Hip-Hop for the Summer

So I got a tweet from link343 aka Mark asking if I knew of any good hip-hop albums for the summer. He didn't specify new or old so I sat down and made a list. In no particular order, the following ten albums should kick the summer doldrums and put you in a great place. That said, you can't download these albums here, apart from the last one which is dead out of print, but you should be able to find them easily enough as the first nine are still in print and they're all sure-shots!


1) Dr. Dre - The Chronic
What ride for the summertime would be complete without The Chronic? It's not about whether you smoke or not (I don't), and you don't have to be a G to enjoy it (I'm certainly not), Dre simply has the beats and the MCs to keep your car groovin'. Of course, it's thoroughly politically incorrect, especially that skit in the "doctor's office", but if you've got a good sense of humor you'll love it. That said, you've probably already heard this album a thousand times before, but if you haven't, what are you waiting for?
PRIME CUT: Let Me Ride



2) The Pharcyde - Bizarre Ride II The Pharcyde
I don't know if you can have more fun than with Bizarre Ride II The Pharcyde. These guys sound like they were having the time of their lives! Every rap is funny, every beat is funky and every MC has skills that will leave your mind blown. Seriously, there isn't a bad track on this record. It's almost like the second volume of Paul's Boutique, albeit without as many samples. Get this NOW!
PRIME CUT: I'm That Type Of N***a



3) Beastie Boys - Paul's Boutique
How could this not be on the list? Paul's Boutique is like a frantic jigsaw puzzle that you'll never finish assembling but you'll never get sick of trying to put together. The Beasties were quite possibly in the best form of their career and it shows. The rhymes will leave you scratching your head like a seriously engaging episode of Jeopardy while the beats will have you trying to figure out where you heard that before. This record NEVER gets old! One of the best hip-hop records ever, one of the best party records ever, simply one of the best EVER!
PRIME CUT: Shadrach



4) Public Enemy - It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back
Chuck D has a voice like the horn on a sea liner, as in you'll never miss it when it hits. One of the most powerful voices in hip-hop gives you lyrics that educate and inform while entertaining endlessly. The beats, produced by The Bomb Squad, are truly explosive and can still blow up a party today. Put this on while stuck in traffic and watch the stress peel off as you're gripped by Chuck's intensity and Flava's odd ability to entertain.
PRIME CUT: Louder Than A Bomb



5) De La Soul - 3 Feet High and Rising
Completely different from just about any other hip-hop record you'll ever hear, 3 Feet High is an otherworldly trip through the stratosphere that will entertain fiercely, all the while painting a completely chilled vibe. De La Soul were unfairly labeled hippies for their positive lyrics and attitudes, something they dealt with on the equally essential but significantly darker follow-up, De La Soul Is Dead, but this is still amazing stuff that will put a smile on your face and keep you cool on hot summer days.
PRIME CUT: Say No Go



6) MF DOOM - Operation: Doomsday
Recovering from the ashes of his former group, the under-appreciated KMD, the former Zev Love X donned the mask of Marvel Comics villain Dr. Doom and restarted his career as only he could. DOOM has a voice deep enough to dig a man out of his grave, jokes old enough to make you and your grandfather laugh and beats that sound like recycled quiet storm jams but will nonetheless leave you wanting more. DOOM is an entertainer, through and through, and that's what this record does, it consistently entertains. You'll also find yourself saying "where have I heard that before?" throughout, wondering how he got away with that Beatles sample or the theme from Scooby Doo.
PRIME CUT: Rhymes Like Dimes



7) Handsome Boy Modeling School - So... How's Your Girl
Prince Paul and Dan The Automator became this Get A Life inspired duo almost as a joke, but their music is anything but a joke. With beats like only they can make and appearances from guests as wide-ranging as El-P and DJ Shadow to Sean Lennon and Father Guido Sarducci, this will have you laughing and jamming all summer long. Seriously, this is wonderful stuff!
PRIME CUT: The Projects (PJays) (feat. Del tha Funkee Homosapien and Dave of De La Soul)



