Jeru The Damaja - Me Or The Papes

Another great Primo production. This track is definitely one of his more melodic efforts but it's still signature Premier. Other notable tracks on this album (Wrath of the Math) are 'How I'm Livin', and 'Frustrated Niggas'.

Bad Brains

I heard that Bad Brains was putting out a new album and so I thought I'd do a post about them. Bad Brains was probably the best hardcore band of all time. I condsider them to be as influential as The Clash, Ramones...all the bands that people usually cite. I've played drums in hardcore bands and it's super hard to hit the drums as hard as this guy for an entire show. This is a pretty good clip of them playing "Banned in DC". Check out their myspace for a clip of their new song which is being produced by Adam from the Beatie Boys.

Talking Heads Naive Melody

This is the best Talking Heads song there is. Check out Bernie Worrell from Parliament Funkadelic on synths in the video. Anyways...check this song and this album out.

robert wyatt shipbuilding

Robert Wyatt is amazing...This song was apparently written by Elvis Costello. If you haven't heard of Wyatt he was in the band Soft Machine and Machine Mole (Soft Machine in French). He was paralized when after a night of drinking he jumped out of a third story window. He wrote the soundtrack for the incredible film Winged Migration and did some vocals for the Bjork album Medulla. Other than this song I would highly recommend "At Last I am Free"

Don't Call it a Comeback...

Yo!
It's been a while since my last post as I haven't had very much money to go record shopping and I went on a trip to the Bahamas with my lady and her family. I'm going to try and post regularly again, starting with today's good finds.

My first stop was the Goodwill on Michigan where I found 3 Gil Scott Heron albums, a Milt Jackson Record, and a Smokey Robinson record. If you're not familiar with Gil Scott Heron, he wrote the songs "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised", "Home is where the Hatred is", and "Whitey on the Moon". It's very powerful spoken word, black nationalist kind of stuff similar to the Last Poets but not as good. Milt Jackson of course is the vibraphonist from MJQ and the album "Sunflowers" that I grabbed has a few good tracks with Billy Cobham on drums and Herbie Hancock on piano.

After I left Goodwill I hit the Community thrift on edgewater and miraculously found Wu Tang - "Enter the Wu (36 Chambers)", and Boogie Down Productions - My Philosophy (12"). It's always awesome when I find records that aren't really that old like the Wu record because they are usually in pretty good shape- unfortunately this isn't the case with this record. A few of the tracks skip a little but the rest of the albums plays straight through. The BDP record was a cool surprise because I'm a big KRS-ONE fan and that's one of the few BDP songs that I actually like alot.

Usually after these two stores I call it quits but I decided to head to the Community Thrift on Edgewater because I was having pretty good luck. At this store I found Sly and the Family Stone's - "Small Talk", which has the song "Loose Booty" that's sampled in The Beastie Boys track "Shadrach". So today was probably one of the better thrift store record shopping days I've ever had. I'll post the BDP song "My Philosophy" for everyone (the two people who might read this) to check out. Def check out the lyrics in the second verse...BDP and KRS were def at the forefront of the so called "Conscious Hip Hop" Movement.
My Philosophy - Boogie Down Productions

Party Time!

The Heptones have to be one of my favorite Reggae vocal groups. Ting a Ling is probably the best example of their vocal work, but their performance on this record is great as well. I recently aquired the album Party Time produced by Lee Perry (I've been trying to get all of the Lee Perry records produced at Black Ark). This album is great, and despite the title, most of the songs are overtly political as oppossed to the love songs on Ting a Ling. To me the standout songs are Sufferers Time, Now Generation and the Bob Dylan classic I Shall be Released. Posted below is I Shall be Released.
The Heptones – I Shall be Released

Modern Jazz Quartet

I picked these two Modern Jazz Quartet records up at a local antique shop that has about 2000 records in a back room. I actually discovered MJQ my freshman year of college when my dad started giving some of his records. I took “The Last Concert” from his collection, which is a live recording of the last show in 1974 before Milt Jackson left the band. Since taking that record, I usually buy whatever MJQ record I find if the price is right (these were 3 bucks each).
What I like about MJQ and any other jazz band with a vibraphonist, is how much more relaxed a quartet sounds with a vibraphonist instead of a sax or any other horn. A quartet sounds much more brash with a horn blazing through scales compared to the smooth, chilled out sounds of a vibraphone.
These records are both pretty decent. I don’t think either one of them compares to the album on Prestige, but they are good in their own right. I’ve posted the song “Dancing” off of plastic dreams for you to check out. Make sure listen through to the end because there’s a nice little breakdown.
MJQ - Dancing