Here’s a quick update for ya Sunday, starting w/ a song I like by Taio Cruz “She’s Like A Star”! It’s the RMX w/ Busta Rhymes, who does a nice job adding something 2 the track. In a lil bit of a rush, so also be sure 2 check out the latest from Yung Berg, Akon, & videos featuring Q-Tip, Dead Prez, & The Game! Enjoy!
FULL, CDQ, Track off upcoming album, First Love*Tibs Fav.™
Large update, starting with another nice track from up and comer R&B singer Karina Pasian! It’s a slow jam that should be on her upcoming album of the same name, in stores August 19th! More trax below feature a pretty sick beat by The Underdogs, a nice Chris Brown feature, & Mikkey Halsted ripping thru one of my all-time favorite beats (Mobb Deep - “Shook Ones Pt. 2″). Finally, a ton of videos for u 2 look at, including behind the scenes looks at music videos from CRS, Lupe Fiasco, & T.I., and a bunch of Rock The Bells interviews with all the various artists on the bill. Enjoy!
***Added some Nas performance videos from the event below!***
From Left 2 Right: Sgt. Tibs, stic.man of Dead Prez, & Max G.
Jay Electronica & Max G.
S-Preme & Max G.
Immortal Technique
Rakim
Method Man & Redman
Redman
Mos Def
Nas
A Tribe Called Quest
The 2008 Rock The Bells tour kicked off in Chicago this past Saturday on July 19th with a bevy of artists taking stage at the First Midwest Bank Ampitheatre. Artists and legends like Kidz In The Hall, Jay Electronica, Dead Prez, Immortal Technique, Rakim, De La Soul, Method Man & Redman, and Mos Def, The Pharcyde, Nas, and A Tribe Called Quest provided a concert of live, raw hip hop lasting nearly half a day! All the artists brought their own style and entertainment to the stage so there was never really a time to drift off and take a break. Some notable highlights and characteristics from the performances were the passion and clarity of the messages from Immortal Technique, the high-octane energy Method Man & Redman came with to ignite the crowd to another level (even stage-diving), Mos Def’s incredibly slick acapellas, Nas’ entire set, especially his “One Mic” finale, & finally the best moment for me - The Pharcyde performing one of my all-time favorite jams “Runnin’”, enhanced by the live energy by all four MCs and the live drums and instruments. One critique of ours was that Nas should have closed the concert because his buzz is at the highest with his recent release of Untitled and the hip hop legend had the crowd in the biggest frenzy of the night. No disrespect to A Tribe Called Quest, who were great in their own right as well, but we noticed the crowd was not as into them as they were with Nas. Again, “One Mic” was an excellent closing song to Nas’ set and would have been a perfect cap off for the entire day of real hip hop performances. We would have also liked to see artists like Dead Prez and Kidz In The Hall later on in the bill as the crowd was still filing in well into the early evening. We had a great time chillin’ with our friends, GWHH ‘Return Of The MC’ Contest winner S-Preme, and even some of the artists who were in and out of the SanDisk VIP lounge! Much love to Ronda & SanDisk for the hookups!
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Nas LIVE @ Rock The Bells Chicago (Pt. 1)
(Check for Tibs in the gray Cubs hat snappin’ some pics around 3:45!)
Nas LIVE @ Rock The Bells Chicago (Pt. 2)
(Check for Max G. & Jay Electronica with his cane around 4:30!)
This album is what hip hop is all about! It’s hard to say if it’s his strongest album, but Nas brings it once again with the NiggerUntitled album. The first thing I noticed, along with his previous LP, Hip Hop Is Dead, is that Nas adapts his masterful lyrics over a new age sound. It’s really easy to see the difference if you put in Illmatic or It Was Written after listening to Untitled, which I did over this past weekend. It just speaks to Nas’ versatility and his music today is still relevant and appealing to today’s modern ear (as evidenced with his likely #1 Billboard spot for his first week). A perfect illustration of that is through the song “America” where Nas teams up with R&B producers, StarGate, and both parties compliment each other’s style to make a beautiful track. Nas has always been considered one of the greatest lyricists and storytellers to ever grace the mic and below are a couple examples of that, including one from the aforementioned “America”.
“Love to sit in on the Senate
And tell the whole government
Y’all don’t treat women fair
She read about herself in the bible
Believing she the reason sin is here
You played her, with an apron
Like bring me my dinner, dear
She the nigger here
Ain’t we in the free world?
Death penalty in Texas kill young boys and girls
Barbarity, I’m in the double-R casually
Bugging how I made it out the hood, dazzle me
How far we really from third world savagery?
When the empire fall, imagine how crazy that’ll be..”
- Nas “America”
“My father was not a banker
Neither was my neighbor when it came to getting paper
Who the hell was gonna train us?
