The Flavr Blue with a luxurious new electro-scape… Is that even a word? Anyway. Check the pristine beat, synth and vocals of “Feathers,” which premiered on Variance Magazine a few days ago.
Category: Audio
AUDIO: “Jock Me” – Joey Ka$h (feat. Nacho Picasso; prod. by Rob Skeetz)
Rapper Joey Ka$h enlists the help of Moor Gang’s Nacho Picasso for “Jock Me,” the new single from Joey’s recent album, Paid the Cost. Rob Skeetz on the beat.
AUDIO: Space > Pod < Memories – Astro King Phoenix
Astro King Phoenix — rapper, photographer, video director — puts OCnotes’ Rap Loops instrumentals to good use on Space > Pod > Memories, a fleeting collection of lyrical excursions over beats that range from lush, to skeletal, to abstract futuristic. The 12 songs are gone before you know it but the whole thing makes for a nice snack.
ALBUM REVIEW: The Cigar Room – Neema (prod. by Keyboard Kid)
I wrote an album review of Neema and Keyboard Kid’s new record, The Cigar Room, for City Arts. Click through to read it: “Deep Decadence in Neema’s
AUDIO: The Turntable Doctrine EP – Blues
West Seattle native Blues is hustling to make a name for himself in Seattle rap. His The Turntable Doctrine EP adheres to a classic throwback (read: early- to mid-90s) recipe, which fits just fine with Grynch who shows up to guest turn on “Just One Night,” an appealing party-starter.
Check out the full album and video for “Just One Night,” below.
AUDIO: SuperSquare – Amos Miller
Amos Miller — area eclecticist and frequent collaborator with such Town rap stalwarts as Gabriel Teodros and Macklemore — recently released a solo album called SuperSquare. It’s 22 tracks long, composed mostly of brief, interlude length songs that are each packed to the brim with musical ideas. SuperSquare plays like an aural sketchbook, pulled from the shelf of an artist with a far afield, wandering mind.
Hip-hop, folk, electronic, R&B, neo-soul — all of these genres play together beautifully on SuperSquare, albeit with a smart pop sensibility. Low-fi record scratches adorn one track, only to be supplanted seconds later by high-def synth and futuristic thump. And is that a processed didgeridoo on the tracks “Crystal” and “Conflict?”
A grip of collaborators including Jake One, Evan Flory-Barnes, Adra Boo, and Aaron Walker-Loud lend a communal feel to the record which, despite its tracks’ short attention spans, never feels rushed or scattered which is due to the tightly executed transitions between songs. “Ascent” is one of only two that extends beyond three minutes: sonar pings, laser gun synth, coasting jazz high hats, and what sounds like a live upright bass back Amos’s pitched raps that slide from visceral poetic ruminations on artistry, to lamenting the prison industrial complex.
SuperSquare keeps you in the listening moment by engaging your ears and mind with big concepts over short ranges of time; and as the songs fold into each other, your brain keeps working, imagining what might have come next.
AUDIO: “Aspis” – Dex Amora (prod by Melo-Zed)
Rising rapper Dex Amora makes this joint — something so heavy — sound so light. Producer Melo-Zed provides the elegant stutter. If you missed Dex’s 2014 Aura… Don’t.
AUDIO: “Hop” – Zaddy Rxffin, BishpBishp & Seaan Brooks (prod. by Mvllah)
With names unfriendly to your preferred search engine, and a cold industrial sound bleak enough to make Chappie shit his robot drawers, producer Mvllah teams with fellow Tacoma goons Zaddy Rxffin, BishpBishp and Seaan Brooks for “Hop.” The latest from the upcoming Wett Peso LP.
AUDIO: High On Wax – Stay Hi Brothers
Producer/MC Vitamin D and MC Maineak B are two Seattle rap nonpareils who’ve blessed the Town with crucial albums and career-making artist co-signs over the course of multiple decades. Their official union as a duo, the Stay High Brothers, has always catered to the classical rap-minded aficionado’s ear.
High On Wax forgoes the universally accepted studio techniques normally used to craft beats (ie. samplers, sequencers and the like) and relies solely on the art of turntablism to provide the backing tracks for the duo’s raps. The result is a heady, organic and raw soundtrack for Vita and Maine’s daily living. In this hazy, hedonist’s landscape, the good is consumed like daily bread and the pursuit of pleasure rules the day; that is until the fucking pigs inevitably blow the high.
And yet, no matter. Music is the benevolent dictator for the Stay Hi Brothers who remain compelled to get — and stay — lost in the forgiving boundaries of the groove.
AUDIO: “Why You On My Line” – Raz Simone
Raz Simone continues his assault on 2015 with a new joint, “Why You On My Line,” off an upcoming album — that would make four within the calendar year, but who’s counting? — titled That Nigga; artwork above. And that bro-y sounding dude on the phone at the end of the track? That would be one of the Burch twins with whom Raz has apparently entered into a business relationship. More info to come, apparently.
A SEATTLE HIP-HOP BLOG 