Ghostface Killah - Twelve Reasons To Die II

ADRIAN YOUNGE PRESENTS TWELVE REASONS TO DIE II STARRING GHOSTFACE KILLAH
I kept seeing this cover everywhere on the interweb. It's obviously a homage to 70s Italian Giallo film posters and it got me intrigued so much so that I coughed up the dough to see what Ghostface Killah is up to now, plus I heard it was pretty good. The last Wu Tang Clan related release I bought was his very own Ironman from 1996 (can you believe that's 19 years ago?). I did have taped copies of Wu Tang Clan's The W and Iron Flag and those tapes were ok but they were nowhere near the magnificence of Enter The Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) from 93 and the classic run of solo LPs from 94 to 96: Method Man's Tical, Ol' Dirty Bastard's Return To The 36 Chambers, Chef Raekwon's Only Built For Cuban Lynx, Genius/GZA's Liquid Swords & the aforementioned Ghostface classic Ironman. Apparently Ghostface Killah recorded several other post-Ironman classics (during my rap blackspot era) such as Supreme Clientele (2000), Fishscale (2006) and the first volume of Twelve Reasons To Die (2013) amongst others.

I'm used to listening to modern hip-hop with its crisp drum machines, synth keys, electronic bass and general digital textures so it's weird to hear an album like this. When I first heard 12 Reasons To Die II I thought it was deep crate digging at its finest (Ala Paul's Boutique or Entroducing) with samples of Turkish psych bass lines, Allessandroni fuzz, old funk beats from obscure 45s, strange Euro easy listening, divas from Morricone/Nicolai soundtracks, scratchy dub singles, trippy Moog sounds from library records etc. So I thought it was a sampladelic record, but on about the 3rd listen when I started listening closely, it all seemed a bit too smooth and cohesive. Upon further investigation it was revealed that the backing tracks are actually all live instrumentation (I think) from retro arranger extraordinaire Adrian Younge. So Younge has replicated a sample laden hip hop album by playing all the instruments instead of sampling them. I'm not sure if there's a point to this strategy apart from the reactions 'Wow that's quite an effort!', 'Gee These are Strange days indeed!' or 'Is he following the kind of manifesto put forth by Daft Punk on Random Access Memories, whatever that was?' Anyway Adrain Younge seems to have swallowed a cool 70s pill. Several layers of retromania are at play here. Firstly we are put it in a mid 90s Wu zone with the propulsive and intense rapping of Ghostface Killah and his chums Raekwon & RZA and the return of the Tony Starks pseudonym who originally appeared on the brilliant Only Built For Cuban Linx LP. Secondly Younge's backing trax have a Finders Keepers/Lo Recordings/Now Again etc. vibe which is both 70s and post-millennial as most of us never heard this sort of shit until it got extensively reissued in the last 20 years by the likes of these and many other record labels. Thirdly it's a live instrument recording produced by a one man producer, arranger and multi-instrumentalist harking back to the days when Stevie Wonder did this kind of thing. I'm not really sure what to make of these observations. It is what it is I suppose.

Anyway when Ghostface Killah's voice appears it's like an old friend showing up like nothing's changed since the mid 90s. Raekwon is a welcome feature on five of these tunes and RZA pops up on a handful of trax too. Twelve Reasons To Die II runs at half the time of Ironman and this leaves you wanting more. Which is better than wishing a quality control editor had been employed to get rid of the filler to keep the LP more concise. I'm not really into comic books and I'm not a 100% sure what he's on about on every track but it sounds so good, what does it matter? It all adds to the Wu mystique and there are no bad tunes here. Who'd have thought Ghostface Killah would be making one of the best hip hop albums of 2015? Dunno, but he has.

Ratchet & Trap Explained

"Trap = derived from southern "gangsta" rap; particularly mid-2000s stuff like gucci mane, young jeezy, t.i. lots of intricate, rattling 808 percussion & snare sounds along with booming kick drums and bass. a lot of the original producers used a lot of big wall-of-sound, gothic sounding synths and there was a noticeable influence from electronic genres like trance and electro, but filtered through a rap production aesthetic. now a huge influence on rap, r&b and electronic music, and the production is often a lot sleeker and less bombastic."

