Moor Gang’s Thaddeus David with a proverbial banger. “MoorThanLess3” is one track in three parts, allowing you to execute your three go-to dance moves in under four minutes.
Category: Audio
AUDIO: Tax Season Special – All Star Opera (prod. by Breve)
Nothing’s free during tax season — except for this two-piece EP from All Star Opera. Tax Season Special finds ASO rappers Flow Carter and Oz trading the mic over producer Breve’s organic, Golden Era throwbacks.
AUDIO: “Jealousy” – Ryan Caraveo (prod. by L.E.K.)
Ryan Caraveo answers his detractors with a new song called “Jealousy” (produced by L.E.K.). The message here: work hard and don’t waste your youth dwelling on peripheral opinion, lest you become the person who ends up hating the new version of yourself. Or something.
(And for post-listening exposition: Critics get old, cranky and end up eating their own tails. Discuss.)
AUDIO: “That Nigga” – Raz Simone
A punctuation mark and some friendly advice for fakes, from Raz Simone: “Your outfit cost more than your life savings… You should budget.” Produced by Antwon Vinson and Raz.
AUDIO: “Quotient” – Sax G
Producer/rapper/singer Sax G brings his heady methodology to “Quotient,” the flowing, rhythmic first drop from his upcoming Lullaby of the Forbidden Dancer, out May 18, 2015.
AUDIO: “Love Yourself” – Brothers From Another (feat. Mario Sweet)
In advance of their Locals Only show coming up this Saturday night at Neumos, Brothers From Another (featuring Mario Sweet crooning and Nima Skeemz and Elan Wright on production) present a synth-heavy, bouncy pop ditty, “Love Yourself.” A musical pat on the back in preparation for summer.
AUDIO: “Rain” – Dave B (prod. by Stewart Villain)
Dave B and Stewart Villain with some electric relaxation. “Rain” is their new drop and it falls like, well, you know.
AUDIO: Planets – Kevin Lavitt
Kevin Lavitt is a producer, musician and singer who’s done the bulk of his work in Seattle with Raz Simone and the rest of the Black Umbrella family. His debut EP, Planets, is self-produced and features a number of area MCs and vocalists. The album’s eight tracks are heady, soulful doses of modern hip-hop and R&B, one of the highlights being “Strange” which finds singer and frequent Black Umbrella collaborator Ariana DeBoo stretching out her jazz vocals. Download Planets for free, here.
AUDIO & VIDEO: Baby Jesus – Raz Simone
Thus far in 2015 Raz Simone is outpacing all other rappers in the Town in terms of artistic output and bold statements. He’s turned this very website into his own virtual PR firm with a steady barrage of video and audio drops. He’s rarely taken a day off, it seems, and today is no exception.
Baby Jesus — available for free download here — is Simone’s third album project of the year and deals heavily with ideas of self-actualization, self-worth and the redemptive properties associated with those two things. Like his Macklemore Privilege & Chief On Keef Violence EP, the message isn’t always cut and dry; it’s complicated by meddling factors like the power of your own subconscious, your environment and the demands placed upon you by the company you keep. A world of cognitive dissonance, indeed.
Click here to watch Raz’s latest video for his song “Hallelujah.” and stream the title track from Baby Jesus below.
Update (4.10.15): Check out the video for the title track to Baby Jesus, below.
AUDIO: Ones and Zeroes – Carl Roe
If memory serves, 206UP was one of the first (if not the first) local website to feature a piece of rapper/producer/sound engineer Carl Roe’s music (that would be this internet-ancient episode of 206UP’s The TrackMeet — remember those?). Carl won that contest and, in his estimation, has been proverbially winning ever since.
Ones and Zeroes is his debut full length album and, as the album cover illustrates, it’s the sprawling portrait of an MC weathered by a hard life: Roe is an Iraq war veteran with a childhood that was far from sunny. Hardscrabble lyricism abounds on Ones and Zeroes, with bars reserved for dismissive bloggers, talent bookers and short-sighted musical peers (see: “No No,” “Ones and Zeroes”). But there’s also a well-woven autobiographical narrative (“Eye For An I,” “The River”) that likely informs the darkness found elsewhere on the album: the unsettling killer’s fantasy “Murder On The Clock” and paranoid, pro-Second Amendment “Fire Sale”).
The boom-bap production is parts soulful and rugged, matching subject matter, and beat credits include Brainstorm, DJ Semaj, Randy Ross, and Trox. Roe also enlists a bunker of loyal MC lieutenants including frequent collaborators Ripynt and Produktive. Ones and Zeroes is probably two or three tracks too long, but by far represents Carl Roe’s best work to date.
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