groove metaphors
: It's not about the moves, it's about the movement :
-
Check out the french house dance crew Serial Stepperz givin a 7minute freestyle encore at this year’s Breakin’ Convention!
(Source: natsukashii.co.uk)
-
Thousands march to confront NATO in Chicago, May 20, 2012.
Photos by Bryan G. Pfeifer
-
The 100 Greatest Native Tongues Songs
Top 10:
1. A Tribe Called Quest f/ Leaders of the New School - “Scenario”
Face it, you know every word to this song and can recite it in a coma backwards. You’ve played it a million times in your lifetime. Whenever you purchase a new iPod, you make sure to sync at least one playlist that features it. You’ve debated with your friends over whether Phife, Dinco, or Busta had the best verse. When this song comes on at a bar or a house party you forget that you’re an adult and turn right back into an adolescent rap nerd. You have pretended at some point that you could die happily never hearing “Scenario” again, but here you are again, rapping along to it while you read this blurb. “Oblighetto” plus Jimi Hendrix drums equals win.
2. De La Soul f/ Queen Latifah, Monie Love, The Jungle Brothers, & A Tribe Called Quest - “Buddy (Native Tongues Decision)”
The album version of “Buddy” is a great song in and of itself, but the “Heartbeat”-sampling remix is the definitive Native Tongues posse cut. It’s a song that is essentially about chasing tail in nightclubs, but the real draw is to hear the entire Native Tongue crew rapping together and having the time of their lives.
3. Black Sheep - “The Choice Is Yours (Revisited)”
“The Choice Is Yours” is Black Sheep’s “Me Myself and I.” They will forever be known as the group that made the “this-or-that engine-engine-number-nine song.” Fortunately, such pigeonholing comes with royalty checks for television advertisements and new opportunities to tour and release music. Plus the song is a classic banger, and thus can never really get played out, and that’s the main take-home message of the song anyhow. Play this and rap along enthusiastically.
4. A Tribe Called Quest - “Check the Rhime”
“Check the Rhime” converted all and any doubters who expected Tribe to fall off after their first album. Part back-and-forth rhyme cipher and part celebration of their lower-middle-class Queens roots, “Check the Rhime” boasts a great sample from Average White Band’s “Love Your Life” and one of Phife’s most inspired verses. Q-Tip’s verse is purposely understated but effective, and it contains a nice little jab at MC Hammer.
5. De La Soul - “Plug Tunin’ (12” Version)”
On first listen “Plug Tunin’” probably sounds muted, even placid, but in actuality it is a massive, genre-changing record. Pos and Dave debut their “Plug style of speak,” a form of rapping that sounds easygoing and almost talky, but is also filled with dense metaphors and odd word choices. As a song on a demo tape, “Plug Tunin’” caught the attention of DJ and fellow North Amityville, Long Island, resident Prince Paul, convincing him that De La Soul were not the average local rap crew. As a 12” single, it ushered in the “D.A.I.S.Y. Age” and foretold the death of Kangol-and-Pumas superficial shout-rap.
6. A Tribe Called Quest - “Jazz (We’ve Got)”
It’s a shame that Tribe are pigeonholed as forerunners of “jazz rap,” because their influences and sample sources run the gamut of genres. However, it cannot be denied that they consciously cultivated the notion that their complex, melodic, bassy take on hip-hop was a direct descendant of jazz, broadly defined. Rumor has it that Pete Rock found the horn sample from Lucky Thompson’s “Green Dolphin Street” and Q-Tip ran with the idea. Whatever the case, this is a beautiful, somber song, the kind you cannot picture anyone else other than Q-Tip and Phife flowing over. Songs like this more or less relegated staccato rap to the “old school” and inspired a new generation of producers to sharpen their skills and think bigger.
7. Jungle Brothers f/ Q-Tip - “The Promo”
“The Promo” is as raw as it gets. Mike G, Baby Bam, and Q-Tip just keep rhyming as if in a lunchroom cipher, thoughts and words spilling out in all directions. There are probably hundreds of mid-’90s underground tracks that attempt to capture the mood of this record, but very few artists have the finesse to make something like this sound so appealing. The tangents are not overdone and the emphasis is on style, not on wowing everyone with Latinate vocabulary; Native Tongue made rhyme clinics feel less like indulgent jam sessions and more like block parties. “In Time” is an alternate version that appeared on a few Jungle Brothers B-sides; Q-Tip sounds more pensive as he discusses topics like religious faith and mankind’s fall from grace.
