Shad, Canadian hip-hop musician, has been featured on the site before. After our interview with DJ Hyphen we were reminded of him. If you haven't heard of dude, give him a listen.More info: www.myspace.com/shad
Saturday, April 25, 2009
A Second Listen... Shad
Shad, Canadian hip-hop musician, has been featured on the site before. After our interview with DJ Hyphen we were reminded of him. If you haven't heard of dude, give him a listen.More info: www.myspace.com/shad
Friday, April 24, 2009
With All Due Respect...
I'm really feeling that new KRS and Buckshot joint, Robot. I wondered how other heads were reacting to it, so I scanned a few blogs and checked out comments. For the most part, heads were really excited about the single and the KRS-One and Buckshot project overall. I did come across one comment that I just couldn't agree with."KRS and Buckshot make an entire song about the state of the industry, and we are supposed to bob our heads and dance to this? Where is the rhythm, the groove, the swing in the music? Even their spoken parts sound like a lot of dry talk that happens to end up with rhyming words, but the soul of the poetry itself (if that's what they call this) is buried in this boring press-conference and history lesson. It's not entertaining anymore to make music about the industry. It's old. These MC's are old. This song is old. This press conference has been delivered over and over and over again. Let's make fresh and new music and move the people"
The dope thing about opinions, is that you can counter it with one of your own. With this comment it's just clear that the point of the song obviously went over the head of this listener. It's obvious dude is probably more interested in buying, listening and supporting crap. These MCs are old?! Woooow. KRS-One is a pioneer and is much hotter lyrically than a lot of the cats running around with a record deal.
Guess this guy loves auto-tune copy cat tracks. I mean, a little bit is okay. But every song it seems has a bit of that damn auto-tune. All of a sudden real singers don't get bought in and paid to do a hook anymore - not when the rapper can just auto-tune the chorus them self. I'll listen to this "press conference". I'll listen to them go after unoriginal heads.
You know how I realized dude just didn't get it? "...we are supposed to bob our heads and dance to this? Where is the rhythm, the groove, the swing in the music?" Yeah, because all tracks are suppose to be that instructional dance trash that fills the radio airwaves. Come on man.
What's your thoughts?
Hi, I'm Bill Burr and I Just Don't Give A F***!
You know what happens when you decide to make it a stay at home night on a Friday? You start channel surfing, finding out that there's absolutely not much going on in tv land. Hundreds of channels for some and still nothing. Then......out of nowhere comes Comedy Central to save your evening. Man, they do find them. I don't know about you but when I saw Bill Burr's Why Do I Do This? stand up special, I was so upset that I was watching it solo. Why? Because. You ever crack up so hard that you want to ask the person you're watching it with if they heard what you just heard so both of you can die laughing? Yeah. Bill Burr's a (bleeping) nut job. Insanely funny. Says things you only think. I must've watched this about 6 times. Hilarious each time. Go get it. Seriously. Haha. Here's a clip of him from his DVD special on pedophiles...
Purchase here at Amazon: Bill Burr - Why Do I Do This?
Dope Contest
Common is looking for producers to enter the remix contest for his track Gladiator, off that Universal Mind Control Album. Check the link. Dope contest.
Check out more info on the contest:
www.okayplayer.com/news/Commons-Gladiator-Remix-Contest
Q&A with Melissa Czarnik
Three years ago we launched The Mad Bloggers as a way to vent about the way we saw thing in the world. Then we began to morph and push music. Twenty-four days ago, we re-launched The Mad Bloggers, with a bit of our old sarcastic edge coupled with a desire to share real music and talented artists.
It’s because of commercial radio, MTV, BET and other commercial outlets that our site and other sites like ours can exist. I turned off the radio a few months ago because every time it was on, there was some new instructional dance garbage passing itself off as real music. Because of our discontent with mainstream music, we constantly comb the Internet for good, unheard of and mostly underground music. We then share it here with you.
Melissa Czarnik is one of those finds. She is one of the first heads that we spotlighted on our revamped blog in early April. I was immediately impressed with the emcee out of Milwaukee. To me, she has content and a lyrical delivery to back it up. Her music has something a lot of music on the radio is missing – passion. I’m happy to support real music. Melissa has an album out, Strawberry Cadillac, which is available on iTunes. Get that! Only $9.99.
Like I said, we’ve featured her music in the past but wanted to take an opportunity to do a Q&A and hear from the woman behind the music. Check out what she had to say.
The Mad Bloggers: How do you describe what you do? Like, would you consider yourself an emcee, poet, etc?
