Album Review: How I Got Over

How I Got Over - The Roots

This album is spectacular. It has a full live sound from an accomplished and talented band, of the most underrated MC's in the game (Black Thought), multiple appearances from John Legend, catchy choruses, and a high level of consistency and professionalism throughout the whole album. This isn't a thoughtless rampage of fat techno house beats with lyrics about getting money cars and women, its a spacious real musical sound with thoughtful sincere lyrics. I'm ready to call this the album of 2010. It can be playful, dark, soulful, but always always entertaining. I'm going to list my favorite songs, and its going to be the whole "A" side of the album. Turn the volume up, and play them through some big good box speakers. Buy the album, youtube cannot do it justice.

Walk Alone

Dear God 2.0

Radio Daze

Now or Never

How I Got Over

And that's only the A side.

Thursday Special: Deadly Medley

Deadly Medley - Black Milk feat. Royce da 5'9'' and Elzhi - Album of the Year

Detroit goes really strong in this song as all three hail from the motor city, and all three do a fantastic job with their verses, crafting funny and memorable lines. Although I personally think Elzhi was the weakest of the bunch (and his lines were pretty good), but that Royce Da 5'9'' absolutely knocked this song out. Black milk was good, and his beat on this song is classic showing that he took a couple of notes on the late great fellow Detroit rapper/producer J-Dilla.

Enjoy the song and my favorite lyrics from the three.

"My shit is martin luther your shit is martin lawrence" ~ Black Milk

"You can't take the heat get yo ass out the kitchen

Matter fact take yo ass back in there and wash the dishes" ~ Royce da 5'9''

"I left detroit rappers in fitteds decapitated" ~ Elzhi

That Doomed Feeling: What Have You Done Lately

What Have You Done Lately - Sasquatch - II

I thought I'd make some posts more directly relating with one of my favorite sub genres of music: Doom Metal. Doom metal is just normal metal (which in itself is hard to define, the sound difference between Iron Maiden and Golgoroth is vast, but both are blanketed under the term metal) but with a very slow tempo. A great and early example of doom metal is Black Sabbath from the album Black Sabbath by the band Black Sabbath. Although not original in name it was original in just how slow dark and "doomed" the music sounded. Many modern Doom Bands are now considered part of the "Stoner" genre, when that term was birthed in the early nineties, because of their hypnotic nature and lyrically focus on illict drugs (i.e. Weedeater), but again the basic qualities are the same, slow, loud, and heavy. Some bands I've posted about before that fall into this genre would be: Electric Wizard, Acid King, Om, and Earth. A classic Doom band that I need to post about is: Sleep.

What Have You Done Lately off of Sasquatch's second album II (Creative, just like Sabbath's song Sabbath, off the album Sabbath), really hit the button for me in terms of doom metal. It's less vile than Electric Wizard, while still holding onto its tripped out, heavy, and hypnotic stylings. The thing I really like about this is that instead of just riding out that groove, Sasquatch seems to have a little fun with it and just get into a absolute stomping tear, changing the tempo and the riff, and layering on even more lead heavy guitar.

Enjoy.

New Release: My Goodness

My Goodness is a bluesy rock Seattle two piece band, that does more than just sound like the Black Keys, and allow me to rant on this for a moment, just because the Black Keys are successful does not mean they own, or completely invented their sound, or that we should reduce bands that sound like them, to cheep knockoffs. That being said, although they're sounds are similar, I think My Goodness absolutely has a more violent aggressive attack to some of its songs. The first thing I thought of when I saw the music video for My Goodness's I've got a Notion was the Melvins. I'm not sure why, but I felt extremely validated when I saw that Big Business (shares members with the Melvins) was listed as an influence on their music. The second thought I had was of Valient Thorr, who also played very hyper aggressive, bluesrock-ish (punk-ish?) music. Ultimately though, this band stands very well on its own and I look forward to getting its debut self titled album soon.

Live Performance Special: Civilian

Civilian - Wye Oak - Civilian

I love this song live and in studio. The vocalist has a beautiful swirling delivery which is a perfect match for the distortion and reverb of her guitar, matched with the simple, thumping kick drum. The amount of passion and loud she puts into that guitar solo is just fantastic. It's not technical, it's just simple and brutally emotive. Wow.

Live.

Studio.

Song of the Week: Tyrant

Tyrant - Black Math Horseman - Wylt

Way back in the early months of 2010 when I was first buying records I was trying to choose an album to buy off of the TeePee record label. The decision was split between the cool looking The Legend Of Gods Gun by Spindrift and the not as cool looking or sounding (in name) Wylt by Black Math Horseman. I ultimately left it up to album covers and chose Spindrifts because of that and the fact that it was yellow translucent vinyl. I made a poor decision, although there are some good songs on The Legend Of Gods Gun, that will probably get mentioned in another post sometime. Anyhow what I liked about Black Math Horseman and Tyrant in particular still holds true to today, over a year and a half later. It has long songs which would put it more in the post rock category, but a dynamic quality, and solid enough drumming (and rhythms in general) that keep the songs from getting too lost while still having a darker, almost trance like quality. This quality is really shaped by the amount of delay and distortion on guitar, but also the ethereal quality of the vocals, which I love. I think nothing would suit this band better than a female vocalist, she doesn't wail or scream, but instead delivers haunting whisping vocals, perfect for this album. I really find it refreshing when vocalists, especially metal ones, don't really on brutal screams. There's really nothing creative about a scream, and that's the wonderful thing about music is that you can make it scream for you, in a much more beautiful and powerful way, than you just making loud unintelligible noises for 4 and a half minutes, with no dynamic change. Her voice is perfect for this, it's subtle at times but not wavering, it's powerful, without being oafish. Tyrant winds this mix of heaviness, subtly and hypnotism very well, and is extremely enjoyable to listen to. Enjoy.

Retrospective: Roots Manuva

Roots Manuva - Run Come Save Me

Way back in early April I had Witness by Roots Manuva as my song of the week, this June I bought the whole album and thought it would be a nice idea to visit the material again. The things that I loved about Witness, it's bumbling, heavy, sloppy, electronic beats and odd offbeat (usually nonsensical, at least to me) rhyming, were things that I really enjoyed about songs throughout the album, but weren't mixed as well together. Join the Dots with Chali 2na from Jurassic Five (who I really like as part of Jurassic Five) didn't seem to fit in with the rest of the album. It lacked the stumbling quality, and like Chali 2na's rapping style was very clear and almost forceful. Trim Body (or Kicking the Cack, as he may not actually be saying words) I loved even though it really didn't have that same clear beat or any rapping at all, instead it just had that slippery, funky electronic sound that fits so well in the album.

Album Review: Midnight Marauders

Midnight Marauders - A Tribe Called Quest

I just recently bought this album so maybe I'm still in the honeymoon period, but I knew songs like "Award Tour" and "Electric Relaxation" for a long time and I still think they have a very fresh and live sound to them. I really think this album will last for me, its already been 18 years since it was put out, and it sounds great in every category, from the writing to the production. The beats are funky, and the rhymes are playful, although it sounds darker to me than The Low End Theory, which has to be in my top ten albums to listen to. The interplay of jazzy samples, funky bass, and thumping boom bap drums makes the album just enjoyable to listen to, and the rhyming is absolutely top notch. The two songs I mentioned above are excellent and some other great ones are:

8 Million Stories

Sucka Nigga

We Can Get Down

Oh My God

God Lives Through