Jazz Liberatorz...Clin d'oeil

Smooth beats, dope emcees...a magical combination. I am halfway through this record, but so far I am thoroughly impressed with the production, the collaboration choices - in fact, I feel safe putting my approval stamp on it even before I finish listening to the whole thing. How can it be that this came out in January of 2008 and I haven't heard it? I was sleeping...

Anyone else just now waking up can check this album out on Amazon HERE.



Other artists include the lovely and talented Stacy Epps, Asheru, Buckshot, Fat Lip and Tre Hardson from Pharcyde, and more. This is my kind of hip hop.



Their latest effort released in April of this year is called Fruit of the Past and is available to peep on Amazon HERE.

Don't sleep...

Mas que nada...

My theme song for the day...this thing has been playing over and over in my head. Damn it, soul-sides!!

Exotica day dreams...

Man, I really zoned out at work today listening to the soothing sounds of Martin Denny. Dubbed the "father of exotica," he has quite a catalog, and an interesting story if you have the time. Check the wikified version here. Very interesting and creative, no cheesy synthesizers, just really cool piano melodies, xylophones, sax and exotic percussion (and occasionally an animal sound or two).



Here's another cool one...



This is probably the most well known piece, Exotica. Be careful, do not operate any heavy machinery while listening to this one, you could easily drift off to sleep. If anyone is having trouble with insomnia, go get this album and play it before bed.

Quote of the day...

"Everything you can imagine is real."

-- Pablo Picasso

Bitter:Sweet melodies...

Trip-hop duo Bitter:Sweet caught my ear on Pandora this afternoon. If you like Portishead, Thievery Corporation, Esthero, etc, then you will probably like their first album, "The Mating Game," released in 2006. Comprised of vocalist Shana Halligan and producer Kiran Shahani, her breathy voice is a great compliment to his moody melodic down-tempo beats. I must say, the album is pretty good from beginning to end...here are a couple of stand-outs.





They have a new album entitled, "Drama," that was released in 2008, but I haven't heard that one yet. If you want to, you can find out more about these guys on their official website.

Some throwback music...

Not only is this track is slammin', but the video is off the chain. This beat really takes me back to the Primo days, man, this is that straight New York rap music...no fillers or fluff...respect. The MC's voice and cadence reminds me of Xzibit, but he's got his own thing going.

Pluggin' Phonte...

Phonte, of Little Brother, is also on my top ten favorite rappers list. He is also a great song-writer, which seems to be rare with rappers these days. Cats can spit three dope 24 bar verses back to back, but couldn't arrange a song to save their lives. Phonte gets deep with the harmonies, too, he can really take you to church on a track.

If you haven't checked Foreign Exchange, grab their first album, "Connected", produced entirely by producer Nicolay from Amsterdam. These guys met on okayplayer.com and recorded an entire album thousands of miles apart. Very talented cats, check them out when you get a chance. Nicolay now resides in NC, and they recently put out a second album as Foreign Exchange, but get "Connected" first.

Here's a sample:




(A little side-note, Nicolay did a remix of a CE track, Until My Life's Gone, for the Medicine Remix project, which was never realized, but still may surface one day...)

Here is some stuff that Phonte did with DJ Spinna - dopeness...