A pressure couldn’t escape us through the ages
We changed the basis of derogatory phrases
And I say its quite amazing
The use of ghetto terms developed our own language
No matter where it came from
It’s celebrated; now people are mad if they ain’t one”
- Nas “Y’all My Niggas”
As you can see, Nas has the complete lyrical package, combining intricate wordplay with relevant social commentary. The topics vary throughout on songs like “Sly Fox”, “Untitled”, & even the lead single “Hero” f/ Keri Hilson, just to name a few. He matches the top-notch lyricism with the flow of a superstar and what even further stands Nas out about the rest, is his ability to hit your ear on first listen with such captivating lyrics in the verses. It’s usually the chorus that strikes a chord on the first listen, but Nas is one of the rare artists that captures me more on his verses. That being said, it is the chorus’ in general that I feel hold the album back a little bit (along with a couple “ehhh” beats.. Ex: “Sly Fox” has grown on me negatively because of the beat..). Some of the chorus’ could be a lil’ catchier, not radio-friendly exactly since that’s not Nas’ true style, but just to the point that some songs can have a greater lasting appeal. Instead, I’ll skip a few tracks unless I have the goal of listening to the entire album all the way through or mindlessly keep the playlist on as background music at the laptop. Nas consistently brings it lyrically throughout the album and was close to a perfect 10 in the lyrics category had he blown me away like he does in the examples above for the entire album. Nas could have spit over a 3rd grader’s beats for the entire album and it would still be a MUST-BUY! Instead, Nas dipped into a variety of fresh producers including the aforementioned StarGate, Mark Ronson, stic.man of Dead Prez, & Jay Electronica to name a few. So if you haven’t yet copped Untitled and you are a hip hop fan, then stop what you’re doing and get to a store and buy the album, or simply CLICK HERE!
04. Hero f/ Keri Hilson (Prod. by Polow Da Don) *Tibs Fav.
05. Black President (Prod. By DJ Green Lantern) *Tibs Fav.
06. Association f/ Stic Man (Of Dead Prez) (Prod. By Stic Man) *Tibs Fav.
07. Legendary (Mike Tyson) (Prod. by Salaam Remi) *Tibs Fav.
08. Ghetto RMX f/ Joell Ortiz (Prod. by DJ Green Lantern)
09. Seen It All (Green Mix)
10. Esco Let’s Go (Prod by DJ Khallil)
11. N.I.G.G.E.R. (Slave and Master) (Prod by DJ Toomp) *Tibs Fav.
12. Be A Nigger Too RMX f/ Dante Hawkins (Prod. by DJ Green Lantern) *Tibs Fav.
13. Surviving The Times (Original Cool and Dre Version) *Tibs Fav.
14. Nas Timeline - Mixed by Statik Selektah (Nararated by Nas) *Tibs Fav.
15. Outro f/ Richard Pryor
Nas “Be A Nigger Too”
VIDEO PREMIERE!
Above is all NEW Nas for ya - the long awaited mixtape, The Nigger Tape, with DJ Green Lantern AND the VIDEO PREMIERE of “Be A Nigger Too”. It’s impossible 2 go through and listen and hear Nas without him stirring some thoughts and emotions in you and I think he proves it once again with this mixtape (STILL bumpin’ “Hero” and will be for awhile..!), setting the stage for his album, tentatively titled Nas, in stores July 15th! Below are a couple solid trax from N*E*R*D (another bonus track… Seeing Sounds in stores 2morrow!) and One Chance! Enjoy!
On May 14th at the Canopy Club in (Urbana, IL) DJ Belly & DJ Bozak will be hosting a a show/party featuring performances from MoherLess(Springfield) Jonah(Urbana) Cornbread (Urbana) 9th Degree, and Harsh (Urbana) who are some of the most talented MCs in the area. The tracks above are a remix EP of some random remixes of some classic hip hop tracks that DJ Belly has put together! May 14th, doors open at 9pm. Come out for a night full of the best underground hip hop spinned by DJ Belly and DJ Bozak. Only $3 for 4 nominees for Local Music Awards in 1 night?!! come on, you know it’ll be dope…So if you’re in the area next Wednesday be sure to come out for the hip hop event of the year!
“I really think the hip hop scene in the town really needs a night like that for everyone to come together and realize the talent and work everyone does for it on their own and come together and meet and share resources. It will also give the fans of good hip hop in this town somewhere to go to listen to GOOD hip hop music on a regular basis”. - DJ Belly
Producer: Fabrizio Sotti - FULL, CDQ, Track off 2006 album, Confidential*Tibs Fav.
Old School Sundays, happenin kinda late I know, but it’s up with a MUST-DOWNLOAD hip hop track above! The mainstream hip hop fans might not be familiar with the hip hop duo Dead Prez, but they are well-respected throughout hip hop and the track above is by 1/2 of the duo M-1 with guest verses and vocals from K’naan & Stori James. The track came out in 2006 and I was actually introduced to it on the NBA Live 07 soundtrack, haha. But it is a great track that was one of my Tibs Favs Of 2006! I just love the message and the awesome chorus in this song and all you hip hop fans gotta DL this great example of good hip hop!
Below is a video that my roomy and his buddies made back in the summer of last year as they wrote a ridiculous rap song for the fun of it. Haha, it’s got some hilarious one-liners and u should def check it out. Below that, we flip from Old School 2 New School as Estelle hits us with another hot track f/ Cee-Lo of Gnarls Barkley and Chingy & Bobby Valentino’s new collaboration hit the States from the Japanese version of Chingy’s album, Hate It Or Love It! Enjoy!
Taio Cruz “She’s Like A Star RMX” f/ Busta Rhymes & Sugababes - MORE