Melissa Czarnik: I consider myself a poet/emcee. I read a lot of poetry. I work at a destination poetry bookstore, Woodland Pattern Book Center, which brings in poets from across the nation and so I’m constantly surrounded by inspiring wordsmiths. I also grew up on hip-hop. Some of my favorites are Talib Kweli and right now I’m bumping that Diamond District like crazy. I mix the two together sort of naturally. I think the one thing that defines me, as poet/emcee, is that I don’t pay any attention to the rules of hip-hop (per say). That whole verse, chorus, verse, chorus thing ain’t really my thing. If I want to have a 24 bar poem that leads into a 16 bar verse that exits back into a 24 bar poem then that’s what I’ll do.
TMB: I know you're pushing the Spooky Love project right now for Eric Mire but what's the next project coming up for just you? How much time do you spend per week dedicated to music?
MC: I am working on my next album right now. I’m setting a deadline for late 2009, but I don’t want to rush it if it’s not ready but that’s what I’m aiming for. In terms of time spent working on music, I feel like all my free time goes towards working on music. Because when I’m reading, I’m furthering my vocabulary and my knowledge, which eventually ends up in my rhymes. When I’m listening to music, I’m constantly analyzing, “OK, what did I like about this, what can I borrow from to make my music better.” And in terms of writing, I’m always writing. Now whether it ends up in a song or not is one thing but like I always say a “line of rhyme a day, keeps the haters at bay!”
TMB: Shows, events that are upcoming and exciting?
MC: Actually yes! I have very exciting news, The Eric Mire Band, a jazzy, hip-hop, folk group that backs me up at my live show is releasing their first group album, “Spooky Love” on May 9th. I’m featured on a couple of the tracks so I’m extra hype on that. And Eric Mire, who is also my producer and guitar player, is coming with me to Europe at the end of May for about 10 days to try and do some international promotion and performing.
TMB: You're a female ... how does that play in hip-hop for you? (Woman in mainstream music often had to come off more sexual than talented for example) Do you see it as an issue in presenting who you are?
MC: I see it as an issue for women in general, more than just for me. I mean women in music often use their bodies to sell themselves. The problem starts with mainstream record labels putting a pretty face before talent. The next thing you know you got little girls growing up thinking all I got to do is look sexy, play dumb and I’ll get ahead in life. I think that’s why I look up to women like Ani Difranco, india.arie, and Lauryn Hill. Cause these are women who are talented, intelligent, and naturally sexy. I mean Lauryn Hill could rock a mini-skirt and some combat boots and be sexy as all hell, and yet kill whatever Pras or Clef were spittin next to her. Which actually brings me to your first question about being a female in hip-hop. I feel that I constantly have to watch my back cause it’s a male dominated game. I want to be strong, taken seriously, but at the same time I don’t want to hide my sexiness. I also want to make sure people like me for my talent and not for my body. So at one show I might be rocking a dress and the next show I’m in dickies, timbs, and a hoodie. But, I usually always got some sneakers on or some boots, cause you never know when you’re gonna have to take off running!
TMB: If there was one thing you could change about that state of hip-hop right now, what would it be?
MC: I would like to change the fact that most of the hip-hop you hear on the radio today is garbage, degrading, and mindless. I would like to make it so that in order to get on the radio, young emcees had to aspire to be uplifting and have heart.
Check it out:
Rue Lafeyette is one of my favorite joints. It’s a love song about Paris (not Hilton). It’s inspired by a trip Melissa took to Paris in 2004.
More on Melissa Czarnik, www.myspace.com/melissaczarnik
Sneaker Documentary
Found this sneaker documentary by Justin Black. I thought it was a pretty cool feature. If you have a bit of time, you should check it out. It's an interesting look at the sneaker phenomenon.
Sneaker Documentary from Justin Black on Vimeo.
Sneaker Documentary from Justin Black on Vimeo.
TELL 'EM WHY YOU MAD: Stuck in a Dumb Box
Question... to the designers of those new boxed looking cars, did you like playing with cardboard boxes as kids? I mean, that Scion was running things for a while with that box look (by running, I mean no one else had the nerve to do such an ugly design). Then it seems like an influx of boxed looking cars hitting the market - enter the Honda Element, that new Kia Soul (I'm still trying to figure out the use of hamsters in their commercial by the way), Ford has one and I recently saw a commercial for a new Nissan. All with that box looking design. They all seriously look like cardboard boxes with engines, wheels and windows. What an imagination. I would say, nice way to think outside the box but based on the recent designs, that's not really appropriate.
Thursday, April 23, 2009
What I'm Listening to Right Now... Mr. Lif
I'm Lovin It
I don’t know if I’m just in the right spot when crazy things go down or maybe I’m always just paying attention and looking for wild stuff (so I can write about it later). Today while going through some pictures, I was reminded of this bizarre experience I had at a McDonalds.
A few months back I went to this McDonalds in a semi sketch area. It was one of the smallest McDonalds I had been to in my life. When we get in the spot we notice that they are attempting to shut down for the night. Kind of threw us off because the sign on the door said that they closed at 9pm and it was only 7:30, but whatever I suppose. Girl behind the counter is wearing a t-shirt (with no McDonalds logo) and a pair of jeans. Threw me off a little bit because I didn’t know that McDonalds had plain clothed employees. Perhaps she was undercover.