8) Dr. Octagon - Dr. Octagonecologyst
Dan The Automator does it again, this time with Kool Keith, and the results are utterly disgusting and hilarious at the same time. Rapping about gynecological exams gone wrong, shark/alligator men, and surgical procedures that only aliens would consider performing, Keith could make you lose your lunch if you don't have a firm grasp on his perverse sense of humor. That said, he's so ridiculous you'll probably be thinking about how laughable his strange flow is. Keith is relentlessly entertaining, but it wouldn't mean much if the beats weren't top-notch too, and they most certainly are. The Automator brings it all, from classical pieces to old school boom-bap beats, so it's never like you're wondering if the next track will be good or not. Sew your tongue to your cheek and let Keith and Dan freak you out.
PRIME CUT: I'm Destructive



9) J Dilla - Donuts
Donuts is a wonderful heartbreaker, released just days before Dilla's death, it's an instrumental juggernaut that plays with your mind and never sits still. Put this on for a long ride and listen to the kaleidoscope that is Donuts constantly change its mind and go in a hundred different directions, all the while keeping heads bobbing and people wishing Dilla was still here so they could buy some beats from him.
PRIME CUT: Lightworks



10) Bombshelter DJs Z-Trip and Radar - Live At The Future Primitive, Vol. Two
A document of Z-Trip and Radar's amazing abilities, this is also a party rocking mix throwing everything you could want for your car into over an hour of mania. The duo mixes Pink Floyd and Aerosmith alongside LL Cool J and Black Sheep, among many others. That last sentence should be reason enough for you to grab this, but if you need another reason just take my word that it's awesome!
PRIME CUT: ALL OF THEM!

Download Live At The Future Primitive, Vol. Two HERE!

Prince Paul's Greatest Snips & More

For this coming week and a little into the next one, I'm going to be digging into some slept-on records that I've had sitting around that I've been intending to post. Don't worry, the Homemade Deluxe Edition of Parade will be going up Tuesday and I'll be posting the February mixtape most likely before the end of the week, but there will be some interesting things that may have received an official release but you couldn't find a copy of if you tried coming up. That's all starting here...

I am a HUGE fan of Prince Paul. He's on my interview wishlist and while I don't have slightest as to how I might get to pick his brain that doesn't mean I won't stop looking into it. That said, Paul is one of those hip-hop producers that simply has so much material in his discography that it makes things a bit complicated when trying to research his history, much the way one could be quickly overwhelmed by the RZA or DJ Premier's production credits. Of course, the easiest place to start for those producers is usually their best known releases, Enter The Wu-Tang for RZA and the first few Gang Starr records for Premier. For Paul, hit the first two De La Soul records and you'll find yourself almost drowning in samples instantly recognizable and impossible to place, kind of like an even trippier Paul's Boutique with an emphasis on soul over the party. Listen to 3 Feet High and Rising next to Paul's Boutique and while you might initially think there is no similarity between the two you'll fully understand how much alike they are after the first listens. Layers and layers of samples that will start a party and keep it going, although the parties are a little different.

After producing the first three De La Soul albums, Paul had a bit of a falling out with the the De La crew as they decided to go for a more mature sound. They remained friendly and still collaborate frequently but another De La Soul album with Paul handling the beats never appeared, De La started their mature phase promisingly with Stakes Is High but fell short on later releases, and Paul's career fell on hard times. He formed the Gravediggaz with Frukwan of his first group, Stetsasonic, fellow ex-Tommy Boy associate Too Poetic, and the RZA, but their darker hip-hop didn't translate into hits despite being incredible and Paul's participation almost entirely ended after their debut album, 6 Feet Deep, known as Niggamortis in the UK. He did an insane indie album named Psychoanalysis (What Is It?) that got him attention from labels again and a new contract with Tommy Boy, but his incredible A Prince Among Thieves album never seemed to take off, mostly because Tommy Boy wasn't what they used to be. He collaborated with Dan The Automator to form the Handsome Boy Modeling School whose first album, So... How's Your Girl?, hit in the unexpected fashion that Psychoanalysis had and sounded like it was conceived out of joy, whereas their major-label funded follow-up, White People, sounded like it suffered from contractual pressures and A&R schmucks breathing down their necks. Another successful concept died a painful death and Paul went back to producing indie rappers and his own projects, all of which received indie releases despite strong connections to comedians like Dave Chappelle and Chris Rock and rappers like MF Doom, El-P, Kool Keith and the then returning Everlast. Probably the most successful release he had during this period was an EP he produced for MC Paul Barman, a goofy white guy who was ridiculously overly wordy and came off like the penultimate nerd and blew all of his lead-in success by waiting several years to release a full-length with other producers and horrid attempts at Bob Dylan-like folk.

