South Sound makers Rockwell Powers and DJ Phinisey are back in the lab and working on a new project together. The pair’s Kings & Comics EP from two years back highlighted strong boom-bap fundamentals and, according to Rockwell, the upcoming release will show a different musical side.
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Spekulation is working a new collection of tracks; Truth Be Told is due out in February 2013. “Remember” is the first leak from the upcoming EP and it features a Hall and Oates sample. Need I say more?
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Local spitter Donte Peace recently dropped his new ‘tape, Illway Nights: The Art Of Indecisiveness. Preview the collection and download it at this location. And press play on the clip for “Speed”, below.
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You might remember Shao Sosa’s video for “Kiss of the Dragon” which I posted a while back. Or maybe not. In any case, the Tri-Cities area rapper is back with a “timely” new song called “Bomb On My Chest” featuring the venerable Luck One.
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Way back, when I had the red and black lumberjack, 206UP.COM used to run a semi-regular feature called The TrackMeet, a weekly contest whereby three up-and-coming Seattle-area artists were pitted against each other in a sort of battle of the bands showdown. The blog readership got to vote on whose track they thought was the freshest, the prize being nothing more than bragging rights and a spot on a 206UP.COM mixtape. Well here’s hoping your boy gets his mojo up well enough in 2013 to revisit that feature.
All this to say: COMN GRND is a group that participated in, and won, a past edition of The TrackMeet. The MC Cheeks is one-half of that crew and his heartfelt “Windsorknot” is the first single from his upcoming The Divergence. Take a listen below.
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J. Pinder gives a new treatment to his previously released Careless (which I reviewed for Potholes In My Blog, here). Careless Redux is twice as long as its predecessor and features a heavy list of cameos: Rapper Big Pooh, Thurzday and Musiq Soulchild, among them. DJ Skee lends an assist, not that Pinder needs it. The young rapper has come to embody the very essence of “dependable” whenever he touches the mic. Get Careless Redux for free, here.
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Sportn’ Life Records turned ten this year. “Over Emotional” is the final drop celebrating the label’s decade in business, and it features two of the still up-and-coming artists on an already impressive roster. Larry Hawkins (fka. SK) and childhood friend Davey Jones are working on their joint When The Dust Settles.
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I’m in a race against the clock. With less than a month to go in the year and a Best-Of Seattle Hip-Hop list to generate, your loyal blogger is doing some last-minute cramming, making sure mine ears have heard a proper sampling of all that 2012 has had to offer. I’m beginning with Leroy, the full-length album from MC Bruce Leroy and producer 1st Born. This free download showed up in the inbox two weeks ago, and with a co-sign from Larry Mizell in last week’s My Philosophy, it deserves a listen.
Alright, welcome me back from my week-long vacation out West. The irony of me traveling to Seattle (from my now more-than-temporary home of New York City) is that I don’t actually get any blogging done when I’m out there. Too busy drinking coffee, eating the best sandwich in the country, and splattering pho broth all over my shirt front.
Oh yeah, I’m also busy talking my way into sold-out Blue Scholars shows (thanks, Hollis!) whilst trying to avoid every drop of torrential rainfall the Pacific Northwest has to offer. (The U-Dub stadium parking lot was a river on Friday night. Sheets of water, I’m telling you!)
Anyway, BS kicked off their #TownAllDay Tour jaunt around the country on Friday with a sold-out performance at the Showbox Market. Geo and Sabzi have tightened up their live set (as if that were even possible) by interspersing a totally engaging series of video shorts throughout their rap songs. If you’re lucky enough to live in one of the cities on the tour docket and have tickets, you’ll see what I mean.
The vignettes act as a narrative stitching the hyper-local focus of Blue Scholars together. It’s fun playing guess-the-Seattle-sights while watching the clips, but perhaps more importantly the sequences serve to eliminate that bit of regular hip-hop show fatigue — you know the one that starts settling in right around the 45 minute mark.
On Friday the group also debuted a new song, “The Decisive Moment,” which finds Geo getting back to MC basics. There’s no hook here and just enough of a groove by Sabzi to help impart the autobiographical, self-revelatory sentiments of one of the Town’s most beloved artists.
Also fresh: the video for “Anna Karina” (directed by Matt Jay) which has an interesting origin story and subtle provocativeness that speaks volumes without being bombastic. Blue Scholars continue to age like a fine wine.
You know MADlines as one half of Canary Sing (Hollis Wong-Wear is the other more conspicuous fifty-percent). Nice to see this talented MC going for dolo on the soulful “I Need a Moment”. Check the wardrobe changes, the chopped-up sample, and the sexy nuance of the video, conceptualized and directed by Spenser T. Nottage.
A SEATTLE HIP-HOP BLOG 