8. A Tribe Called Quest - “Bonita Applebum”
“Bonita Applebum” is one of Tribe’s most daring and recognizable songs. It is something of an oddity in that it is a song devoted primarily to the vulnerability and idealism that runs rampant in young love (or inspired lust, really), but the drums are some of the hardest ever recorded. Where nearly every other rapper before him might have attacked the track with a macho Big Daddy Kane style, Q-Tip speaks calmly and freely, sounding just awkward enough to project a tinge of adolescent insecurity, but just smooth enough to seal the deal.
9. De La Soul - “Breakadawn”
“Breakadawn” is one of De La Soul’s most beautiful, elaborate songs; one gets the feeling that they were listening to a lot of Pete Rock & CL Smooth while recording Buhloone Mind State. The pairing of the Michael Jackson and Smokey Robinson samples is so classy and ingenious that it seems almost obvious from the perspective afforded by hindsight. After the group put their D.A.I.S.Y. image to rest with De La Soul Is Dead, nobody knew what to expect from their third album. When it hit the airwaves, it was clear that the trio was intent on developing their sound without conceding to any prevailing trends. “Breakadawn” was a gem amidst a sea of Onyx impersonators with shouted choruses and nondescript attempts at “grimy” rapping, and it remains a fan favorite to this very day. Pos and Dave ride the beat like consummate professionals with flows so good you won’t even notice that you barely have any idea what they’re talking about.
10. A Tribe Called Quest - “Electric Relation”
“Bonita Applebum” is Tribe’s classic romantic record; “Electric Relaxation” is a little nastier, but just classy enough to throw on a Valentine Day’s playlist. Ronnie Foster’s “Mystic Brew” gets transformed into the backdrop that inspires Phife to utter some of his most famous lines, including “I like ‘em brown, yellow, Puerto Rican, and Haitian” and the punny “Bust off on your couch now you got Seaman’s furniture.” Q-Tip opts for the smooth and debonair role, forthright but respectful. This will be a fixture at “grown and sexy” parties for some time to come, but unlike most of the other selections, this one isn’t too slick or over the top.
-
(Source: artivista)
-
This is what it’s all about… (via Dancing With No Arms or Legs)
-
Here’s a little early-morning funk:
Lettuce, Superfred, with guest legendary trombone player Fred Wesley. Super funky instrumental.
-
(Source: debarrage)
-
Watch Bionic’s video for the R16USA prelims coming in San Francisco June(8&9) www.R16USA.com for more info-He will be judging the popping competition.
Youtube acct: BionicSupreme
Twitter: @BionicGoneFunk -
(Source: yves1988)
-
(Source: thechewchronicles)
-
The LatiNegr@s Project: How to Get Your Book Banned in Arizona
Step 1: Write about people who aren’t white.
Step 2: THERE IS NO STEP TWO.
You will very rarely see me curse, tumblypoos, but…but…I mean, what the fuck? How is this even possible? This reads like an Onion article.
To be clear, it is now ILLEGAL to…
-
Because this is UndocuNation and art is what we do. If you’re in San Francisco on May 3, please come thru!
-
10 Things You Didn't Know About Nas' Illmatic
1. Large Professor Would Edit Nas’ Rhymes
Hip-hop purists might find this hard to believe, but the lyrical masterpiece of Illmatic wasn’t constructed by just one man. Every great writer needs a great editor and for Nas it was Large Professor. Extra P would bring Nas to studio sessions during the making of Eric B. & Rakim’s Let the Rhythm Hit ‘Em and drop jewels.
“He helped me because I only knew half of what was going on,” said Nas, to Mass Appeal back in 2002. “I knew about the pen touching the paper. Paul knew that too, but he also knew to tell me, ‘Don’t say this. Take that out. Why would you say this? That makes you look crazy! This word don’t make no sense.’” He taught me everything.” IT WAS WRITTEN EDITED!
2.Russell Simmons Passed On Signing Nas
Hip-hop history is filled with missed opportunities and almost moments. Kanye was going to sign to Capitol Records, Game was going to sign to Bad Boy, and Eminem was looking to sign to an underground label before Dr. Dre came calling. Turns out the same is true for Nas.
