Tonight: Inventos Film Screening & Turntablist Sessions (with GrandWizard Theodore, GrandMaster Caz, Charlie Chase & more)

You have your choice of two great events tonight. First option is a film screen of Inventos: Hip Hop Cubano. We posted about this film a minute ago but now there is more information available including a website and a preview. The other option is the Turntablist Sessions event which "brings together three decades of legendary partyrockers and battle champs to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Scratch, invented by GrandWizzard Theodore in 1975 (at the age of 13!)." Artists included are: Charlie Chase, GrandMaster Caz, GrandWizzard Theodore, Egg Foo Young, DJ Big Wiz, DJ Boo, Marcus, Lord Finesse and more TBA. Inventos: HipHop Cubano will be screened at the Nuyorican. Turntablist Sessions will be held at The Gazebo @ Rufus King Park - 153rd St. and 90th Ave. Jamaica, Queens. But it starts and finishes early (5:30-8:30) so don't delay. And bring your younger siblings or kids! This event is being co-sponsored by the New York City Department of Parks And Recreation. ShreddedMelody.com for more info.

This morning El Keter posted a dope review of Sean Price's Monkey Barz album. After finally having time to read it, I have to say I agree with almost everything he writes. Link, previously: one, two, three

Busdriver Won Diesel-U-Music Award

Speaking of Saul Williams, according to this article/review, he is responsible for nominating Busdriver for the Diesel-U-Music Award for HipHop. Bus won the award and performed alongside other indie artists a few weeks ago in NYC. Decent description of show, but what's the deal with those comments directed towards Saul Williams? "Looking positively collegiate in thick glasses, polo shirt, and light beard, Busdriver, whose real name is Regan Farquhar, opened with "I Won't Dance", a suitable choice for the sparse, stock-still crowd. Busdriver was nominated for the award by Saul Williams, and the two men have a similar rampant intellectualism, taking greedy pleasure in twisting together elements of high and low culture. No offense to Williams, but the only real difference is one of talent (ok, I guess there's no way to make that sound inoffensive, but c'mon, Saul, face it)."

Grokster Loses

Coverage on the Grokster ruling, which took place today, is widely available all over the internet and traditional media outlets. I haven't had a chance to read the court opinion or anything but I'm sure it's going to be interesting. Good place to start is here and mp3 of hour long Grokster press conference and Justice David H. Souter's court opinion and Grokster Decision Worries Tech Industry. Excerpts: "This decision won’t kill P2P sharing. Engineering students write P2P software in 11 lines of code as class assignments. The majority of Internet users use file-sharing software, and that’s not going to stop, no matter how many lawsuits against customers and companies the labels win. P2P will outlast today’s generation of technophobic record execs who are steering their companies to slow, spectacular suicide. But what today’s decision will kill is American innovation. Chinese and European firms can get funding and ship products based on plans that aren’t fully thoughtcrime-compliant, while their American counterparts will need to convince everyone from their bankers to the courts that they’ve taken all imaginable measures to avoid inducing infringement. This is good news if you’re an American corporate attorney worried about job security, but not if you’re about to invent a new way to enjoy content. Both sides went to the court hoping for clarity on what is and isn’t legal in P2P, and instead, the Court tipped a fresh load of claymores into the decade’s most perilous legal minefield. " "But knowing we were right legally really still isn't the same thing as being right in the real world. We had that euphoria with the first Napster decision. I hope my former colleagues remember that. The result was lots of back and forth and leverage hunting on both sides and continued litigation and then a great service shut down to make room for less great services. And more legal victories didn't bring more more market control no matter how many times it was hoped it would." "The technology world - from multibillion-dollar computer companies to garage tinkerers - faces new and potentially costly uncertainties with the Supreme Court's ruling that inventors can be held liable if third parties use their products to infringe on copyrights."

Saul Williams Black Stacey Video

I'm so happy Saul Williams decided to shoot a video for the hypest track on his album, Black Stacey. Link via catchdubs, via 15min

Random Rap (Hip-Hop's Raiders of the Lost Archives)

Robbie from Unkut points to a somewhat interesting article in the NYTimes about a phenomenon I never saw lableled before - Random Rap - described as a growing movement consisting of mostly young males seeking out and collecting rare and obscure rap records. Now vinyl collectors aren't a new breed, but according to the author rap-vinyl fiends collectors apparently are and they are increasing dramatically. One example used as a signal of this is out-of-control ebay auctions: "As random rap's profile increases, though, prices for crucial records are beginning to soar. A copy of "Pelon," by the Bronx group 360° - a highly sought-after Paul C production - recently sold on eBay for more than $700. The fervor has even spilled over into the world of CD's - out-of-print titles on Rap-A-Lot, a Houston label, can trade for over $100, as do gangster rap obscurities from cities as unlikely as Denver and Dallas." Anyway, good read. Link to article (registration required), via unkut (unkut posted full article for you non-registering types)

Need a laugh?

