Wired last night and will probably grab Pages before the weekend is over. Not to mention the Toy Story read along, Epicurious, Wall Street Journal, Time and a stack of other news apps. Oh and I have the Sin City comics, Persepoli 1 & 2 and Ghost World ready to load onto it.

I'm also a fan of True Blood and it starts the third season mid June I think. So yay.

Song of the Week 21/05/2010

Jackson Browne - Take It Easy

This week I have discovered that there's more to Jackson Browne than Running on Empty and Stay that always get played at my Step Dad's when he listens to 94.5FM. My sojourn into Browne land (wait.. what?!) began when I discovered a 70s channel on iTunes radio. I was taken by how everything Pop and Rock from the 70s (remember, my usual 70s fare is Funk and Punk) seemed to be smothered in a sort of stoned honey. Everything sounded like someone gave Van Morrison some Valium and told him to sing about nature - smooth and mellow and copacetic. It sounded like a nice way to be on the inside.

So I got hold of some Jackson Browne. I could have picked any song of the Best Of that I got, but I chose this one because this was the first time I had heard it and I had no idea that he wrote it and not The Eagles. On another note, I also found out he wrote Fountain Of Sorrow. I'd always assumed that was a Joan Baez song because it seemed to be so much about her and Dylan. Maybe that's why she chose to cover it, or maybe Browne wrote it about them, but man those words sound like hers.

Hip Hop Appreciation Week Pt 5

Mixtape 5 of 5 Back to the Roots

Finally the end of my set, but certainly not the end of my devotion to all things Hip Hop. While Eminem had got me back into rap with the Marshall Mathers LP, it was a couple of hooligans from Adelaide with a CD called The Calling that I borrowed from the library who got me passionate again. The rise of Australian Hip Hop made me realise there was a way forward - upwards and out of the gangsta quagmire. ...giggidy ;)

• Hilltop Hoods - 1979 : It wasn't til after I had lent The Calling that I discovered Hilltop Hoods and downloaded Matter Of Time from their website archives. This song for me covers everything I've been saying about where rap went wrong and how it can be fixed. Plus, you can feel a genuine passion for the culture in every rhyme Suffa and Pressure drop. "It's not Hip Hop / It's something more sad, sick and seedy / What's popping that Gucci got to do with graffiti?"

• Bliss N Eso - That Feeling : Thanks to my initial foray into Skip Hop, I discovered Bliss N Eso via an iTunes free song of the week. Again, these guys had a love for the culture and were telling their own tales of how they got into it, where it took them and where it's heading. It genuinely felt good to hear people tell stories like my own - much the way I figure Bronx kids felt when Run DMC blew up. It got me all the more passionate about the music and made me rediscover the old school stuff I used to love.

• Pegz - Back Then : Yet another great Australian Hip Hop song about the old days of the culture from an AU perspective. When Pegz says "Who remembers Ice-T was king? Flat tops were in, Swatches were bling" you just try and stop me putting my hand up (with my Swatch on).

• Hilltop Hoods - The Calling: As mentioned, this was really the album that put me firmly back on the Hip Hop track. This song is an ode to the almost religious hold of the culture and being down for the joy of it and not for money, fame or girls. "So from the cradle to the grave, turntable to holy father / I swear I didn't slit my wrists, I've got the Hip Hop stigmata".

• Public Enemy - So Whatcha Gone Do Now? : The first piece of positive flow I had heard come out of America for a while was of course from the great PE. On this track, PE use soundbites from Spike Lee's School Daze from the likes of Laurence Fishburne and Giancarlo Esposito to punctuate Chuck D's rant about what he percieves is a lack of self respect from the men in his race. Chuck spits vitriol at those who are "talking that drive-by $#!&", "that gangsta $#!&" and call each other by the N word. And, like Fishburne's Dap in School Daze says when an arch rival accuses "You're all N----s just like us, and you're gonna be N----s forever." Chuck's point is "You're Not N----s".