Nasty was going to sign to his current label Def Jam back in the early ’90s but Russell Simmons passed on him because he feared the album would be a commercial flop. In retrospect, it might seem like it was a short-sighted decision but Russell was right; Illmatic failed to go gold in it’s first year. Nas later recounted the entire situation on the song “Surviving The Times” where he said he was compared to Kool G Rap, “Russell said I sounded like G, the nigga fronted.”
3. Nas Did “N.Y. State of Mind” In One Take
What’s crazy about “New York State of Mind” isn’t just that it’s Nas’ best song ever, what’s crazy is how many tries it took for a young Nas to get it just right.
“He did that in one take,” explained to DJ Premier. According to Nas, the original verse was close to 60 bars which he wrote in the studio that day.
“If you listen to ‘N.Y. State of Mind’” continued Premier. “You’ll hear him going, ‘I don’t know how to start this shit,’ because he literally just wrote it. Before he started the verse, I was signaling him going, ‘One, two, three,’ and he just goes in.”
4. It’s Short Because It Was Rushed
One of the most distinct features about Illmatic is its length. At a mere 39 minutes and nine songs, it’s the type of album that proves that sometimes less is more. However, the tracklisting was more a result of rush than design.
In the years leading up to the album’s release, the streets were so thirsty for Nas material that enterprising DJs started putting album cuts on street mixtapes and playing the songs on college radio.
In fact, MC Serch once claimed they found a garage filled with 60,000 bootleg Illmatic albums before the album’s release. That’s why Columbia rushed the Illmatic’s release in ’94 and dropped their original plan of making it a larger, longer project.
5. Nas Wanted To Sample “Juicy Fruit” Before Biggie
Biggie’s best song “Juicy” was released in 1994 and built over a sample of Mtume’s “Juicy Fruit.” But it turns out Nas was also a big fan of “Juicy Fruit.” So much so that according to Nas, he asked producer L.E.S. to bring the record to the studio so he could sample it.
But L.E.S. didn’t have that song so he brought The Gap Band’s “Yearning for Your Love” and looped that up instead. Once Nas heard the beat, he forgot all about Mtume’s hit and opted to rhyme over the Gap Band sample and make “Life’s A Bitch.” Both songs are great, but we can’t help but wonder what could have been.
6. Nas Begged Large Professor To Executive Producer The Album But He Refused
“I wanted him to executive-produce that record, but he told me that I had to do it on my own,” explained Nas. “I was like, ‘Please! Executive produce my album.’ And he said, ‘Yo, my shit isn’t even straight.’” What Extra P was referring to was the messy breakup with his group Main Source that he was going through at the time. Large Professor would go on say that he wasn’t interested in signing Nas and that he wanted Nas to go out and make his own money.
7. Large Professor Almost Had To Smack The Hit Out of MC Serch
After Large Professor pulled out from being the album’s executive producer, Nas teamed up with MC Serch. But it wasn’t all good. “Paul was with me,” said Nas. “And he had to scream on Serch and almost smack the shit out of him.” We’re not sure what the alleged almost altercation was about, but we’d much rather get the gasface than get smacked in the face.
8. Busta Rhymes Could Have Had The “Halftime” Beat
Busta Rhymes once told XXL that Large Professor made the beat that would later become “Halftime” in front of him. But once Busta got the beat, he didn’t know what to do with it. He told XXL, “Then I heard it on ‘Halftime,’ and I was like, Goddamn, I was a stupid ass for not touching this beat!”
9. Q-Tip’s Original Idea For “One Love” Was “My Summer Vacation”
Leading up the album, Nas wrote a record that was about sending letters to friends in prison and he wondered why no one had done it before. When he went to the studio, Q-Tip suggested the idea of doing a song where a kid reads a letter in class about what he did during his summer vacation. But Nas had a different kind of vacation in mind…
10. AZ’s Verse On “Life’s A B***h” Lead To A Bidding War
AZ was initially hesitant to drop a verse on “Life’s A Bitch” but then eventually did and it turned out to be a classic. In fact, it was so well received a bidding war began over who would get to sign AZ. In the end, AZ signed with EMI and dropped his underrated debut Do Or Die in 1995.
