We tapped a lot of people to talk about their favorite beats for last year’s colossal year-end Beat Drop, but I was especially excited to get Paul White’s picks. The largely overlooked British Dilla disciple was sure to pick something mind-blowing. His five picks were Georgia Anne Muldrow’s “Language of the Flame,” a vinyl-only Madlib Medicine Show beat that we couldn’t even find, a funky offering from the Dilla Donut Shop EP, and two unreleased tracks that Alex Chase of One-Handed Music was nice enough to provide.
Of the two unreleased tracks, “Syncro System” by Mo Kolours was the one that piqued my curiosity. The half-Mauritian singer/percussionist has a tropical, handmade funk. His debut release EP1: Drum Talking draws upon the the sega music of Mauritius and the single “Biddies” matches garbled chants with a soothing bassline and Kolours’ airy singing. Listen and escape your modern life for a few minutes.
ML: When was the last time you saw Prodigy and how is he doing?
Havoc: I seen Prodigy about two weeks ago and he’s doing real good.
ML: How do you think he’s going to sound when he comes out?
Havoc: I think he’s gonna come out sounding hungrier than ever.
ML: Do you have any concrete plans yet?
Havoc: Nothing concrete, but I can tell you one thing for sure, when he get out, we definitely gonna be working on the Mobb Deep album.
Time to check in with our old friend, New York hip-hop. Boom bap luminary Large Professor is back with an album with Neek the Exotic called Still on the Hustle. The title track is strictly for those who crave beats lacking synthesizers and don’t mind rhymes we’ve heard a million times already.
Valentine a hopeful pop superstar from Ukraine reaches out to mega-producer Timbaland via the youtubes.
The result is.. well, let’s just say I haven’t laughed this hysterically in a while. I really hope Timbaland reaches out to dude, to make meme worthy music.
Note: My mom sent me this video, thanks Mom! (she won’t see this, I make sure ML is blocked on her home network)
Alabama duo Untamed dropped Street Solid last year and it was straight beatdowns, albeit more measured and less repetitive than what you get from today’s trap rap stalwarts. “Do It Till You Feel Good” trades violence for sex with fuzzy handclaps, 80s keys, and nasty bars.
So far, Chico 2Triple is three for three on beat selection. “6 Year Grudge,”“Re-Up” and now “Grind Season” all seriously knock. His upcoming tape Home Coming could be a sleeper hit.
Time for some confessions. “My Life” by Von Pea wasn’t really “a bone-chilling hip-hop bildungsroman” produced by 9th Wonder. It was Von dumbing out over “Gettin’ Jiggy Wit It.” And DB49’s “Death & Resurrection” was actually a parody of “All of the Lights” about lite beers. April Fools. Admit it, we got you.
But this amazing day isn’t over yet. We’ve saved the best for last: an exclusive remix of Will Smith’s “Men In Black” by DJ Burn One. One day, when Burn One is mentioned in the same breath as Organized Noize and Pimp C, this track will become the stuff of hip-hop folklore, like Biggie’s Pepsi freestyle or the Lootpack’s Toyota commercial. And maybe, just maybe, people will remember that Metal Lungies had something to do with it.
Hopefully you’re up on Huntsville hip-hop by now. G-Side has one of the best albums of the year so far with The ONE…COHESIVE, which features the eye-watering production of Block Beattaz. But the Slow Motion Soundz crew is just getting started.
The new single from DB49, provided exclusively to Metal Lungies by SMS Director of Marketing Codie G, will crack pavement, shatter windows, and uproot redwoods. Kristmas and Bentley contemplate mortality and existence with the backing of the most far-reaching Block Beattaz production yet. CP and Mali Boi match Ahmad Jamal’s “Death & Resurrection” with cataclysmic bass — you will feel like twenty rhinoceroses and twenty elephants are battling in your backyard.