I guess you could say that Prince Paul is kind of his own worst enemy. I've always gotten the impression that he's less about a professional career and more about being creative and having fun. When he's enjoying himself he always turns out his best records and he knows when things are going right. That said, it's rather hard to get labels to fund the kind of imaginative records he makes as they aren't necessarily filled with hits. Sure, they're great records, filled with his crazy humor and all kinds of catchy tracks, but he doesn't just make beats and send them off to potential clients, he works with them and contributes just as much to the final work as the artist whose name ends up on the cover. He's a bit of a dying breed with labels even cheaper than they were ten years ago and no one interested in hiring a guy who wants to take his time to put quality into the final product.

It should be noted that Paul isn't flawless, he's had his missteps as is the case with 2003's Politics Of The Business, his attempt at making a stereotypical hip-hop record with the hope that it would slip under the radar and get people interested in his craft again. The humor was limited, the guests were popular and the whole thing overly produced, and while it was easy to see what he was trying to do it more or less backfired. I bought a copy because it's Prince Paul, but it's certainly not on my frequently played list. Around that time though he did produce an incredible career-spanning mixtape named Prince Paul's Greatest Snips that featured everything that makes him great. Samples of tracks produced for Vernon Reid, Queen Latifah, 3rd Bass, Gravediggaz and far too many more to list filled out a nearly hour long collection of the best of Paul's career along with skits, funny interview snippets, an audio-trailer for A Prince Among Thieves and an almost infomercial-esque sampler for Politics Of The Industry that gave it a much needed jolt of humor. Of course, this being a mixtape and the source material being from all over the spectrum, an official release was unheard of and most people never got to hear it, which is truly a shame. It's the type of thing that should be sent to labels asking why they wouldn't hire Prince Paul over will.i.am or some other drop-in-the-bucket modern producers.

Today, for your listening pleasure, I'm sharing a very high-quality rip of Prince Paul's Greatest Snips which I'm sure you'll find thoroughly engaging, but it doesn't stop there! I'm also posting over and hour and fifteen minutes of rare Prince Paul produced tracks and remixes! So, grab both of these and if you're as knocked out by these collections as I hope you are you'll want to go check out a few of his other productions. So you can check some samples I'm going to post links below for some of those albums on Amazon, but definitely check the mixtape and rarities below as they're every bit as good as Paul's officially released albums and collaborations!


De La Soul - 3 Feet High and Rising
De La Soul - De La Soul Is Dead
Handsome Boy Modeling School - So... How's Your Girl?
Prince Paul - Psychoanalysis (What Is It?)
Prince Paul - A Prince Among Thieves
Prince Paul - Itstrumental
Prince Paul - Hip-Hop Gold Dust
MC Paul Barman - It's Very Stimulating

Quick note: I'm rather shocked by how many of these albums appear to be out of print or unavailable digitally. Some of these listed above might get posted after I do some more research.


Prince Paul - Prince Paul's Greatest Snips

01 Intro with Stetsasonic
02 De La Thing
03 That Brother's Production
04 It's That Skit Shit
05 Get The Message
06 The Gravediggz Bomb
07 That Stuff
08 Psychoanalyst
09 A Prince Among Movie
10 Now That's Politics!
11 princepaulonline.com



Prince Paul - Rarities

UPDATE: Don't know why it wasn't working but I've re-uploaded the rarities comp and the link above is brand new. I clicked it and it seems to be working fine.

