Album of the Day: Flash Bang Grenada - 10 Haters

A collaboration between Busdriver and Nocando. The last song that I know of that they did together was 'Least Favorite Rapper' from Jhelli Beam, but that's by no means a precursor for what's going on here. I swear, if they're voices weren't different, I would think that these two were just one person on a continuous flow, they play off of each other so smoothly and seamlessly. The beats beat you over the head, and most of the lyrics take a couple of listens just to comprehend, but when you do, it's amazing. I'm actually surprised, because Busdriver is one of those rappers whose songs I could listen to ten times in a row, and still not get even half of what I'm listening to. 'Beat My Bitch,' an awesome song to begin with, ends with a pure, no beats flow by Busdriver that just blew my mind. 'Aphrodite' features confusingly straightforward lyrics, with each rapper waxing poetic about women and love (although Busdriver still manages to mix in a little of the weird - “Bringing home niggas that made your legal guardians scream/And they followed you but there's a lump in your breast/You're young and distressed cause they want you to come and undress/But you're like 'nah' on the hundredth request/Well I'm sending you advice to have hummus and crepes”), which would be really heartfelt if not for the heavy bass line that runs throughout. 'In a Perfect World' shows off their self awareness (“I'm the shit/In a perfect world/I'm independently wealthy/In a perfect world.” Also“Mrs. Obama keeps it shaved but what's a world without a Bush?” There's really no reason to include that, other than I think it's funny.). 'Hyperbolic' uses similar elements, playing off of the seriousness of disses and battle raps, which was great, but then Del tha Funky Homosapien appears and rips off a ridiculous verse and just puts the song over the top, as they feed off each other's verses like basketball players throwing up lobs. They play off one another, while at the same time trying to one up each other, and you can just tell that this a fun project, rather than a forced one. It's an interesting mix: Nocando flows continuously, and Busdriver uses his usual “crazy verse-hook-crazy verse” format, and each blends their style with the other. It descends into dubstep territory at times, with tracks like 'Moisturizer,' but I really don't mind here. I rocked out for a good 45 minutes here. Nocando provides an amazing flow, and Busdriver brings his trademark off-the-wall, 90 miles an hour lyrics and nasal voice. I am seriously angry at myself for not having heard about this sooner. 

 

Album of the Day: Freddie Hubbard - A Little Night Music

I found this record for $3 in a music store, and I have to say, that's some pretty drastic undervaluing. 'Bird Like,' true to Freddie Hubbard's style, the trumpet is lively and energetic, especially given that it's a live performance, and the pianist does a masterful job at keeping pace. 'Sky Dive,' which is split into two sides across both sides for some reason, is much more laid back. The trumpet is accompanied by a beautifully played saxophone, and the drums are set farther to the back of the soundstage. Partway through 'Part 2,' the pace picks up, the energy is palpable, and the drummer reasserts himself into the piece. The ebb and flow of pace here is really amazing. The final song, 'The Intrepid Fox,' was featured on “Red Clay,” one of my favorite jazz albums ever. It feels just the least bit out of place here, but it's still a Freddie Hubbard piece, which means it's still fantastic and energetic, and the drum solo at the end is nothing short of excellent.

Album of the Day: Edan - Primitive Plus

Now THIS is how you work a turntable. It's a true one-man hip-hop album: he provides his own beats and works the mic like a pro. If this were released just as the instrumentals or a cappellas, it would still arguably be better than the majority of albums in my collection. Full of old-school hip-hop beats, jazz samples, and rhymes that are ridiculously on point (think Eyedea mixed with Blueprint, yet somehow different), this is exactly the type of album you should take a listen to if you want to experience fundamentals worked to perfection. This could easily have been produced in 2009 or 1989, it would have fit in either era. This is mind-bogglingly awesome. It's sort of like watching a Falcons game over the last couple of years: everything is fundamentally sound, and more or less the way the game is supposed to be played, and that's what is most impressive, not the flashiness or any kind of style points. Every aspect, (nearly) every song is solid, but none are heads-above fantastic (except for perhaps the title track, that one is just a fantastic display of lyrical ability). That is honestly the only criticism I can muster here. The only song that I didn't really like was 'Run That Shit,' which was relatively crude and felt totally out of place with the rest of the album. The title track made me pause the CD and catch my breath, it was that good. Edan, to me, is easily on the level of Peanut Butter Wolf and Madlib when it comes to instrumentals, but is a better rhymer than either, which makes it that much more impressive.