• Hilltop Hoods - She's So Ugly : So you can probably guess the importance of the Hoods to me with three tracks in my final ten. State of the Art dropped this year and it continues the great work of the Adelaide trio with rhymes that mean something, that have a tale to tell and do it with impressive flow. This track again touches on what others have been saying about Hip Hop being at a low point - with the great sample "Hip Hop right now she's an ugly b!%#&" At the same time, the Hoods again proclaim how much they once loved 'her'.

• Brother Ali - Watcha Got : I don't recall how I found Brother Ali, but he has quickly become my favourite US rapper. The hulking albino with a cheeky grin and a whole swag of arrogance has no time for the empty rhymes and disrespect for women and Hip Hop pioneers so prevalent in much of rap in the early 2000s. This track spoke right to me from the opening line "I came in the door 1984, paint on the wall got chased by the law / Once got stole in the face for the flow, was never given a zone, had to create my own." It's like Ali grew up in Perth in the 80s too.

• Nas - Hip Hop Is Dead : Featuring wil.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas and samples from In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida and Apache (the latter fittingly among Hip Hop's earliest and most iconic tracks) Nas proclaims the death of Hip Hop from over-commercialization and the pursuit of conspicuous wealth. Meanwhile, he reminds us what is right about the culture with talk of its pioneers and its roots - proclaiming he's "on my second marriage; Hip Hop's my first wifey."

• Nas - Carry On Tradition : As well as declaring Hip Hop as we know it DOA, Nas offers advice on how to revive it on his 2006 LP Hip Hop Is Dead. Despite some dubious antisemitic statements, this song is a protective hand over the culture demanding that up-and-comers show it respect or get out. As Nas spits, there's no point calling yourself Hip Hop if you can't even quote Daddy Kane.

• Double Dee & Steinski - Lesson 3 History of Hip Hop : Winners of the 1983 Tommy Boy Records remix contest, Double Dee & Steinski were turntablist pioneers who layed down in 3 lessons the bare essentials of just about every iconic cut in Hip Hop history, ever. I have included Lesson 3 as a celebration of the fourth element (DJing).

And so that is my full set of 50. It has been an enjoyable experience writing about the songs that have kept me in Hip Hop's grasp or pulled me back in through all these years. For anyone who read this, I hope you learned a few things and maybe want to go out and hear some new tracks. If you read this and you lived it all too, I hope you felt a little of the joy that reminiscing about all this brought me.

Now throw your hands in the air and wave them like you just don't care... Yes, yes ya'll. And it don't stop.

Playlist : May 24th - 28th, 2010

A couple of compilations and some old favourites in this week's list. Unfortunately, it doesn't include the new vinyl only Ryan Adams release, Orion as I'd just splurged on Down Under By law (which arrived safely btw and has been ripped to mp3 nicely).

So here goes:

• Deb Talan - A Bird Flies Out - The distinct and honey sweet voice of The Weepies in a 2003 solo effort. The other half of The Weepies, Steve Tannen, recommended Ms Talan to me via Twitter, saying he'd listened to and enjoyed her music long before meeting her and forming a their band.

• VA - True Blood OST Volume 1 - My wife and I are massive True Blood fans and can't wait for Season 3 - which I'm told is due to start sometime in June. The soundtrack contains a whole lot of down home rock.

• Drive-By Truckers - The Big To-Do - A twitter follower and fellow alt-country tragic recommended the latest Truckers to me. This will be my first listen.

• VA - What It Is! Vol. 4 - The fourth and final installment of this great collection of funktastic soulful grooves.

• Jebediah - Slightly Oddway - With the overall brooding tone of much of the rest of the list, I felt I needed something a little power poppy. Seeing as the WAMIs were just on and the Jebs played, I chose this old favourite from 1997.

• Ice-T - Power - While writing my list of songs for Hip Hop Appreciation Week, I was reminded how much air time Power got on my TEAC double cassette deck (laughingly referred to as a boom box back in the day). Good fun, good knowledge and great grooves from SVU's own Finn ;)

• Black Star - Black Star - Another album I decided I wanted to hear while compiling my Hip Hop list. Talib Kweli and Mos Def bring the jazz and the BK swagger to their debut, and so far only, LP.

