Lupe Fiasco - I'm Beamin' (video)

This is just one of those tracks that makes you think back to a better time, as if the first time you heard it was when some really memorable shit went down. The thoughts running through my mind? Lasers, golden era hip-hop, The Thames and making something out of my life.

Whatchu thinkin' bout?

Tone-Lōc - Lōc-ed After Dark

Being such a young artform, Hip-Hop has a tendency to forget those who paved the road. Slowly we are coming back to commemorate the first and second waves of Hip-Hop's pioneers but it seems like the mid-to-late 80s artists from the Golden Era are largely forgotten.



Tone-Lōc is one of those guys. A lot of folks don't remember Tone and many of those who do conveniently choose to forget about him. Hindsight should eventually reveal this album to be one of the classics of it's era. Tone had the voice and a smooth delivery but it doesn't stop there.



Lōc-ed After Dark (1988) featured the first hip-hop productions of the legendary Dust Brothers. Though still a far shout from the masterful sound collage they would accomplish on The Beastie Boys' "Paul's Boutique" tracks like "Wild Thing" and "Funky Cold Medina" show the seeds being planted. "Cheeba Cheeba" (which uses the now oft-used sample of Edwin Starr's great "Easin' In") was one of the first rap songs advocating marijuana use. And while I can't be sure how far the history of ghostwriting goes, this was one of the first instances in my history with Hip-Hop where I found the use of ghostwriters; in this case, Young MC (another talented westcoast MC forgotten by time).


A quick peek at Wikipedia revealed that Lōc-ed After Dark's great album cover is a remake of Donald Byrd's album cover for A New Perspective. Another fancy tidbit for the 80s babies who've been trying to forget the decade through wanton alcohol and drug experimentation: the first video below this diatribe, the clip for "Wild Thing", is a take on Robert Palmer's "Addicted To Love". I also added the video for "Funky Cold Medina"

B.o.B. Concert Stream

B.o.B. aka Bobby Ray is holding a pro bono concert tonight. If you ain't in the A-T-L to watch it, you aren't completely out of luck. He is streaming the concert on his website bobatl.com and hooking up codes for everyone to stream it, too. So yeah, I got you. 5 pm PST, 8 pm EST and 1:30 am for you London cats. Enjoy and remember...The Adventures of Bobby Ray album out on April 27th. Chea!

Also, B.o.B's mixtape May 25th is available as a FREE download from the good folks at The Aphiliates, Rebel Rock, Grand Hustle and LRG. I would link to it here but Google and Blogger are on some retarded musicblogicide so fuck that noise. Maybe if you visit 2dopeboyz.com, they might have something of interest on the sidebar or maybe you could type "B.o.B May 25th" in the site's search engine and come up with a lead but this is all just hypothetical think-out-loud stuff on my part. Really.

SEXY UPDATE: If you missed the show, you can still watch the replay through this video (starting point tagged by B.o.B. around the 37 minute mark) or at ustream.com/bobatl

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