"When URB magazine recently decided it needed to manufacture the next DJ Shadow in order to create a new media darling it could call its own, the GBs were on top of it. Inside you will find the discarded applications of various hip-hop notables, recovered from the recycling bins at URB's offices. [Read More Here]"

Cormega on Why We Need the Boom-Bap Back

Jacked from allhiphop which jacked it from Elemental Mag #68. Link Excerpt Right now, we’re extracting all the juice out of Rap. It’s getting to the point where it’s so wack, so boring, so predictable that people tend to forget what made Rap what it was. The sped R&B vocals tracks producers are using is played out. When I did that on The Testament, it was the early 90’s. Now I’m trying to get away from all that because it’s overused. I’m trying to make music that’s timeless, classic Hip-Hop. That’s one of the reasons why people are still able to listen to my album The Testament which we just put out in February. It was recorded nearly a decade but it doesn’t sound like the typical record you hear today. They all have the same formula. I don’t ride with what everyone else is doing. Rap has been very abusive to its pioneers. I told Large Professor, he’s dope – I’m definitely going to put him on the album. He’ll look at me like, “word word?” So many people tell him that, but don’t do it. Take MC Shan. When we did the QB’s Finest album, I told him, “Don’t try to do what we do. Do what you did. Because what you did, made us want to do what we doing. The way you rapped is timeless. It’s not played out.” That’s one of the reasons why I like Soul music because it’s classic. Marvin Gaye’s album, What’s Going On, is a classic that you can listen to even a hundred years from now and it still has relevance and meaning.

Prince Paul Video Interview from '03

Cool Prince Paul video interview from 2003 at Red Bull Music Academy. Link Excerpt of dialogue:

Session held in Cape Town 2003 Fellow innovator Steve "Steinski" Stein called this man ‘the closest thing hip hop has to a genius’. By the age of ten, Prince Paul’s pals were comparing him to Grandmaster Flash. He had to convince them otherwise, and has been challenging people’s preconceptions about Hip Hop ever since: from his scratches in Stetsasonic to his groundbreaking production with De La Soul. Heads should take note that rebellion and money were never the focus - even Hip Hop itself wasn’t the focus. ‘The focus, that was always the music’. RBMA: »Let's welcome my man Prince Paul here.« Prince Paul: »Thank you, thank you! Well, I feel still like hugging the microphone. That’s Hip Hop for you. I should hold it like this [in a proper microphone position], right?« RBMA: »I mean, you are the guy who is producing, so you should tell us how we should hold it.« Prince Paul: »Yeah, hold it like this (holds the mike upside down to his mouth). That’s when you gangster…« RBMA: »How did you get the name Prince Paul?« Prince Paul: »Prince Paul was given to me, because, they said my regular name - that was DJ Paul - was boring. You don’t want to say 'DJ Paul' on the microphone, you know. I’m a humble dude, but I was forced on that whole Hip Hop ego thing.« RBMA: »Since when do you DJ?« Prince Paul: »I been DJing since I was my son’s age (pointing his finger), that's him right there, actually a little younger than him. When I was 10 years old, I’ve heard, I was the fake Grandmaster Flash of my day. And when you’re 10 or 11 years old, that’s pretty traumatizing. That’s why I’m here today, it’s to prove the world, that I’m not the fake Grandmaster Flash…« RBMA: »Being the fake Grandmaster Flash, who came up with that name then?« Prince Paul: »That was back in school. (...) For me DJing started or Hip Hop, it wasn’t called Hip Hop when I started, I was like my son’s age. I was like 10 years old. Hip Hop for me is a lot different from what people see out here now. Especially the commercialized side of it, when I was coming up it was more or less DJing in the park. MCs rarely had any substance to say.« RBMA: »So when you were the DJ it wasn’t like that (posing in front of Paul)? Hey, where's the DJ? I'm the rapper!« Prince Paul: »DJ was the primary focus. That’s why you had Grandmaster Flash And The Furious Five, Grandwizard Theodore and The Fantastic Five, Jazzy Jeff And The Fresh Prince. It was a lot different back than: it was about having fun, you battle people and you did your thing. But it was basically going out to see people dance. As opposed to now, it’s just a little bit different – well it’s a lot different! I think once the money gets involved, it changed a lot.«

A Time Before Crack

Jamel Shabazz strikes again with his new photo-book on powerhouse, A Time Before Crack. Link to product page

Once upon a time before crack, inner city communities were blighted by poverty and unemployment—but not by the drug wars that tore families apart, destroying lives with needless violence and mindless addiction. Once upon a time before crack, pride and style were as inseparable as a beatbox and mixtape, or as a pair of shoes and matching purse. Once upon a time before crack, Jamel Shabazz was on the scene, working the streets of New York City, capturing the faces and places of an era that have long since disappeared.