• Counting Crows - This Desert Life - Yes, Counting Crows, okay? As uncool as it is, I still don't mind a good CC track. People forget how massive August was. Crows PWNED son. I enjoy this album, if for no other reason than Mrs Potter's Lullaby can transport you instantly into a giggling and giddy flirtation with Monica Potter. Most people at least know Colorblind from the Good Intentions soundtrack.

• Ryan Adams & the Cardinals - Cardinology - So after convincing the "bank manager" that I absolutely had to spend almost $100 on a record (after $700+ on an iPad and accessories), Ryan Adams decides to release Orion - a vinyl only sci-fi metal concept album that would have cost me $50 to import. Not. Happy. Radams. So in protest I will play the last Cardinals release and obstinately insist that metal is crap anyway and who wants a stinking clear vinyl record...

By Friday I may have gotten around to compiling all my Hip Hop Appreciation Week mixtapes, so I may be listening to them that day. I still have had no joy posting them here. Might need to make them a lower bitrate and try again.

See you at the coalface.

Hip Hop Appreciation Week Pt 4

Mixtape 4 of 5 Bling & Remebering

Welcome to part 4 of my tribute for Hip Hop Appreciation Week. At this stage in the game, I wasn't what you'd call a fan. I was off listening to Dinosaur Jr, Nirvana, Hole and Soundgarden etc, wearing flannel and 'slacking'. It's also when I got into folk and Dylan for the story telling. But when Eminem dropped Stan, something that I had forgotten somehow resurfaced as I realised rap told many a great tale. It was just that now most of the tales seemed to be of little importance.

• Snoop Dogg - Still A G Thang : With the popular G-Funk style of synthesized melody and deep bass lines reminiscent of the 70s funk stylings of Sly, Parliament et al, Snoop Dogg told tales of the life of a G and his harem of 'bitches' and yards of bling.

• The Notorious B.I.G. - Things Done Changed : Cali may have been the in sound, but the Bronx kept a stamp on rap in the form of Biggie Smalls, aka the Notorious B.I.G., real name Christopher Wallace. Biggie talks here of how the streets aren't the place they used to be with kids punching on over territory. Using a sample from Dr Dre's Lil Ghetto Boy, BIG exerts "Remember they used to throw? But now they blast, right?" This is the violence and nihilistic attitude of gangbangers writ large

• Nas - N.Y. State of Mind : The West Coast v East Coast rivalry was in full effect by now and East Coast rappers had a penchant for burrough checking. Nas was very firmly in the East Coast camp having come up in Queensbridge. This song talks about the escalating violence of gang culture, as B.I.G. had, but without the swagger and with an added touch of disillusionment.
  

• Jay-Z - Izzo (H.O.V.A.) : An anthem of sorts with not much more to say than "I'm Jay-Z and I sell a lot of records but I used to be a drug dealer." A long way from the positive message of rap's 'founding fathers'. Famously, Jay-Z was involved in a feud with fellow NY local Nas and was later Nas' boss after he signed him to Def Jam in 2006.

• Eminem - My Name Is : Marshall Mathers aka Slim Shady aka Eminem burst onto the scene with this, for the time, controversial track which again had not much to say. It did later cost Eminem almost US$10M when later his own Mother sued him for the claim that she 'does more dope than I do'. While Eminem has a staggering talent for rhyme that helped suck me back into rap, he only occasionally has something important to say with his impressive tongue.
  

• 50 Cent - In Da Club : Many people may disagree vehemently with me, and that's fine, but as little as I paid attention to this kind of track, I think the new faux R&B / Rap reached its most vacuous low around about here. I have heard 50 Cent drop some tremendous flow, but this isn't it - and the dance track backing makes it all the worse. The backlash had to come, and it's coming still.

• Black Star - Definition : In 1998 two then little known MCs, Mos Def and Talib Kweli formed Black Star and released a self-titled debut. Much of their rhymes focused on reconciliation between the West and East coasts. This track talks about the inherent dangers of being a rapper and of life on Brooklyn's streets, while it takes a subtle swipe at the up and coming wannabe gangsters with "What a pity blunts are still Fiddy cents...".

• Missy Elliot - Wake Up : Just as guilty of the phony R&B but none-the-less starting to get on the positivity train, this track sees Missy Elliot and guest star Jay-Z reassure rappers and ghetto youth that "If you don't got a gun it's alright..."