 "Ratchet = term for the recent production style that draws on hyphy (e-40, keak da sneak, mistah fab etc), jerk music, crunk and g-funk. lots of simple rhythms, kicks and claps, squelchy synth bass. i think the term was originally used by lil boosie in Louisiana but now usually refers to west coast rap and r&b stuff like dj mustard, yg, ty dolla sign etc."

*This was left by an anonymous commenter. Thanks Anonymous I think you know your shit!

They've intermingled and cross-pollinated though haven't they and not just with each other but most other forms of 90s electronic music and some 90s rap ie. 666 Mafia, right?

Funcrusher Plus - Company Flow

HIP HOP I IGNORED PART 4

I always meant to check this album out. It was critically acclaimed but I guess I never heard it on the radio so I never got around to it. I don't really know what I was expecting as I'd forgotten what all the fuss was about. I think I was expecting some kind of futuristic hip hop informed by Autechre. God knows why. Perhaps I had them mixed up with another group. When I first put the cd in the tray I was a little daunted at the running time of 75 minutes. That's almost twice as long as Illmatic by Nas. I knew there was a white guy on the beats (El-P) and a couple of African American dudes (Big Jus & Mr Len) in the posse. This LP is not really similar to the other 3 albums in this series (Nas, Geto Boys and DJ Paul & Lord Infamous). I don't think they say 'nigga' or 'bitch' until about halfway through the record. Bewildered would be the best word to describe how I felt when it started. Thinking "Another 75 minutes of this? F*%$! What have I got myself into? Is this the underground rap that's meant to be shite?" Persevere I have. It took about ten listens to eventually start getting it. Not listening to Funcrusher Plus in it's time of release makes it hard to pinpoint innovations and where it fits. It was recorded between 95-97. Some of it is contemporaneous with Wu-Tang Clan I guess but not really a step beyond that.

1997 was a strange year for music and for me. I got off the Hardcore Continuum and pretty much missed tech-step (well the records anyway which I later returned to and now rate highly) and speed garage (I tried but...). 1997 was the year I disengaged from the rap scene as well and perhaps there was a reason for that ie. not much good rap. Which could explain why Company Flow were seen as messiahs by some. Wu-Tang Clan released a double cd which I never listened to due to its absurd length and still haven't. The last rap albums for me were Ghostface Killah's Ironman and New Kingdom's Paradise Don't Come Cheap. R&B was in its ascendancy. Timbaland, Aaliyah and Missy Elliot had arrived with The Neptunes and Destiny's Child about to enter pop culture. Germany was still where it was at with arty electronica (Mouse On Mars, Farmers Manuel, To Rococo Rot et al.), to the mellow tech sounds of Basic Channel/Chain Reaction and then onto the more extreme music from labels like Cold Rush, PCP and anything by Marc Acardipane and his several hundred monikers. Nick Cave, Spiritualised, Daft Punk, Royal Trux, Autechre and Portishead all released great LPs. Reissues were becoming more frequent with excellent re-releases from Yoko Ono, The Monks, La Dusseldorf (who I'd never heard!), Pharaoh Sanders, Lee Scratch Perry etc.