Dope thing is, he worked with La Lutta to turn this into a documentary. Link Link2

Mostly positive impromptu write up of Noodle Arms Whimsy, including lyrics to that pilates joint we put up last week. Link

Serengeti is weird. It's not that the lyrics don't make any sense, but listening to him rap is something like hearing the bastard child of MF Doom and MC Paul Barman reading the old version of James Joyces' Ulysses, except funny. Serengeti, aka Dave Cohn, rhymes about damn near anything outside of what you would expect him to. It's not like he goes all pseudo-esoteric like 2Mex or Aesop, though, but rather he lets his rhymes flow from one immature, childish concept to the next -- but there is still a underlying feeling that Dave's a pretty bright guy. Damn, this is hard to explain, let me just drop some bars:

Like women do pilates And always talk about these fantastic changes to their bodies Ha, jokes The only way you lose weight If you start to smoke coke Cause I be at your mix parties Where wives have fake jobs And husbands drive Maseratis And kids say to their mommies But oh! I'm so bored, I don't wanna go skiing_ or By the way, I'm not the man of my dreams My girlfriend mostly spoke of me and washed-up things like Jobly challenged, hardly having balance, loving weird outlets, and when she goes on it's quite depressing like only eating salad dressing or trying to find a retard from intense testing

And so on. While it's hard to describe the effect of Cohn's Chi-accented voice as he jumps from topic to topic, I can say that it is somewhat refreshing to hear a project that rejects the whole gangster/conscious dichotomy: this record is one that stays away from the tired cash-hoes-drugs (actually he talks a lot about drugs, but this time it's funny) trifecta, but also stays away from the equally tired "oh look at me I'm so radical/progressive/bloody lame as hell" theme that I'm seeing way, way too much of in the underground. Hip-hop is supposed to be fun, kids - and Serengeti obviously has this in mind. Dude talks about some relevant ish, but bottom line, this is a fun record.

San Jose HipHop And Scion, Friends or Not?

Came across this article that raises a lot of interesting questions about indie artists' relationship with big money and the corporations that control the flow. Toyota Corp, via Scion, and their soon-to-be-imitated-worldwide marketing team, have done an excellent job at penetrating the underground/indie hiphop scene. Mr. Gonzalez, an artist himself from San Jose, wonders about the authenticity of the art that is influenced by the support of Scion and does a good job at probing a worthwhile discussion. Link

Buck65's Centaur Cut Up Into The "Imperial March" Theme

Check out this video of some Dj (Dj Scratch Bastard?) as he tears up Buck65's The Centaur and masterfully juggles it into the "Imperial March" theme from the Star Wars. Dope. Link (Good lookin Richoner!)

Cope2 Hired By Time, Inc. To Bomb SOHO Billboard

In our never ending quest to come to terms with sophisticated marketing schemes that dazzle the senses and blur the lines between expression and manipulation, we bring to you an example of such. Well respected graf-artist Cope2 was hired by Time, Inc. to "bomb" a billboard in SOHO, probably one of the most sought after and expensive ad-placement zones in the city, in order to draw attention to their magazine, which from what I understand has a dwindling market share. Ad or art? Subversive or sellout? I'm thinking both but what about you? (By the way, that graf movie we posted about last week was well worth the doe and the trek to the city). via adrants, bigger pic, cope2

Video For Democracy Is Dead by Dead By Wednesday

Here's a video for Democracy Is Dead by the good people from Dead By Wednesday, your favorite hardcore band. Yes, most of our posts tend to be centered around independent hiphop. No, this one doesn't fit in nicely. Why not this one? Bite me. Stop pigeonholing us. Link

Buck65's New Collaborative Album - Secret House Against The World (Who Needs An Apology?)

It seems like Buck65 will never fully escape the backlash from his rash and heretic anti-hiphop comments (scroll down), seeing how he now feels the need to include an apology and/or rationalization in his auto-bio ("It was like a fight with your girlfriend where you say all this crazy stuff that you don't even mean and then after you cry and have incredible sex"), but I think we will all have the opportunity to bare witness to his true attitude towards hiphop when his next record drops, and we will also see the loyalty of his original fan base tested. I haven't heard much about this record in the regular circles but after reading a few Canadian news sites and perusing his domain, it could be interesting (you can check his site for a sample of an instrumental from the album in the Fly On The Wall section). Set to be released in June (in Europe anyway) it seems to be a slight departure from his traditional one-man-act since he collaborated with Tortoise for a few tracks and I think it's being mixed down by D-Styles. He also gives a lot of credit to his engineers and other studio people for helping hone the sound of the album (especially the drums, wow). Secret House Against The World is even being personally pitched by the President/CEO of Warner Canada, as is Buck65 the artist who "...is not an artist we will depend on for singles. He’s an artist who will build a loyal fan base willing to take a musical ride with him.” Let's hope he's right or else "Free Stinkin' Rich" might start popping up on t-shirts (as it already has on message boards) . Speaking of Stinkin' Rich, Four Ways To Rock Hand'Solo Records recently re-mastered and re-released CockDynamiks.

Busdriver, Subtitle, Vick Booz And The Unicorns Are Th' Corn Gangg

Don't know much about this and I haven't heard any of the music yet, but it appears that your favorite smug and decadent rappers, Busdriver and Subtitle, along with Vick Booz, have started to rip shows (and possibly record songs?) over instrumentals provided by The Unicorns, an apparently successful Canadian indie-rock style pop band. Should be interesting. Link