• Common - I Used To Love H.E.R. : Telling the tale of a woman he once knew, Common lays down some soulful lamenting of how she went from a sweet young girl to a militant activist and eventually a drunken, crack-smoking gangster whore. The woman is of course Hip Hop. This was perhaps the most vitriolic track spat at Hip Hop culture up to that point.

• The Roots - Act Too...The Love Of My Life : The disillusionment turns to nostalgia and a longing for the long gone days of pure Hip Hop for the sheer joy of it. The Roots were proclaiming, it seemed in this track, that they would breathe life back into a dying art.

That's it for part four. In the final part, I'll take a look at how the ascendancy of 'Skip Hop' really sprung from the same thread of disillusionment that seemed to be running through much of the most important Hip Hop music coming from the States at the time. But it wasn't just Australia who wanted Hip Hop back, there were a number of Americans with the same idea.

Adios Amigos.

Hip Hop Appreciation Week Pt 3

Mixtape 3 of 5 : Positive and Negative

My third set of 10 songs begins when Rap's conscience was developing fast. After the Stop The Violence Movement, many rappers began 'dropping knowledge' on the subject of gangs and violence and other matters in the everyday lives of kids in the ghetto. The movement got militant with X-Clan and Public Enemy and then afro-centric with crews like the Jungle Brothers and A Tribe Called Quest. Before long though, G-Funk came along and made rap all about 'bitches, bling and hos'.

• Ice-T - You Played Yourself : Over a tasty sample from James Brown's The Boss, Ice-T lets it be known that frontin' to fake a reputation, smoking crack and selling out for money are not what the culture is about. At the time, Ice-T was the king of rap and what he said went.

• Public Enemy - Fight the Power : 1989! Another Summer! That 'nine' from Chuck and Flav was a missile fired across the bow of all culture as a warning that rap and Hip Hop were in charge. From the S1Ws marching through the Spike Lee directed film clip to Chuck's intense delivery, PE were the most militant thing on two turntables and a microphone, ever.

• Beastie Boys - Root Down : Continuing Hip Hop and rap's growing nostalgia, the Beasties dropped this awesomely funky track about growing up in the BK and the idols that came before even their own seminal influence (such as Kool Moe Dee and Busy Bee). More importantly, they offer the advice that 'disrespecting women has got to be through..." little knowing that from hereon in, it would get much worse.

• Jungle Brothers - Black Is Black : A curious mix of the new dance music, House, and afrocentric Native Tongues acts, the (other) JBs debut Straight Out The Jungle ushered in the high-conscience form of rap along with De La Soul and A Tribe Called Quest. This song features Q-Tip.
  

• X-Clan - Heed The Word of the Brother : At the time X-Clan released To The East, Blackwards on which this track appears, I was hooked on De La Soul, The Jungle Brothers, NWA and PE. What I heard from X-Clan on Scratch FM sounded too militant. It wasn't until Eminem's Yellow Brick Road spoke of X-Clan's debut that I went out and picked it up. I was right, it is too militant...
  

• Ice-T - Original Gangster : Beats punctuated with machine gun fire, warnings about street connections and a film clip of a buffed up Ice in prison blues, wife beater and bandana were as hardcore as gangster got in 1990. Even NWA seemed like a few kids playing smart when Ice-T was on the mic. This instantly became my new favourite tape to blast from the '79 Gemini :)

• The Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy - Televison, the Drug of a Nation : Just to prove there were intelligent rappers left who understood the whole new media, post-modern trip that the world was on, the Heroes gave us a song about mass consumerism, the Gulf War propoganda machine and a host of very 90s concerns that mostly still ring true today. I was studying Media at the time and all my Professors drooled over this song and its clip.

• De La Soul - Ring RIng Ring (Hey Hey Hey) : De La blows up. Every man and his dog's dog knew this song. It was the start of more popularisation for rap. I still hear people singing this chorus when joking about not taking phone calls.