01 Alliance Ethnik - Simple & Funky (Prince Paul Remix)
02 Queen Latifah - Mama Gave Birth To The Soul Children (feat. De La Soul)
03 Fine Young Cannibals - Good Thing (Prince Paul Remix)
04 Slick Rick - Behind Bars
05 Nikki D - Freak Accident
06 Black Rock & Ron - You Can't Do Me None (Prince Paul Remix)
07 Dr. Octagon - Blue Flowers (Prince Paul Remix)
08 Cookie Crew - Born This Way (Let's Dance) (The Prince Paul Dope Mix)
09 The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion - Blues XXX Man (Prince Paul Remix)
10 MF Doom - Hot Guacamole (feat. MC Paul Barman)
11 Chill Rob G - Let Me Show You (Mixmaster Mase & Prince Paul Remix)
12 Gravediggaz - Don't Be Afraid Of The Dark (feat. Craig Gee)
13 The Jaz - It's That Simple
14 3rd Bass - No Static At All
15 Living Color - Funny Vibe (Prince Paul Remix)
16 Scotty Hard - Who Said (What?) (Prince Paul Remix)
17 Boo-Yaa T.R.I.B.E. - Psyko Funk (Prince Paul Remix)
18 Cypress Hill - Latin Lingo (Prince Paul Mix)
19 Bill Laswell and Friends - If 9 Was 6 (Prince Paul Instrumental Mix)
20 Imani Coppola - Legend Of A Cowgirl (Prince Paul Mix)
21 The Waikikis (Prince Paul and Wordsworth) - Prince Paul's Bubble Party

Resident Alien - Suckas Revisited

I'm not in the habit of doing reposts but I noticed Bust The Facts posted two Resident Alien singles here and here so I figured, what with my mentioning that Prince Paul is on my interview wishlist, this was as good a time as any to mention that you can download RA's unreleased It Takes A Nation Of Suckas To Let Us In here and you can read the original post, actually the very first Unheard Music post, right here! Just in case you want the quick and dirty though...

Resident Alien were a hip-hop group consisting of actual resident aliens that Prince Paul knew and he intended for them to put an album out on Dew Doo Man Records, his short-lived subsidiary of Def Jam. They recorded the album between the first and second De La Soul records and it sounds like it, making it an interesting bridge between the other Native Tongues groups of the late eighties and early nineties. They had videos released for the songs Mr. Boops and Ooh The Dew Doo Man, both of which can be seen here and here, and a 12" with both tracks on it. Everyone was taken by RA but Russell Simmons who decided to terminate the deal with Dew Doo Man and Def Jam prematurely. Maybe that's because Paul holds nothing sacred and made big fun or "Russell Rush" on RA's album. A few tracks have surfaced since but the album is still otherwise unreleased. Def Jam should just give Paul the rights to issue this because it does no one any good to let it just sit in a vault somewhere. Seriously, how much money could this have cost to produce? How much would Def Jam lose after twenty years?

That's the abbreviated version of the story, for which you can read a longer and more detailed account here, but I couldn't help but share this again after Bust The Facts shared those singles and videos! So grab this and party like it's 1991 all over again! Native Tongues forever!


Resident Alien - It Takes A Nation Of Suckas To Let Us In

01 Intro
02 The Resident Alien
03 I Yam What I Yam
04 The Ox Tail, The Burger & Chicken Wing
05 Miss Lee
06 Shakey Ground (feat. Maceo and Dres)
07 Ardicle Don
08 Horrorscope
09 Midtro
10 Ooh The Dew Doo Man
11 Mr. Boops
12 Alone
13 State Of Emergency
14 Are You Ready
15 We Na Play
16 Wanna Be (Russell)
17 Mother's Day
18 Third World
19 Extro
20 Welcome To America

