Here’s a one off single from the currently incarcerated one time No Limit emcee Mac and an heretofore unknown female rapper named Storm, who has a bit of a Bahamadia vibe to her style. On the whole the tape is a bit of a letdown, sort of a smoothed out, almost early Bad Boy sound to it, as laced by Mannie Fresh’s old school homie DJ Wop. We’ve heard early Mac over here before and this stands as further evidence that he was basically the best backpack rapper in New Orleans before Percy’s assembly line production approach reigned him in to the NL sound (and after his kiddie rap days). Even in those days, though, he proved to be a pretty lyrical dude with something of a New York rap sensibility. Not an essential tape by any means but a cool footnote for the three Mac completists out there and a quick gap filler for me to throw up after the sudden realization that i haven’t updated this site in about a week of tumblin’ erb. More to come soon. Here and there.
This is the very first, pre-Priority record from Low Profile. Released prior to WC’s involvement in the group, DJ Aladdin was using the moniker alongside another rapper, MC Zero. Zero Is more on the scientifical lyricism side of things than Dub C (When has anybody ever accused hip hop of being a “psychedelic trend,” anyway?) but is a solid emcee in his own right. I long figured that the b-side, “My Dreams,” would be a horrible embarrassment, mostly because it has the word “Dreams” in the title. It’s actually pretty tight as well inna goofy, Fresh Prince style, with Aladdin rocking the “Mary Jane” loop.
When it was announced that Snoop Dogg would be taking over as “Creative Chairman” at Priority Records it seemed like another meaningless label job for a rapper, an excuse to get a long forgotten labels name back into the press for a split second. As it turns out Snoop is actually doing something for the label, overseeing a series of back catalog reissues. Three of these represses – Eazy-E’s Eazy Duz It, Master P’s Ghetto D & EPMD’s Strictly Business* – dropped last week, billed as “USDA Editions**” and marketed as “Snoop Dogg Approved.” As if Snoop Dogg, the man who released Tha Doggfather is some sort of bastion of quality control. He is, apparently, writing the liner notes, which could be interesting but probably not interesting enough to justify the purchase of an album you already own.
And that’s the thing. This is just another shallow grab by a seemingly rosterless label to get you to repurchase the NWA catalog. This time with garish artwork. In fact Eazy Duz It and Ghetto D have both seen the full reissue treatment in recent years. And I’m sure if we see anything else from this series it’ll be another EFIL/100 Miles combo pack or something similarly redundant. Still, I’m going to take this moment to suggest a few good nominees for the series, many of which have been legitimately unattainable for years. Because Snoop Dogg might read this blog. [Read more]
How did you feel about the other artists coming out of the bass scene at the time?
I think Miami does not have a sound right now… Oh you said back then? Back then I was excited because we had a sound that you could identify Miami with. It was the bass sound it was uptempo it was what we created and you had other artists around here piggybacking off of what we were doing and they were doing really good. Not on a national level but on a regional level. Then you had 69 Boyz and they were doing good on a national level and you had Quad City doing good when they did the Space Jam movie. that was a major movie for them and that was a bass record. I was really excited about the sound and the sound was something that you identify Miami with. You know that was southern music, that was the only southern sound at the time. We were the only ones from anywhere else that was really doing something. I mean you had Jermaine Dupri in Atlanta but he wasn’t really doing nothing southern. Only person in his camp that was really doing the southern sound was Lil Jon. Not in ‘88 but a little later on. The sound was there, you heard a bass song you thought of Miami. [Read more]
Gifted Unlimited Rhymes Universal is currently in a coma after suffering a cardiac arrest. He is scheduled to undergo surgery tomorrow. Here’s hoping for a speedy recovery.
(And please check your “Primo made the group” internet revisionist idiocy at the door. Keith is one of the greats.)
Dis is why i do dis shit righ here mayn. When i wake mah azz up mayn still a lil thowed from de nigh befo mayn an see wuss poppin on mah dayum laptop mayn i can only hope dat i see sum’m like i saw dis mornin. [Read more]
It’s been a minute since I’ve reached into the vaults, so here’s an old Luke interview, no pegs attached. It was originally conducted on 5/6/08 for the same Vibe retrospective that I also interviewed Too $hort for. As with that interview, the focus is Dirty Rapp in ‘88, but then veers off in different directions. Too often 2 Live and Luke are left out of the conversation, even in wake of the Southern rap explosion. This site is as guilty as any other, so let it be said now: Luke gave birth to your favorite Southern rapper. Hit the jump for the Qs and As. [Read more]
Even if we don’t always see eye to eye as far as taste goes there is probably no blogger that I trust more than Robbie at Unkut. Dude is easily one of the last real bloggers alive. Today marks sixth anniversary of his site and they’re celebrating with this well constructed mix of new school but classically angry broken 40 bottle New York rap. I’m about to break out my Carhartt and Timbs over here. Tracklisting after the jump. [Read more]
At last The Official Cocaine Blunts Tumblr has been born. Better late than on time, it will exist as the short form, high post sibling to this site with a focus on obscurity and absurdity: rap ephemera that I find online or in my closet, songs that bang but I have nothing to say about and fragments from the trulybizarre corners of the hip hop universe. If you’re one of the 43 people who has been reading my experimental/secrete tumblr in recent months, you’ll notice that I’ve recycled some choice posts from there to get things started. It’s all original from here on out. That blog will remain as well, but it’ll probably be less rap-centric.
Eventually I’d like to fully integrate the Tumblr Annex with this blog, similar what Perpetua has done with his Fluxblog but it will probably take me months to figure out an easy way to steal his code. I’m not too good with computers.
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