Bad Touch Example brings the bad vibes you were expecting from an album with a title like Funcrusher Plus. Haunted beats and distant horns blaze in the background while words are thrown at you at a hundred miles an hour. The best bit is when they say candyman 5 times in the mirror. Some of the references are so 90s like Maggie Simpson, Ricky Lake and Baby Jessica (did she fall down a well?). So I was thinking this LP going to be some kind of funny horrorcore lite, wrong! 8 Steps To Perfection is next and god knows what it's about. Trying to be clever but not catchy. Is that the meaning of underground rap? It's got some nice beats though with little computer game noises and a really cool atmospheric loop that sets a strange vibe. Collude/Intrude begins with distorted commands, an unbelievably funky beat, scratching and disorientating vocal effects. This tune is about some sort of science fiction military football match against a major record company. Aren't they all? Blind's got more reverbed effects. Oh....and hang on....I think they've written a hook on this line "I wanna be payed MC Beserker/Fancy tyin to eat just living". Gee this is almost pop. I'm confused by one of the other lines "Every bloodline is tainted/Signifying malignant raps/Who with bad intentions of Boogeymen and death as a source of laughter." Are they having a go at Horrorcore and Gangsta or are they talking about themselves? More importantly do I care? No. Silence has got a fabulous deep bendy bass sample, choice beats and much scratching. This could get played out on the dancefloor I reckon. Legends is more anti-major label shit. Company Flow claim their style is bizarre (usually if you have to point this out you're not) and independent as fuck (like that's supposed to be meaningful). Sonically there's a great clanky guitar/bass line and some noisy abstract samples. In the final minute it gets into some classic cacophonous scratching. Help Wanted is a sampledelic intro to Population Control with a kind of Brave New World scenario. A classic slowed down tough def jam beat is mixed with eerie samples, aquatic sounds and an off kilter piano loop which makes Population Control a backing track that could have been put together by Moon Wiring Club. The lyrics are kinda 2000AD futuristic but place the song firmly in the 90s with mentions of Bill Gates, Ted Turner and Keyser Soze. Then I'm starting to think they're homophobic with use of the term faggot in a derogatory fashion and not for the first time. Lune TNS is a tribute to graffiti artists and b-boys in NYC with a plinky plonky backing courtesy of a sample from ambient guru Steve Roach. Definitive is more anti major label shtick amongst sci-fi ideas. You get the feeling they only became indie after having major labels slam doors in their faces. Having few hooks and clunky raps would've helped those doors slam. This route to becoming indie is hardly likely to endear you to hardcore indie followers. Anyway I quite like this track with its minimal keyboard, beat, scratching and the top line 'My style Is War & Peace/You're shit is just cliff notes.' This is only halfway through this double LP.

89.9 Detrimental sounds like one minute of a rap battle that Company Flow lost. Vital Nerve features BMS as guest rapper, whoever he may be? Now this is good and the catchiest tune so far giving Raekwon and Ghostface a run for their money, at last. El-p bragging that he's been the 'nastiest MC since birth' over a stark bassline and beat. Is it too little too late though? This is followed by a sprawling epic Tragedy of war. It references Waterworld, Storm Troopers, DEA, Drug smugglers, Jackson Pollock and Watership Down? Strange beat change ups make me like this one a lot. A difficult unfunky beat begins The Fire In Which You Burn. Sitar samples add to the mess along with incoherent raps with too many words. Chorus alert! Krazy Kings has one along with some cool synth stabs. Lyrically it follows their space age hood jams template. Last Good Sleep delves into the darkness with dystopian sounds and a creepin beat. This all adds to the tale of this urban nightmare of alcohol abuse and domestic violence. Info Kill II has another dark creepin beat with terrific synth lines and is one of the more instantly likable tunes on Funcrusher Plus. This tune does actually have a 90s IDM vibe. This is the sort of track I was expecting before I ever put the record on. Hey, it only took 18 tracks to get there. Funcrush Scratch brings proceedings to a close. This is a dark scratching jam fitting with the mid/late 90s turntablism revival and Return of the DJ etc.

All in all pretty much a disappointment. I cannot believe this was so revered. Some editing would have made this an ok single LP. It's hard to imagine kids now going back to it and digging it and using it as an influence. Usually the most dumb arse shit ends up appealing to the following generations see Black Sabbath and AC/DC over Yes and ELP, Darkside over intelligent D&B etc. So I advise you to check out early to mid 90s rap from Memphis as a tonic to get over having to listen to Company Flow.
  

Come With Me 2 Hell - DJ Paul & Lord Infamous (1994)

HIP HOP I IGNORED PART 3

Come With Me To Hell wasn't hard to ignore. This was a self released tape from rappers DJ Paul and Lord Infamous (who is also The Scarecrow, I think) with production by DJ Paul and Juicy J. It was released in 1994 with no cover apparently. I found it a few years ago in MP3 form from one of those great sharity blogs like Mutant Sounds (RIP). I was unaware of its Three 6 Mafia connection until I played the first track. Triple 6 mafia get mentioned in several of the songs but I don't think they used that moniker as an artist name until the following year. In 1995 Three 6 Mafia released their now cult classic Mystic Stylez album which I didn't hear until 10 years later. I had been led to believe underground rap was shite. How wrong I was. Rap was like supposed to be the opposite to rock, you know mainstream rock (Hair Metal, Stone Temple Pilots, Nickleback) bad! But underground rock good! (The Fall, The Clean, The Smiths, Slint, Royal Trux etc.). The theory was that the good rap rises to the top and you get to hear it. Another case of don't believe the rock crit consensus. Sure some of the people involved on this recording ended up winning an Academy Award but that was after spending a long time in the rap underground.