Monie Love - Down To Earth

What a strange career it's been for Monie Love. One of the first British rappers to get a major label contract in the US, she was a member of the Native Tongues crew and is well known for her appearances on Queen Latifah's Ladies First and the remix of De La Soul's Buddy, although her singles Monie In The Middle and It's A Shame (My Sister) are also fondly remembered. Her albums though are not remembered with such a joyous perspective, although that may have more to do with the changes in the rap community while she was making a name for herself. N.W.A. and other gangster rap was becoming very popular in the late eighties and early nineties, and while De La Soul and A Tribe Called Quest remained popular, their contemporaries like the Jungle Brothers and Black Sheep were finding a steady decline in their popularity. Monie's aforementioned two biggest hits are fun and memorable, but their success didn't necessarily translate into record sales. It also didn't help that the version of It's A Shame that got radio and video play was a remix not featured on the album. Worse yet, by the time Monie's second album, In A Word Or 2, was released, the movement had moved on. The addition of two songs written and produced by Prince didn't help her credibility either. It's always been hard to be a hit in the rap community when your image isn't overly commercial and you stick to your guns, and Monie is a near definitive example of this.

Despite Monie's lack of record sales (at least in the US), her debut album, Down To Earth, is a classic early nineties/late eighties hip-hop record, owing more to the light psychedelia of De La Soul and their Native Tongues cohorts as well as the British dance scene. Ultra Nate makes a vocal cameo on the house groove of Ring My Bell (not to be confused with the Fresh Prince's identically named hit single) and the production duo of Cox & Steele, best known as two-thirds of Fine Young Cannibals, wrote and produced several songs on the album including Monie In The Middle. Afrika Baby Bam also lent his hands for production duty on several tracks, including the wonky Race Against Reality. Overall, Down To Earth is a lot of fun and a very enjoyable record that doesn't take itself too seriously apart from the ridiculous Swiney Swiney, a diatribe against eating pork and blaming it for any illness Monie could come up with, or the mind-numbingly dull Ring My Bell.

Down To Earth was released in abridged form in the US, dropping a few cuts and Monie's appearance on a thoroughly unnecessary response track for FYC's She Drives Me Crazy. It makes sense that these changes were made, but it's also funny since there were good tracks left over that never saw release in the US. So, today's post is the UK edition of Monie Love's Down To Earth as issued on CoolTempo in 1990. Everything from the US edition is here, including the finale, Grandpa's Party, which had it's remix label dropped from the US release. This is truly a great but slept-on hip-hop record that deserves to be heard, so grab it and enjoy, but be leery of 1993's In A Word Or 2. Even with Marley Marl on that album's production, it just doesn't cut it.


Monie Love - Down To Earth
UPDATE: Apparently someone at the DMCA thought this out of print and legally unavailable album is a hands off item, so I have to remove the link. Sorry.


01 Monie In The Middle
Produced by Cox & Steele, additional guitar by Bootsy Collins, additional vocals by Almond Joy

02 It's A Shame (My Sister) (feat. True Image)
Produced by Cox & Steele, additional guitar by Bootsy Collins, additional vocals by True Image

03 Don't Funk Wid The Mo
Produced by Afrika Baby Bambaataa, Kevin Maxwell & Jerry Callendar

04 Ring My Bell (feat. Ultra Nate)
Produced by Richie Fermie, additional vocals by Ultra Nate

05 R U Single
Produced by Afrika Baby Bambaataa, Kevin Maxwell & Jerry Callendar

06 Just Don't Give A Damn
Produced by Afrika Baby Bambaataa, Kevin Maxwell & Jerry Callendar

07 What I'm Supposed 2 B
Produced by Jerry Callendar & Richie Fermie

08 Dettrimentally Stable
Produced by Afrika Baby Bambaataa, Kevin Maxwell & Jerry Callendar

09 Down 2 Earth
Produced by Afrika Baby Bambaataa, Kevin Maxwell & Jerry Callendar

10 I Do As I Please
Produced by Cox & Steele, additional guitar by Bootsy Collins

11 Pups Lickin' Bone
Produced by Jerry Callendar & Richie Fermie

12 Read Between The Lines
Produced by Afrika Baby Bambaataa, Kevin Maxwell & Jerry Callendar

13 Race Against Reality
Produced by Afrika Baby Bambaataa, Kevin Maxwell & Jerry Callendar

14 Swiney Swiney
Produced by Afrika Baby Bambaataa, Kevin Maxwell & Jerry Callendar, backing vocals by De La Soul

15 Give It 2 U Like This
Produced by Afrika Baby Bambaataa, Kevin Maxwell & Jerry Callendar

16 I Can Do This (Uptown Mix)
Produced by DJ Pogo & Dancin' Danny D

17 I'm Driving You Crazy
Produced by Cox & Steele

18 Grandpa's Party (Love II Love Remix)
Produced by Richie Fermie & Dancin' Danny D, all scratching by Ju Ju, Remixed by Jazzie B & Nellie Hooper