I proceed to order first. Everything seems cool after the second guy I’m with orders too. Well, this is until she starts telling us that they don’t have certain things anymore. Like, they are out of fries and you can only order certain types of burgers, there are no more Mc Nuggets and so on (I guess that’s why they were shutting down early). So the dude in the back that’s making up the orders yelled out to the girl to come to the back. They begin to argue. We can’t quite make out everything they are saying, but he’s pretty upset and said over and over, “you don’t listen.”
Dude finally walks to the front of the store. “Who ordered the quarter pounder with cheese?” My man who ordered after me, replied with, “I did.”
The guy begins to explain how they don’t have any more quarter pounder meat. Well, they do have quarter pounder meat but he doesn’t want to fire the grill back up and that takes a lot of effort, especially because he had just cleaned it he goes on to explain. Then he goes on with, “you can order like a fish sandwich or something.” Yeah, nothing about this spot said that you wanted to order the fish sandwich at all! So, my man said, “I don’t really want to do that.”
There’s a moment of silence. Then the dude said, “I have some regular meat that’s cooked up. I figure I put like three or four patties of those on there and that has got to equal like a quarter pounder.”
There is another pause. My man being ridiculous said, “then do it.”
This is what happens when you order food at a sketchy McDonalds. He put four between those two pieces of bread. He had to put it in a double quarter box.
A few months back I went to this McDonalds in a semi sketch area. It was one of the smallest McDonalds I had been to in my life. When we get in the spot we notice that they are attempting to shut down for the night. Kind of threw us off because the sign on the door said that they closed at 9pm and it was only 7:30, but whatever I suppose. Girl behind the counter is wearing a t-shirt (with no McDonalds logo) and a pair of jeans. Threw me off a little bit because I didn’t know that McDonalds had plain clothed employees. Perhaps she was undercover.
I proceed to order first. Everything seems cool after the second guy I’m with orders too. Well, this is until she starts telling us that they don’t have certain things anymore. Like, they are out of fries and you can only order certain types of burgers, there are no more Mc Nuggets and so on (I guess that’s why they were shutting down early). So the dude in the back that’s making up the orders yelled out to the girl to come to the back. They begin to argue. We can’t quite make out everything they are saying, but he’s pretty upset and said over and over, “you don’t listen.”
Dude finally walks to the front of the store. “Who ordered the quarter pounder with cheese?” My man who ordered after me, replied with, “I did.”
The guy begins to explain how they don’t have any more quarter pounder meat. Well, they do have quarter pounder meat but he doesn’t want to fire the grill back up and that takes a lot of effort, especially because he had just cleaned it he goes on to explain. Then he goes on with, “you can order like a fish sandwich or something.” Yeah, nothing about this spot said that you wanted to order the fish sandwich at all! So, my man said, “I don’t really want to do that.”
There’s a moment of silence. Then the dude said, “I have some regular meat that’s cooked up. I figure I put like three or four patties of those on there and that has got to equal like a quarter pounder.”
There is another pause. My man being ridiculous said, “then do it.”
This is what happens when you order food at a sketchy McDonalds. He put four between those two pieces of bread. He had to put it in a double quarter box.
Auto-Tune The News??? LMFAO!!!
Wooooooooooooow! I saw this. Laughed a little. Kept watching. Died laughing. Reeeeeeee-dunk-ulous. LOL! Check this out A.S.A.P.
Nat King Cole To Blu & Exile
Here's another old to new I'm posting for your musical pleasure. Again, Nat King Cole's When Sunny Gets Blue is such a classic in itself. You can distinctively hear the sample at the end of Blu & Exile's Blu Collar Workers. They put a very creative twist to it in my opinion. I love both. Check it out...
Fwd: Auto-Tuneless ... KRS-One and Buckshot's Robot
Robot, produced by Havoc of Mobb Deep, is the first track off of KRS-One and Buckshot's Survival Skills in stores August 25th on Duck Down Records. This is another one of those tracks that popped up in the email (thanks to our people at Mac Media).
Robot is real! They come straight at the current auto-tune trend and the copy-cat mentality of the craft. Remember Roger Troutman? KRS-One and Buckshot do.
This track is just an indication of a dope album on the way. According to the press release, "Survival Skills has confirmed features from Mary J Blige, Slug of Atmosphere, Immortal Technique, K'NAAN, Talib Kweli, Sean Price, Naledge of Kidz In The Hall, Smif N Wessun, Rock of Heltah Skeltah and Geo of Blue Scholars. Production on the album includes tracks from Havoc, of Mobb Deep, 9th Wonder, Black Milk, Marco Polo, Moss, Coptic, KHRYSIS! and Ill Mind."
Yeah, you can say wow now.
The track is available May5th on iTunes.
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