Here's a round up of US hip hop mixtapes that I penned for today's Metro. I can't recommend the Jazzy Jeff/Mick Boogie mixtape enough. It's done the rounds of my friends, and their friends, and their friends, and it's a unanimous WIN.
MUSIC EXTRA
US MIXTAPES
DJ Jazzy Jeff & Mick Boogie: Summertime
Undrcrwn/MTVN
Asher Roth & DJ Wreckineyez: Seared Foie Gras
Schoolboy
Das Racist: Shut Up, Dude
Mishka/Greedhead Entertainment
The Hood Internet: The Trillwave
Mishka
There’s something about summer that suits hip-hop mixtapes, maybe it’s summer’s fun, carefree spirit or barbecues needing a soundtrack as this selection of free downloadable mixtapes, highlights.
Ohio mixtape maestro Mick ‘The Commissioner’ Boogie and exalted DJ/producer Jazzy Jeff’s Summertime (www.undrcrwn.com/summertime) is a 70-minute, 49-track mixtape encompassing blissful hip-hop, sweltering soul, lazy funk and sultry R&B.
Opening with original songs sampled in hip hop anthems (the psych-funk of Quincy Jones’ Summer In The City is the basis of Pharcyde’s Passin Me By), Summertime revisits vintage hip hop including Ice Cube’s languid g-funk, A Tribe Called Quest’s bright and breezy jazz-rap, and Black Moon’s combo of dreamy production and punchy rhymes. Seductive R&B (Montell Jordan, Jodeci), iconic soul (Dionne Warwick, Maze), and early- Michael Jackson, melt into the heady mix. Summertime’s nostalgic but so is summer, it’s also edutaining, brimming with timeless music and shows hip-hop’s golden age was built on sturdy foundations provided by the 24-carat era of American black music that came before it.
Hip-hop freshman Asher Roth revels in his outsider status as a ‘burb-raised, graduate rapper. Roth’s Seared Foie Gras mixtape with DJ Wreckineyez (asherrothmusic.com/#/exclusive) consolidates his wisecracking, prep-rap persona, as he takes on instrumentals by Madlib, RZA, Pharrell, J Dilla and Just Blaze, and veers between deadpan funnyman, and insightful analyzer: Con-Fid-ence switches from eulogizing getting high to achieving goals to celebrating humanity as one. SFG shows how mixtapes can offer more of an appreciation of an MC’s character and prowess than a commercial release, and shows off a witty, accomplished MC, with a broad frame of reference (James and The Giant Peach, Buddha, Dr Octagon). However, it seems Asher’s caught between being the hip-hop boffin and playing the class joker – he is, of course, more than capable of balancing both.
Brooklyn trio Das Racist, Himanshu Suri, Victor Vazquez and Ashok Kondabolu, has stirred the Stateside music press and bloggers-nest with hipster dude-rap (breakout hit Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell, is two stoners shouting, ‘I’m at the Pizza Hut’ ‘I’m at the Taco Bell’). Debut mixtape, Shut Up, Dude, (dasracist.net) is a curious blend of more brainless rap (Chicken & Meat), commentary disguised as torrents of consciousness and genuinely funny efforts such as Fake Patois, highlighting affected Jamaican accents from Jay Z to Jim Carrey. Das Racist’s frame of reference is far broader than most hip-hop thanks to their Indian and Cuban/Italian heritage – they must surely be the only rappers to reference Nehru, Gandhi, Maya Angelou, MoMA and rapper Bow Wow in a single (Hugo Chavez)? The debate as to whether Das Racist is ‘retardo’ (their own words), a joke or something more meaningful continues to rage…
The Trillwave (www.thehoodinternet.com) is a 25-track strong, hour mixtape of subtle, considered mash ups. As with most mash ups, there’s no middle ground, it’s either a fail or works spectacularly well: Southern rapper Mike Jones’ slurry drawl strangely suits Air’s soporific La Femme D’Argent, Ice Cube meets Ibiza as It Was A Good Day is spliced with CFCF’s spaced out Balearica, and Gucci Mane’s bling-thug style fits Lindstrom and Christabelle’s glossy disco. Alt.rapper DOOM’s macabre tale of falling for a girl missing a chromosome to an eerie Flaming Lips backdrop, and conscious hip-hop saviour Jay Electronica’s thoughtful reflections dovetail with Toro Y Mos’ floaty hip-hoptronica, open up a world of possibilities. In this age of unusual collaborations and crossovers, perhaps these combinations aren’t so far fetched.