• Dr Dre - Bitches Ain't Shit : Featuring Snoop Dogg and Kurupt among others, this track may have been about ex-NWA crewmate Eric 'Eazy-E' Wright, but the kids on the street didn't take it that way. And now and for all time, it seems, most people will tell you its only about disrespecting women. It is disrespectful, without a doubt, but it's also about treating Eazy-E like a 'bitch'. Regardless, songs like this helped forge misogyny as part of the rap vernacular. I was onto Grunge at this point. But the Ben Folds version kicks arse.
  

• Ice Cube - The Nigga You Love to Hate : Again, I didn't hear this at the time, but I have the album now. This is Cube glorifying the life of a criminal and hustler and reveling in the hatred of the establishment for gangster rap and Hip Hop culture in general.

So that makes thirty songs so far. For the next ten, I'll be looking at the rise of gangsters, bling, bitches, forties and blunts as well as the first rumblings of dissent from rappers not so down with the vacuous pursuit of the Player's life.

Hip Hop Appreciation Week Pt 2

Mixtape 2 of 5 : Golden Age

The second lot of ten songs on my list covers rap's so-called Golden Age with artists like Run DMC and the Beastie Boys making a massive impact on the world stage.

• MC Shy D - Rap Will Never Die : Having already released this song, Shy D rerecorded and rewrote it to cover the history of the genre; with shout outs to Kool Herc, Arika Bambaataa, Grandmaster Flash and just about every notable artist all the way to Run DMC. This was an anthem to me. All I have for this remixed version is an mp3 I made from a tape off the radio in 1987.
  

• Run DMC - Walk This Way : When my best friend from Primary School came back from Bali in the summer of 1985/86, he gave me a tape and told me it was 'breakdance' music. At the time, B-Boying was deader than the Charleston so I scoffed. That tape was Raising Hell. Within months, Walk This Way was the biggest Hip Hop hit ever, at the time, and remained so for quite some time afterwards. Rap now had true sway with the industry.

• Beastie Boys - The New Style : Def Jam's stab at the white boy market started life as a trio of 'beer-drinking, breath-stinking' spoiled brat middle-class kids from Brooklyn. Mixing rock guitar with beats and cuts the way Run DMC had so successfully with Aerosmith, the Beastie Boys' debut Licensed To Ill was a Billboard #1 hit.

• Eric B & Rakim - I Ain't No Joke - The smooth and serious baritone of Rakim Allah and the masterful mixing of James Brown soul and Hip Hop's hardest beats by Eric B set a bar for rap albums on Paid In Full that is rarely matched. I must have played my dubbed copy from imported vinyl as a 15 year old a million times. I purchased the CD as soon as it made it here, but rap got no love from Perth in 1987. I can still play this album from start to finish and then play it again. Absolute masterpiece and a treasure of the genre.

• Public Enemy - Bring The Noise : With Paid In Full, PE's debut Yo! Bum Rush the Show was like a twin talisman of everything I loved about rap. But Bum Rush sounded like PE had been mucking around when It Takes a Nation of Millions dropped. "Too black, too strong." With Nation, Chuck, Flav, Griff and the S1Ws really brung the noise.

• Ice-T - High Rollers : When Ice-T tells you he is the OG, you better freakin' believe it. I hadn't even heard Six in the Mornin' from Ice's debut Rhyme Pays when I first bought Power, but this for me is where gangster rhymes began; released before Straight Outta Compton dropped - and Rhyme Pays had already done it. Good use of sampled sounds and beats and Ice's hardcore intensity with a moral make this my favourite Ice-T track.

• NWA - Fuck Tha Police : Oh didn't we like to blast this one from our cars on P plates in 1989. This was violence and disrespect for the fun of it - just the way adolescent boys like it. There's a direct line from NWA to Big and Pac and 50 and Jah Rule et al. And of course, without Dre, rap would be a whole different beast by now.

• The Stop The Violence Movement - Self Destruction : Hip Hop and rap's Live Aid. Iconic artists from PE to Heavy D got together and decided to make a song about gang violence. This was rappers with a conscience trying to do something positive amidst the cries from the media and government that rap was violent. Forever all I could get of this song was a recording from the radio (Perth's first rap show Scratch FM on 100FM Fremantle) I have since purchased it online and recently bought the 12" vinyl.

