ChrisCo x Reks x Termanology - "Treez"

Many might remember California's ChrisCo for his freEP with Alchemist last year, "How Does It Feel?". Now, he's preparing his next project, a mixtape titled "Green x Purple" that will be available for free download sometime next week. For the first single, he enlists Reks and Termanology for a blunted weed anthem produced by The Academy, effectively named "Treez".

CHRISCO x REKS x TERMANOLOGY - "TREEZ"

[VIDEO] Rome Clientel - "Enter The Catacombs"

The opening track to Rome Clientel's slamming free release "The Empire: The Lost Catacombs" gets the visual treatment, directed, shot and edited by Brandon Cooklin. Word is that Rome is nearing completion of his follow-up release "The Empire: The Battlegrounds". Real hip-hop is alive and well in 2012!

[VIDEO] DJ Premier / Bumpy Knuckles - "B.A.P."

If you for some reason only plan on buying something like three albums this year, DJ Premier and Fredie Foxxx's rugged "Kolexxxion" should undoubtedly be one of them. 17 tracks deep, the LP is filled with hardcore battle rhymes, booming street beats and ridiciolous turntable work; truly vintage hip-hop shit in other words. The single "B.A.P. (Bumpy And Premier)"'s been out for a while now, but the first official video for the project, which is now available on vinyl, CD and digital, are finally up on The Tube. Gracie Records will even be releasing 2xLP sets of the instrumentals and the accapellas, respectively.

AFS 201-973 x PERCEE P - "Stay Focused"

The artist with the somewhat unusual name, AFS 201-973, is soon set to release his sixth album "The Slum Lord Project". Guestvfeatures will include The Rhyme Inspector Percee P, Pace Won, Serius Jones and U.G.G. to name a few. The rugged album single, "Stay Focused", actually features a impeccable Percee P verse over an equally fat beat provided by Beat Bop Scholar (p/k/a known as Thomas V). Video directed by Dru Peebles & The Cheddar Gettas. 

In further Percee P news, associate Beat Bop Scholar recently revealed that The Rhyme Inspector is currently working on a full-length album with none other than D.I.T.C.'s Diamond D. This is great news, not only bc Diamond is one of my favorites, but because Percee P fans have basically been fiending for a BX boom bap sounding solo joint since he appeared on classics like "Yes You May" and "Kicking Flavor With Man". Shouts to Thomas V for the info.

Joey Bada$$ - "Funky Ho'$" [prod. LORD FINESSE]

Brooklyn representative Joey Bada$$ is only seventeen years old, but is most def a promising cat whose love for the golden era hip-hop shine through. His debut mixtape is titled "1999" and features, amongst other styles, mellow, jazz-infected sample based music, full of heavy basslines and Fender Rhodes melodies. The latest single from the young emcee is produced by none other than Lord Finesse, and is titled "Funky Ho's". Check the single out below, and grab the full mixtape via DatPiff , which also features Joey going in over beats by Statik Selektah, MF DOOM, Lewis Parker and some classic Dilla. Don't sleep!

JOEY BADA$$ - "FUNKY HO'S"

KARRiEM RiGGiNS - "Karriem Produced This"

If you don't know the name Karriem Riggins, you definitely need to do your homework ASAP. Next to ?uestlove, he might just be the sharpest live drummer around; playing drums for countless classic jazz and hip-hop artist; Hank Jones, Oscar Peterson, Milt Jackson, Ron Carter, Donald Byrd and even recently backed up piano king Herbie Hancock on his terrific performance during last year's Elvis  Cosstello show. As if that wasn't enough, Riggin's is also a more than capable producer, having laced some mind blowing gems on his MPC; hitting up the likes of Common, The Roots, eLzhi, Phat Kat and Erykah Badu, just to name a few.