Come With Me to Hell begins with Intro. It's psychedelic as hell with kids singing a haunting lullaby reverbed to the hilt with great horror synth and pounding drums. While the rappers tell you to "Come with me to hell." and "Triple 6 Mafia may we burn forever." This should be used as a horror film theme. 1000 Blunts puts us in typical hip hop territory. They're bragging about how much pot they've smoked ie "I think I smoked a thousand blunts." This ain't no slick Dre style production. It's very lo-fi with a little toy organ loop keeping the vibe spooky. Long & Hard is their pornographic tale of fellatio. A great crackling trumpet sample echoes throughout while a languid guitar line flows in and out of the mix. It's minimal and repetitive. Drop It Off Ya Ass dives into the criminal underbelly of hip hop. It's all Glocks, Infra red and dead cops. "Come with me to hell you little bitch and see how we live in the land of the 666." The backing track's got keyboard sounds that could be straight out of a horror flick, John Carpenter Stylee. Lick My Nuts is a reprise of Long and Hard. The title says it all really. Pass The Junt sounds so 2014 it could be DJ Mustard on the beat. It's another ode to one of hip hop's favourite pastimes smoking drugs with classic blunted horn samples that could have come from a 70s dub track.

Side 2 starts off brilliantly with some of the grimiest and most dense sampling I've ever heard. You Ain't Mad Is Ya is truly psychedelic hip hop and wouldn't sound out of place on a New Kingdom LP. "We're gonna take you deeper than 6 feet." All Dirty Hoes lays on a kind of sleazy slow jam vibe but the lyrics are no where near as romantic as the sweet sounds. 187 Invitation is a homicidal poem set to some of the coolest horror soundtrack samples you're ever likely to hear. Some of these sounds remind me of Ghostbox groups like The Focus Group and The Belbury Poly.  It's unique, no one sounded like this, that I knew of, in 94. Its Cummin is another ode to the joys of fellatio. It's quite a catchy tune but you probably don't wanna be singin this one around your mum and dad. "Try on some real nigga lip gloss." Its Cummin keeps the minimal haunted keyboard loops coming, along with scratching and the world's most raw brittle drum machine. Back Against The Wall is like an ultra violent gangster film. All hell breaks loose sonically and lyrically. In between there is almost respite with more ominous synth lines. There's a sample from Ice T's Colours which may have been a sample from a slasher movie, I'm not sure. Back Against The wall is truly terrifying and demented. Shout Outs is just that. They shout out to all their mates in Memphis while unashamedly plugging upcoming tape releases. Takin No Shorts ends the tape and it's like a whole other band with a beautiful backing track that could be off Sesame St. "Layin some pimp ass shit" 70s style. They're still rapping about motherf*%#ing guns but then they start hanging shit on rappers trying to be like Menace II Society (the 93 hood film), possibly even being a little self deprecating. This is entertainment after all.

Come With Me To Hell is an awesome journey into the early 90s Memphis tape/mixtape underground. This isn't some slick state of the art expensive studio shit. It was probably recorded in their mom's bathroom. Not many of these tracks would get you out on the dancefloor. Instead of being funky these tunes creep like a stoned stalker. DJ, Lord and Juicy don't really use overexposed breaks or cliched samples. They tore up the hip hop rule book and made a truly original masterpiece and didn't even bother with a cover! This tape sounds totally relevant and influential today. Lord Infamous died last year of a heart attack, finally in hell.

Remastered cd reissue.