• De La Soul - Say No Go : Hall and Oates in a rap song about drugs and poverty. How did that work so well?! Prince Paul you are a genius. This is more positive attitude from rap with Native Tongues members De La Soul releasing the ever-brilliant 3 Feet High and Rising (a cassette for which I paid $50 to import when it was released in 1989).

• Salt-n-Pepa - Push It : At this stage in my life as a head, I wasn't impressed with Salt-n-Pepa. They were girls, for a start and not Roxanne Shante, and everyone seemed to love this song - especially people who claimed to hate rap. I had already heard The Showstopper which was simply a dis to Doug E Fresh's The Show and that was the other reason I disliked them. But I have grown to enjoy their early work, particularly My Mic Sounds Nice

So that's another 10. I really would like to post the mixtapes so anyone bothering to read this can hear what I'm rambling about. I wish I had hosted space; but alas...

See you for part 3 soon.

Hip Hop Appreciation Week Pt 1

Mixtape 1 of 5 : Beginnings

May 15th - 22nd is Hip Hop Appreciation Week. To show my support, I have compiled a list of 50 songs that chart my personal history of Hip Hop. I have decided to make these into five mixtapes of 10 songs each. The first is Beginnings and I hope it captures how I learned about rap and Hip Hop culture, as well as what I know now after 27 odd years as a 'follower' and an obsessive reader of history.

This is by no means a proper chronological history, but I have tried to represent the years as I lived them. For that reason, there is minimal representation post Golden Age, with my attention taken away by Grunge while the West Coast sound matured and Pac and BIG duked it out.

• The Sugar Hill Gang - Rapper's Delight : Technically, this isn't really where it all started, as there's even arguments that rap was around in the form of the talking blues. But none-the-less, Rapper's Delight was the first commercial success and it helped cement the term Hip Hop as a name for the culture from a term that was often used on the mic in the clubs and the parks.

• Afrika Bambaataa - Planet Rock: Leader of the Zulu Nation, one time Black Spades member, Bronx messiah and Godfather of Hip Hop; Bam took rap from the Burroughs and gave it a planet.

• Kurtis Blow - The Breaks : Rap's first artist to sign to a major label also gave Hip Hop it's first gold record. Even more impressive is the fact Kurtis Blow was the first rapper to use the drum machine, sample and sample loop - rap's signature 'instruments'.

• Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five - The Message : Hip Hop folklore tells us Flash was the kid who decided the record sounded really good when you 'scratched' it back and forth. For me this track will always be important because I heard it long before I got 'into' rap with Run DMC and it was the first track ever, of any genre, that I realised had an important something to say.

• Arthur Baker - Breaker's Revenge : By the time I heard this song for the first time on Beat Street, I was a fully fledged B-Boy who was popping and locking with the best of them... at Orelia Primary School. Breaker's Revenge was part of the soundtrack to Hip Hop's debutant ball.

• Herbie Hancock - Rock It : While It's Just Begun and Apache were probably the B-Boy anthems for the kids from the Bronx who started it all, this was ours. The film clip was from another world, even given that videos hadn't quite found their way yet. Even now I can't hear this song without an overwhelming urge to do the robot.
  

• The Rock Steady Crew - (Hey You) The Rock Steady Crew : The other bona fide B-Boy anthem for Kwinana B-Boys back in the day. It is with great joy that I hear my three year old sing this song with enthusiasm. She has even invented a few new steps and a couple of freezes. A terrible song, really, but an exceptional dance crew with an inspirational icon as leader - respect to Crazy Legs, the man.

• Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five - Beat Street Breakdown : Beat Street may have made a mess of the true culture and its elements, but to kids a million miles from the Bronx, it was all we had. To us, every element was represented. It was a whole new world to kids like me at the time and we wanted in. Knowing what I do now, they had the great Dondi White hanging around set, so why was the graffiti so lame?! Melle Mel does the Rap element proud in this track though and the New York City Breakers threw down but good.

• MC Shan & Marley Marl - The Bridge : It hadn't even been 10 years since Rapper's Delight when rappers started telling the culture's history. The Bridge tells the tale of MC battles in the park where MC Shan & Marley Marl's Juice Crew threw down in Queensbridge. This track also began one of the earliest Hip Hop beefs on wax when Boogie Down Productions responded in disbelief at the inference Hip Hop had begun in Queens.