PS - In case you're wondering, Monie is still a DJ and has a show on XM called Ladies First Radio. She lives in the Philly area but doesn't host any regional shows any longer due to some controversy over an appearance with Young Jeezy on her then show several years ago. I went to look up details but only found dead links, so if you know the scoop, drop me a line in the comments. I'd love to know if she was on point or off base.

PS 2 - Funny little detail for you. The US version of Down To Earth got a parental advisory sticker despite not having the F word spoken once throughout the album. Apparently someone was upset by the content of Pups Lickin' Bone, a message to people to be careful having unprotected sex. Oddly enough, her follow-up album, despite featuring plenty of obscenities including the aforementioned F word, features no parental advisory sticker. Ridiculous.

January 2010 Mixtape: No Rights Given Or Implied (Side One)

As I stated in a prior post, this month's mixtape is essentially my private soundtrack to a project I hope to begin sometime this year. I don't mean to be a tease, but I will share information about it only when things begin moving forward. This mixtape is a little different from previous ones I've posted though, as it serves a dual purpose, the second being my want to assemble an introductory compilation to different styles of sampling and the forms of music that use it in great detail rather than the occasional soundbyte or lifting of a melody. Not to say that those uses of sampling aren't legitimate or should be considered wrong, but I'm more concerned with the creative recontextualization of previously recorded material, which means pre-existing content can be altered in such a way that it won't necessarily represent the original source recordings and in it's new form cannot be said to be overly representative of the original sources, or in layman's terms, it doesn't rip-off anything. There will probably be a second volume of this compilation, and if there is enough interest I will definitely pursue this further.

Unlike a lot of my prior mixtapes, almost everything here is sourced from a lossless recording. Because of that, I've made a point of posting this mixtape as two separate downloads in the highest quality MP3s possible. Please make sure to download both sides so you get all seventeen tracks. Side Two should be live at some point Tuesday, Wednesday morning at the latest.


The Unheard Music January 2010 Mixtape: No Rights Given Or Implied (Side One)

01 Dickie Goodman - Mr. Jaws
Dickie Goodman, along with Bill Buchanan, can safely be labeled the first artists to use sampling in popular music, although their releases are usually considered novelty recordings. Their singles featured stories where a reporter would interview an important figure (Batman, aliens, Jaws the shark, etc.) and that figure's answers would be provided via soundbytes from then popular records. Goodman and Buchanan did incur the wrath of the artists they sampled and were brought to court, but a judge decided in their favor stating it was clear the records were parodies and not taking income from the artists being sampled.

Sadly, Richard Dorian "Dickie" Goodman took his own life on November 6, 1989. He was fifty-five years old. R.I.P.


02 Negativland - I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For (1991 A Cappella Mix)
If only the world had been as kind to Negativland as they were to Goodman and Buchanan. To put it simply, U2's label, Island Records, sued Negativland for copyright infringement over their U2 EP, claiming it was an attempt to confuse customers and that it illegally sampled U2's original recording of the song in question. This is an incredible story, one that books have been written about and has been discussed in film and other outlets, so rather than rehash something in great detail that will take far longer to write then you'd probably like to read here, I'm going to direct you to the wikipedia reference for this event, as it will give you the low-down quickly and point you in the right direction if you'd like to learn more. Oh yeah, Casey Kasem sounds like a dick.