Illmatic - Nas

HIP HOP I IGNORED - PART 1

Illmatic was released in 1994, a particularly fertile year for new music. This is the year two classic trip hop LPs were released Portishead's Dummy and Massive Attack's Protection. Then there were so many UK jungle trax, too numerous to mention. There was also a shitload of British experimental (dare I say Post-Rock before it became a term of derision for American noodling turds) rock happening Laika, Disco Inferno, Bark Psychosis, Stereolab, Pram, Scorn, Flying Saucer Attack, Main and O'rang. Then there was electronic and ambient music Aphex Twin's Selected Ambient Works Vol 2, the Virgin comp Isolationism, Mouse On Mars, Orbital, Autechre, Global Communication's 76.14, Paul Schutze and the list goes on. Nick Cave, Pulp, Boredoms, Peter Jefferies, Polvo, Kristen Hersh and Burzum all released classic records. Then there were the reissues on Blood & Fire Records and Esquival's Space Age Bachelor Pad Music. Plus way way more. Geez that was a good year for music. The two hip hop albums that did get my attention were The Beastie Boys Ill Communication and Snoop's Doggystyle. Along with Illmatic, I also missed Warren G's Regulate.., Jeru The Damaaja's The Sun Rises In The East, Ice Cube, PE and whoever else.

I had already heard Nas albeit without my knowledge on Live At The BBQ, a track from Main Source's classic LP from 91 Breaking Atoms. By the time of Illmatic's release in 94 he was 20 so he'd been a bit of a child prodigy. The line up of producers here was the cream of the 1994 crop. Main Source's Large Prof, Pete Rock, Q-Tip, DJ Premier and LES all had a twiddle of the knobs. This was a new era with the classic old school of PE, NWA etc. and the daisy age fading away and the beginning of Wu Tang Clan's stranglehold in the east and G funks commercial dominance. Nas's timing couldn't have been better, making the LP old school, of its time and somehow timeless all at the same time.

The album begins with the splendid trippy funk beats of The Genesis and Nas is introduced and then it's quickly into the creepin intensity of NY State Of Mind. This tune travels the decay of the NewYork underbelly with drugs, guns, crime and violence. This journey through urban hell is state of the art 94 hip hop where "The city never sleeps, it full of villains and creeps.". Life's a Bitch is a glorious ode to hedonism that features AZ guesting on vocals. This backing track is so fucking smooth with its Gap Band sample and a trumpet comin on like something from Miles Davis's Big Fun. The World Is Yours features, apart from the the usual peerless rhymes, some awesome scratching. Halftime closes side one with its mentions of Jackson 5 and watching Chips (hey I used to love that show, even had Chips pyjamas). His rhymes are astonishing as is the backing trak with its dubby horn samples floating in and out of the mix like puffs of smoke.

Side two or 41st Side South starts with Memory Lane and it's a Premier production containing a Rueben Wilson sample of We're In Love. Choice turntablism blends perfectly with this sweet soul jazz jam. One Love be a daisy age throwback and that ain't no bad thing here. This is a message to his incarcerated bros that's grasping for optimism amongst the darkness and the rhymes keep flowing like nothing before. Large Prof gives One Time 4 Your Mind  a sweet minimal mellow vibe to show off Nas's def rhymes. Represent is another snapshot of a day in the life in the projects of New York, the every day crime and casual violence of it all. Premier gives this track hypnotic psych beats that you'd be happy to keep listening to for an hour. This is the trippiest of hop. It ain't Hard To Tell closes out the album with MJ and Kool & The Gang samples. The dub inflected beatz are a heavenly haze.

At one stage on Illmatic Nas claims he has so many rhymes and its hard to disagree, they just flow and wash over you. You catch new snippets each time you listen. You could listen to this album a hundred times and still not know all the words. This is part of its charm, longevity and timelessness I guess. Illmatic only goes for 40 minutes thus there is no time to really get sick of it. Other artists at the time should have taken note of his quality control. Cds gave rise to too much wasted time and filler. Ironman by Ghostface Killah is a favourite of mine but a minute or two of editing may have had everyone thinking that was the best rap LP of all time but Illmatic is the one most often quoted as that. With a few more listens I might be sayin the same thing but probably not. He's just not mad, smooth, funny or charismatic enough for me. I would however love to hear an instrumental or dub version of Illmatic, that'd be wicked. I haven't heard other Nas records but I feel Illmatic maybe similar to Tricky's Maxinquaye. They were both debuts and both considered masterpieces. So how do you top that? Retire after your first record? Then tour it live 20 years later? That would have been cool. Rappers gotta eat though and apparently he's put out some other good records but Illmatic was always there to haunt him. Luckily now he can tour it for the 20th anniversary and probably make a small fortune. Nobody back then would have dreamt of this concept, let alone it being quite viable and even almost credible.