• Boogie Down Productions - South Bronx : Responding to The Bridge, KRS One, D-Nice and Scott La Rock released South Bronx to stake the boogie down's (a local term for the burrough of the Bronx) claim as the originators of Hip Hop. This beef continued into Shan's Kill That Noise and BDP's subsequent The Bridge Is Over. Others weighed into the argument along the way including the Juice Crew's Roxanne Shante with Have a Nice Day and the pro-BDP MC Mitchski with Brooklyn Blew Up the Bridge.

I wanted to post the mixtapes, but blogger just sits there 'processing' video; even overnight. I have no idea why it won't work as it's a valid format and under maximum size. Could be Amnet's fault. I'll try again in another post.

And now, a Hip Hop prayer : In the name of Herc, Bam and Flash; yes ya'll.

Playlist : May 17th - 21st, 2010

Busy weekend this week, so I'm posting my list early. I seem to have gone with mostly somber or smooth tunes that match the weather. So I deliberately added some ruckus at the last minute.

This weeks list looks like this:

• Son Volt - The Search - After I realised the chorus chords to one of my favourite ever songs, Methamphetamine, were DEADEADEAD (spooky) I tweeted it and promptly picked up a new follower who said "I started following you based solely on your mention of Son Volt." So I figured I'd spin the album.

• Gil Scott-Heron - Spirits - I really enjoyed playing Glory last week. Also, the documentary I watched on Heron was excellent. I felt like more of old Gil <~ see what I did there? This album was the first released after the man served time for possessing cocaine. He was released in 1994, same as this album.

• The National - Alligator - As I said last week, too much of The National is not enough right now. Their second to latest release, Alligator was a critical hit and the first real commercial success for the boys from Brooklyn.

• Beck - Sea Change - An old favourite and one that always seems to make an appearance when it gets a little chilly. When it gets really, really cold, watch for Nick Cave.

• Jackson Browne - The Very Best Of... - While listening to a 70s internet radio station last week, I heard a non-single Browne track and it felt right. I am going to look into the man whom I am told writes a mean song beyond those old chestnuts we're used to on 94.5 et al.

• VA - What It Is! Vol. 3 - The third installment in the funky series. I'm loving these grooves of a Friday.

• Eels - End Times - My boss today told me Mr E. likes to write and record in a closet. But this album sounds like it's recorded in the back row of a funeral. Haunted and cracked and fit for a stormy day. Even the guy on the cover looks like he's freezing.

• Hole - Live Through This - Checking... nope, still not dated. This will always be one of my most treasured albums. Listening to the new Hole just reminded me how good this was. Polished and determined and hardcore rawk. Courtney Love : Had it, lost it.

• Nirvana - Singles - The perfect compliment to Live Through This, I chose this increasingly hard to get box set in case the guys at my work wanted a listen and hadn't heard some of the B Sides here. Also, I wanted a nice 90s hug to slip into with Hole and Nirvana. Interestingly, that Amazon link is to a US$146.99 unopened copy. Not that I'd ever sell my open one.

That's it then. It's almost 2am, time for bed. Off out to lunch with @2ompkins for Japanese tomorrow and out with my lovely wife @boobalee_ann to the movies Sunday. You crazy kids take care.

Song of the Week 14/05/2010

Gil Scott-Heron - Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler)

From the email:

So given my week has been bland and a little sad, nothing really made an impact on me musically. Which of course makes SOTW hard to pick. Probably the only album I really remember enjoying was Glory : The Best of Gil Scott-Heron. Last week I watched a doco on the man. It was about his early days in college as a radical poet on campus who hung out with Langston Hughes and about his prison term for cocaine.

So, given that I have had yearnings for the radical spirit of the late 60s, early 70s, I choose a radical song - Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler). The name is a nod to the Marvin Gaye song, but this is not a cover. This is a sustained rant on the state of the United States in the 70s under "Ray-gun" and the frustration of the people.

