Photo from The Simpsons
The recent DtttC single, “Swag Treated Treated Swag,” gets (ahem) treated with a remix courtesy of Viper Creek Club. DttC drops their new record, Let’s Quit, February 14 on Out For Stardom. Viper Creek Club has a new guitarist and a new EP called Hot Lights coming February 16. And Moe’s not telling the authorities about either.
Click album cover to D/L.
Viper Creek Club’s new Beat Tape made my morning commute much livelier. Thanks, Mat Wisner! All you local MCs: there’s some good sh-t here, I recommend you hop on a few joints. I especially enjoyed “Like This” with its big beat and warm textures. I would give it the ol’ college try, but y’all don’t wanna hear that. Trust me.
Click image for D/L link.
I have mixed feelings on this one. On the one hand, producer Mat Wisner (of Viper Creek Club fame) makes undeniably danceable electro-pop/funk/rap sh-t. On the other, this track (and a whole sh-t ton of other rap music — much of which admittedly gets coverage on this blog) marginalizes pretty much every woman in Seattle. Some ladies might think this track is just swell, and others might feel justifiably pigeonholed.
There’s nothing wrong with appreciating beauty (feminine, masculine, mammalian, reptilian, whatever), but when the identity of a specific group of people is distilled to nothing more than the sexual, there’s no good in that. Ever. A fair amount of rap music made by men does an admirable job of representing a dualistic point of view with regards to male/female sexuality. This does not.
Click album cover to D/L.
Friday’s album release party for Viper Creek Club’s ViperLust went down with great success, I hear. Your loyal blogger wasn’t on the scene (for a number of reasons, the main one being I live over 2,500 miles away), but I’m positive Mat Wisner and Co. left it all on the stage (or turntables — whatever the case may be) like he always does. Metal Chocolates did their new thing with great style and a nose to the future.
The FREE album download for ViperLust has gone live. Get with that below. For 206UP.COM’s previous thoughts on VCC’s remixes, click here.
Click poster for more info.
Viper Creek Club has gotten a lot of love from 206UP.COM for its highly danceable, innovative reinterpretations of SEA hip-hop tracks. I’m not gonna link to ’em all here — that’s what the Search bar is for, dunny. Suffice to say that Mat Wisner’s side hustle has resulted in the birth of a 10-track album, ViperLust, that will drop and be celebrated live at Neumos on April 1. Get yourself to the venue for that and check 206UP.COM for the download when it goes public.
Also rocking with VCC that night will be the ever-assiduous Truckasaurus, and a new electro-rap duo known as Metal Chocolates, the ridiculously intelligent offspring of oc Notes and Rik Rude that is too smart for both the club and most progressive liberal arts colleges that I hear are all the rage right now. For a little taste of their gray matter, check the Bandcamp thingy below. MC has an interesting promotional package available, too, the spoils of which consist of accoutrement both likely and otherwise. Check for that, here.
This is a fun one: Viper Creek Club with an off-beat take on “What Happened To That Boy” by Birdman featuring Clipse. The Neptunes’ original production sounded like hip-hop made in a futuristic ice age. VCC’s version is distinctly warmer — like the version played at Earth’s party before hell froze over.
Click Play to listen to “What Happened To That Boy (VCC RMX)” by Clipse f/Birdman. Click here for the D/L link, dummy.
Both the original and the remixed versions of “I Need You” are masterful. JusMoni‘s spoken-word is heartfelt, soulful and intimate on the original recording. VCC’s version takes the vocals and gives them flight, turning Moni’s declarations into something beyond delicate words jotted in a diary; here, it sounds as if she’s pronouncing her unconditional love from an electronic mountaintop. It’s just as moving and essential, but in a completely different way.
Press Play to listen to “I Need You (VCC RMX)” by JusMoni. Put your mouse here for the D/L.
Rockwell Powers and Mat Wisner (moonlighting hip-hop producer extraordinaire) combine forces for “Riot,” a glistening head-nodder. Rockwell’s blue-collar flow and Wisner’s hard-but-lush board-work are the perfect way to close out another big year in Northwest hip-hop.
Click image for D/L link
The original version of “The Youth Die Young” (the title track from Mad Rad’s forthcoming album of the same name, streaming, here) is a whimsical but not totally innocent paean to the joys of youth. It’s a celebratory but dubious anthem for the internet generation. There’s a cautionary tale lurking somewhere in the track that belies its upbeat vibe, as if describing a slightly aged Ferris Bueller who’s come to the sudden and harsh realization that the world doesn’t revolve around him. “The Youth Die Young” is actually quite a mature song for Mad Rad, perhaps a sign that the crew is evolving beyond its sophomoric antics of past days. Whatever. The most important aspect of the song is that it gets your ass to moving.
Mat Wisner, of local electro-pop crew Viper Creek Club, has something tricky up his sleeve. Make that a few tricky somethings. If you’ve been following VCC’s blog (get hip, here), you’ll already be familiar with the series of hip-hop remixes Mat has been putting down for local 206 crews. What started with a gritty re-imagining of Fresh Espresso’s “The Lazerbeams” has morphed into a miniature monster: a half dozen or so exclusive remixes in which Town rap gets VCC’s special electro-pop treatment.
The Viper Creek Club Hip-Hop Remixes — collect ’em all!
Here’s the latest: a dramatic redux of Sol’s “Wake Up.” Somnambulant synth and plucky electronic keyboard invoke a different form of hypnotic stasis than the original’s ethereal new wave.
(Wouldn’t an entire album’s worth of VCC’s electro-pop remixes be dope? If only…)
Click here for the download link.
A SEATTLE HIP-HOP BLOG 