Album of the Day: Peter the Chemist Meets The Mad Professor - In the Revolt of the Slave

A set of reggae remixes, with just a tinge of electronic sampling and altering mixed in. These are my favorite kind: not the “turn the original content on its ear and change it into something new” variety of mixes, but simply a re-imagining of familiar content/concepts. Without ever having heard the original pieces that this is based on, I can still get a feel for what it used to be almost as clearly as what it has become, which makes for a phenomenally interesting listen. Some songs are more clearly experimented with, like 'Revolt of the Slave,' with its reverbs and electric percussion interspersed, but for the majority I get the feeling of the original (again, without necessarily having heard it, though some sound vaguely familiar), but changed enough that the mixer's presence is clearly felt and differentiated. I'm still in relatively unfamiliar territory when it comes to listening to reggae, but if this is what I can expect in the future, I look forward to more.

Oh yeah, minor sub-note: it also just sounds good.

Album of the Day: Sun Ra - Lanquidity

I don't get the chance to listen to a lot of Sun Ra, mostly because his CD's are ridiculously expensive, and, at times, hard to find. The title track is a good prelude of the remaining songs to come, a slow, mournful, unchanging melody, above which rises a shift between trumpets and horns, and, rising even above this, Sun Ra's piano. 'Where Pathways Meet' has clear funk influences, especially the trumpet and bass. The piano almost gets lost amid the forcefulness of the trumpet, but its presence is felt just enough to influence the rest of the song. 'That's How I Feel' has a more rhythmic feel to it, and is as smooth as can be, though the percussion section can at times be just a bit jarring. The percussion is a lot more smooth and “cooperative” in 'Twin Stars of Thence,' but the trumpet quasi-solo towards the end is what really stands out to me. 'There Are Other Worlds (They Have Not Told You Of),' the only track featuring vocals (which are ten different kinds of creepy, to the point of almost making my skin crawl, with its stereophonic whispering), starts of slowly, with a creepy melody that reminds me of how people thought of outer space a generation or two ago (the album dates to 1978), or of “The Twilight Zone.” Overall, this album is a bit perplexing: there are clear funk and blues influences interspersed throughout each song, yet it somehow manages to incorporate these elements while maintaining the same, seemingly simple melody over the course of each song. Long story short: nothing is normal. It kept me thinking long after it ended.

Album of the Day: Soulive - Up Here

I bought the vinyl, mostly because the album art was pretty. There is a lot of live instrumentation here, which you don't hear very often anymore. 'Too Much' would fit right in on an Aloe Blacc album, with its soul rhythms and socially conscious (as much as I hate the term) lyrics. 'PJ's' slows the tempo down considerably in comparison to the rest of the album, with a nice, slow blues beat that provides a fantastic contrast to the other songs here, and the album ends with a great cover of 'Prototype.' Now that I think of it, I don't think I can name a single funk artist/album from the last decade without the help of Google. In that regard, I enjoyed this simply because of the novelty: what happens when you take a decades-old (but still fantastic) genre and infuse it with a bit more of a modern style? The answer, it seems, is a set of music that leans more heavily toward the old school than the new, but has a few quirks thrown in, such as prominent electric guitar rhythms ('The Swamp', 'Backwards Jack'), and relatively shorter songs, at least for instrumentals. 

Album of the Day: Jonti - Sine & Moon

The first 2012 release in my collection, free courtesy of Stones Throw. The album starts off with a nice, relaxing ukelele semi-instrumental, then moves on to the meat of the content from there. Immediately I was reminded of Strong Arm Steady mixed with the soundtrack to Portal 2, but this is another Stones Throw album, so that's not entirely surprising. To describe it in a word (or two): laid-back. The beats don't beat you over the head with their forcefulness, they, at least for me, are simply good head nodding music, which is by no means a negative description. Too often beat makers try too hard to incorporate a ton of moving parts into one piece, and the whole thing ends up being jumbled and incoherent at times (I have a certain artist in mind). I like that the focus is more on incorporating a few elements, especially nice ambient waves and strings that waft in and out of the music, and build from there, rather than throwing the whole kitchen sink at you all at once. I'm also not a huge fan of heavy bass, and the somewhat subdued low ends here shift the focus to some of the more interesting stuff on the other areas of the spectrum. This is particularly good because when the bass is used, such as in 'By This Shore,' it's noticeable and meaningful, and adds weight, which I believe is what the low end should be used for anyway, rather than as a means of creating a melody within itself. This is all genre-dependent, though, as in a lot of rap the bass is rightfully the backbone of the beat, although whether the lyrics they support are worth supporting is another issue entirely. In addition to the nice chillout beats, there are some that venture closer to rock territory, like 'Young Wildebeest,' and to a lesser extent 'Lost Machines,' the full-on electronic style of 'Sugar High,' to the almost tropical feeling of 'Lovers Stone (Alternate Passaros).' For under 40 minutes, there is a ton of content and variety packed in.