Set to a nice jazzy brass riff or three with a bass line that grooves, Heron 'raps' about poverty, hunger, drugs and Mark Essex who killed 9 people from a rooftop with a rifle in 1973; something Heron refers to as fighting the Inner City Blues. Quite out there politically really. They don't write songs that dangerous anymore.

"The poster says Uncle Sam Wants You... for target practice

Enjoy the tune brothers. Right on. :)

Song of the Week 7/05/2010

Malcolm McLaren & the World Famous Supreme Team - Buffalo Gals

This week's SOTW came with a story. The story was told by Malcolm McLaren about walking around Manhattan and spotting an enormous black guy with a Nevermind the Bollocks... t-shirt. Nervous but curious, McLaren crossed the street to ask the man about his Pistols tee. The guy told him how much he loved the Pistols and invited Malcolm to a club that night to see him DJ. The guy's name was Afrika Bambaataa. It was 1980. Almost like the late 70s (Punk) crossed the street to hand the torch in preparation for the late 80s (Hip Hop).

This song is a stereo mix done by DJ Cut. The original was mono as far as I know. All I remember of the song when it came out was the big graffiti wall and thinking that Malcolm McLaren looked like a nut job. But that wall looked 'mintox'. I remember his strange kind of dance like he was made of rubber. Looking back, I think he was probably trying to breakdance.

I chose this song because I found a tribute album with present day rappers and legends of the game covering and remixing McLaren songs. It was made while he was still alive as a way of reminding people that he played an important role in taking Hip Hop out of the Bronx and into the rest of the world. This song is still good to listen to as electro too.

Enjoy. And in the words of my mate Mr Falzon - Duck duck duck.

Playlist : May 10th - 14th, 2010

Hello people! As you can see, this week's playlist has a record cover. Check it out ------------------------>

I have decided to go on a most likely impossible quest to find this album on vinyl, or in any format really. I can't link to Amazon because it's impossible to find - that's why I uploaded the album cover.

I still have a dubbed copy from an old friend's older brother who imported his vinyl. At last resort I could try and track him down and offer to buy it. In the meantime, I've ripped my cassette to mp3 through the magic of computers.

So here is the list for this week at work.

• VA - Down Under By Law - This is the very first compilation of Australian Hip Hop ever made. Not a brilliant LP but a stunning piece of history. Shouts to Rick Saurus if he's out there.
  

• VA - What It Is! Vol. 2 - The second volume of four featuring soulful grooves from the late 60s to late 70s.

• Hope Sandoval & the Warm Inventions - Through The Devil Softly - Atmospheric and maudlin melodies from the former Mazzy Star lead singer.

• Miles Davis - Nefertiti - from the genius of John Coltrane a couple of lists back to the genius of Miles Davis this week. Released in 1968 and featuring a young Herbie Hancock on piano (Hancock also composed much of the music), Nefertiti was Davis' last wholly acoustic album before he went electric.

• Q-Tip - The Renaissance - Grammy nominated, meticulous production from the distinctive-voiced former head of Native Tongues act A Tribe Called Quest.

• VA - The Boat That Rocked OST - Finally saw this film last week. As a movie, I found it just okay. Not particularly annoying or anything, but not great. But boy, did it make up for it with the music. This is nearly every classic 60s rock song you'll ever need.

• Gil Scott-Heron - Glory - The Best of Gil Scott-Heron - After watching a documentary on the life of Heron, where luminaries such as Mos Def, Chuck D, Ritchie Havens and Sarah Jones sung his praises, I figured it had been too long since I heard a whole bunch of his songs (rather than just The Revolution Will Not Be Televised (video link) which I spin at least once a week). PS Amazon doesn't have the 2 CD set I have; this is as close as they get.

• The National - Sad Songs For Dirty Lovers - For me, at the moment, too much of The National is hardly enough. After hearing High Violet last week, I had to rehear their previous releases. This is their sophomore effort. Don't be surprised if another LP is on next week's list.
  

As well as these LPs, I'll be listening to mixtapes from The Mixtape Club. Check them out. These guys lay down some great tunes.

Footnote: Special hopes and thoughts to Iveta Mitchell and family. Evey, come home kid; let's have a joint 38th.