03 Girls On Top - We Don't Give A Damn About Our Friends
Richard Philips is best known as Richard X, producer and remixer for artists such as Kelis, Sugababes and Nine Inch Nails, but before becoming an in-demand producer, he released limited edition singles as Girls On Top. All the Girls On Top releases are considered mash-ups or bootlegs, tracks that combine two or more songs to create a track all it's own. While tracks that combined several songs had been around for quite a while in one form or another, Girls On Top, along with Kurtis Rush (aka Erol Alkan), The Freelance Hellraiser and others helped legitimize the trend in the early 2000s. We Don't Give A Damn About Our Friends, which combines the vocal from Adina Howard's Freak Like Me and the music from Tubeway Army's Are "Friends" Electric?, was arguably the most successful of the bootleg releases, becoming popular enough that it was re-recorded by the Sugababes using the Tubeway Army beat with Mr. X getting a production credit and a paycheck.


04 Ice Cube - Jackin' For Beats
Ice Cube isn't generally known for deep production, but this Bomb Squad produced track, recorded during the era of Cube's collaborations with Public Enemy and their production crew, is a true exception. Cube flows beautifully over a track made up of other people's beats, all the while explaining that he'll take your beat if he likes it, no matter who you are. The funny part is, despite the braggadocio, all samples were cleared on this track and the amazingly long list of credits made sure everyone involved, directly or not, got paid.

Jackin' For Beats is often looked at as the start of a trend with rappers where they take someone else's track and rap over it, most often without asking permission. Because of this, most of the tracks rarely receive official releases and are relegated to mixtape status.


05 Eric B. & Rakim - Paid In Full (Seven Minutes Of Madness)
Coldcut are the responsible parties for this classic remix, having been contacted by Eric B. & Rakim's then label, 4th & Broadway, to provide this remix. Eric and Rakim were not initially thrilled by the remix, but it's success helped to eventually change their opinions.

Coldcut started off as a hip-hop and dance-oriented production crew, creating their own cut-ups similar in style to Double Dee & Steinski's Lessons as well as club-centric records like Lisa Stansfield's People Hold On. Back in the cut-up vein here, Coldcut's 1988 remix of the Eric B. & Rakim classic introduced much of the world to the heavenly vocals of Ofra Haza and stretched the simple original well over twice it's length, all the while featuring scratches, cuts, samples from speeches and instructional records and all kinds of madness. Truly a classic in hip-hop as well as creative sampling.


06 Steinski - The Motorcade Sped On
Steve Stein, better known as Steinski of Double Dee & Steinski, gained his initial fame for the duo's groundbreaking Lessons, but afterwards went solo with the intent to release a cut-up record all about the assassination of JFK. Not the most commercially sound idea, but certainly a fascinating one, with just as fascinating a story behind it. Steinski attempted to clear the samples from CBS but was met with a cold stare, leading his label, Tommy Boy Records, to issue it as a promotional-only release. All of this led to the record gaining a reputation just as powerful as the Lessons, while being just the opposite of those three classics. Both records made you think, but rather than dance, The Motorcade Sped On made you learn and remember.


07 De La Soul - Eye Know
Not the most complex record here or the one featuring the most samples, but a great example of Prince Paul's ability to combine disparate parts and turn them into a catchy tune. From De La Soul's debut album, 3 Feet High and Rising, that album is often considered the East Coast equivalent of the Beastie Boys' West Coast classic, Paul's Boutique. Unfortunately for Paul and De La though, they were sued by classic surf-rock group, The Turtles, for a minuscule sample in a brief instrumental on the album. A hefty fee was paid, and while it's their fault for not clearing the sample, one has to wonder how opportunistic The Turtles and their lawyers were over this exceedingly small bit of music that doesn't borrow any vocals or melody from the source. Sadly, copyright law hasn't been updated to appreciate the difference between blatantly ripping something off and using it in a new context.


08 Beastie Boys - Hey Ladies
The Beasties, The Dust Brothers and Matt Dike changed the game forever with the release of Paul's Boutique. They sampled so much and in such depth that you could argue the art of sampling had met it's ultimate act of creativity. In reality it hadn't, but it was certainly a major evolutionary step. I've said far more about Paul's Boutique in previous posts so if you need more from me, please examine my earlier posts, but what you should really do is get Dan LeRoy's book all about the album's creation and, if you haven't heard it yet, go buy the album immediately! Don't hesitate, it's totally worth it!



Come back Tuesday (or early Wednesday) for Side Two!