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Nas
Street's Disciple
December 29, 2004
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Music,
Reviewed
"I write in tears and pray till it hurts," Scarface offers on the excellent "Who Do You Believe In" from the grim, mournful M.A.D.E., an album that's as much Old Testament as it is old-school. Paranoia is pervasive, vengeance is…
by Sam Chennault
December 19, 2007
Tags: Reviewed, CD Review, Scarface (Rapper), Mike Huckabee, Geto Boys
Music,
When crate-diggers unearthed the long-forgotten Bay Area '70s soul hit "Didn't I" by Darondo Pulliam in the early years of this decade, they stumbled onto one of the greatest musical treasures to ever come from that scene. By all accounts,…
by Sam Chennault
December 12, 2007
Tags: Music, Feature, Kenny Burrell, Al Tanner, Ray Dobard, James Brown
Music,
There's little doubt that the Rock the Bells festival, rolling through the Bay Area this Saturday, is the hottest hip-hop ticket for this summer's touring season. This year's edition of the annual rap circus collects more than 20 of the…
by Sam Chennault
August 15, 2007
Tags: Music, Feature, Public Enemy, Chuck D, Talib Kweli, Nas (Rapper)
Music,
Immortal Technique The music of Immortal Technique serves as a solid rejoinder to those who think that rap's fire-and-brimstone radicalism is dead. The N.Y.C.-by-way-of-Peru MC's righteous indignation is driven by healthy political paranoia and topped with a dappling of gangsta…
by Sam Chennault
August 15, 2007
Tags: Music, Feature, Immortal Technique, Mos Def, New York City, Featuring Chuck
Music,
Considering the all-too-humble sales of catalog hip-hop albums, it's surprising the number of books dedicated to the genre's history and pioneers. This dynamic is a testament to the obsessive nature of the small but vocal devotees of classic hip hop.…
by Sam Chennault
June 27, 2007
Tags: Music, Feature, Too $hort, Brian Coleman, Bushwick Bill, KRS-One
Music,
Since Hurricane Katrina made landfall more than 21 months ago and decimated New Orleans, that city's music community has been almost solely focused on chronicling the psychological and physical fallout of the storm. Rapper Lil Wayne released his acerbic polemic…
by Sam Chennault
June 27, 2007
Tags: Music, Feature, New Orleans, Lil' Wayne, Marvin Gaye, Hurricane Katrina
Music,
Some say that this thing of ours, this hyphy music, is dead. The national hip-hop community never really accepted us, pop audiences never understood us, and politicians lambasted our influence (god forbid suburbanites ghostride their SUVs). Even within the Bay,…
by Sam Chennault
June 20, 2007
Tags: Music, Feature, Turf Talk, Lil Jon, Young Turk (Rapper), Fairfield
Music,
BeatBox
Decatur, Georgia's Whild Peach delivers nasty funk just the way George Clinton intended. Its groove is so irresistible that OutKast has considered the group its resident session act and touring band since 2000's Stankonia. Whild Peach lost its heart, though,…
by Sam Chennault, Tamara Palmer, and Tony Ware
June 13, 2007
Tags: BeatBox, Show Preview, Paris, Ne-Yo, OutKast, Decatur
Music,
Reviewed
In this era of Internet omnipotence, where immortality means little and scarcity less, it's both comforting and quaint to imagine there's still great music hidden in dusty basements and lost in record store bins. The vinyl archaeologists at Luv N'…
by Sam Chennault
June 6, 2007
Tags: Reviewed, CD Review, Buddy Connor, Joey Jefferson, Pat Hunt, Rodney Trotter
Music,
BeatBox
San Joaquin ValleyÐbased DJ WiiJ specializes in high-energy mash-ups of crazy hybrid styles. He even co-produced an album's worth of material merging Queen with 50 Cent's G-Unit. Instead of using a computer keyboard to mix tunes, though, WiiJ programmed two…
by Sam Chennault and Tamara Palmer
May 9, 2007
Tags: BeatBox, Show Preview, Los Angeles, 50 Cent, South Africa, Rick Preston