Most heads might know him for is his close relationship with the late, great James Yancey, a.k.a. J Dilla, a.k.a. Jay Dee. With both being Detroit, Michigan natives, both Karriem and Yancey have told stories about friendly competition in creating beats, trying to outshine eachother. Riggins' is also one of few producers to have caught placements on JD albums throughout the years. Matter of fact, my introfuction to him was the heavy hitter "The Clapper", the sole outside production on Jay Dee's unbeliavable 2001 debut, "Welcome 2 Detroit". He continued producing and playing drums on various Slum Village records, guest produced a Dilla solo for his unreleased MCA debut a year later. The real proof of the Dilla estate's trust in Karriem Riggins' came when James Yancey tragically passed away as a result of a long fight with lupus and a rare blood disease. For years, he had been working on his second vocal album, "The Shining" which according to those involved was about 75% completed at the time of Yancey's passing. Ma Dukes entrusted Riggins' to complete and finalize the album which eventually was released as a full-length LP in August 2006. 

At the moment the producer is signed to the always trustworthy Stones Throw Records, and is one half of the duo Supreme Team together with Madlib. Stones Throw's latest free podcast is dedicated to the way too often overlooked Detroit producer/drummer, in preparation for his upcoming solo album on the label - "Alone Together". Mixed and prouced by K. Riggins, the podcast can be listened to in its entirety free of charge via iTunes, so what are you waiting for?!

KARiEM RiGGiNS - "RiGGiNS PRODUED THAT"

NEW Killah Priest / Shabazz / Agallah / Dr. Zodiak

A good posse cut has been one of the epitome's of hip-hop music since Marley Marl and The Juice Crew shocked the world with the immortal masterpiece, "The Symphony". Throughout the years we've been getting plenty of amazing joints of that nature, and one of the latest features two of my favorite rhymers - Killah Priest and Shabazz The Disciple - who is here joined by Agallah The Don Bishop and Dr. Zoiak. The track title is "After the Rapture" and is filled with inspiring verses and terrific production filled with soul samples. Please drop a comment on who you felt have the strongest verse on this headbanger. Thx to FeLo from Wu-Corp for the heads up!

[Video] ASN / Mike Bishop - "24 Six"

ASN is an underground emcee from Boston, known for his sick flow and topics that extendeds beyond the typical guns, violence, bling bling and braggadocio. The single "24 Six" is produced by Mike Bishop who also makes a vocal apperance on the song. Next in line for ASN is a collaboration with Smif-N-Wessun that will appear on the highly anticipated "On The Verge" mixtape, hosted by J-Love, so be on the lookout for that.

GFK / RAEKWON - "Bulletproof Wallets" [c7 Revisit]

Real Wu-Tang heads know that the final retail version of Ghostface Killah's final album for Epic Records, "Bulletproof Wallets", had little to do with how the project originally was conceived. Label policts, sample clearance problems and even lost sample sources transformed what could have been GFK's third classic LP into a rather mediocre affair; even prompting the emcee to leave the label before his contract was even fullfiled. When it was first released in November 2001, I bought the album but the tracklist on the back cover was a far cry from what was actual on the disc. In fact, this "bogus" tracklist is much more representative of what GFK originally intended. A while ago, I got more or less obsessed with the way Ghost had intened his ill-fated third LP, going over singles, rare promo vinyls, the "original" tracklist on the retail cover, interviews and other sources. I eventually think I came very close to what Ghost originally had in mind, and since then I have never played the retail album again. The original link I posted a while back, has been deleted, and due to heavy demand on a re-up; once again, I present to y'all one of my favorite The Lost Tapes compilations/alt. versions.

Maybe Ghostface nr. #1 masterpiece; the preceeding "Supreme Clientele", was hailed everywhere as a true return to form for the Wu-Tang Clan and their solo releases. It was not fully produced by The RZA, but instead RZA and GFK, who received beats from the likes of Allah Mathematics, Carlos Broady and JuJu to name a few, but the two arranged, co-produced and executive produced all songs on the project to give it a cohessive sound. The same formula was used for "B.P.W.", RZA produced about five beats but he and Ghost picked out and arranged beats by Allah Mathematics, Davel 'Bo' McKenzie, Alchemist, Carlos Broady, and Digga. Some interesting trivia is that the recording sessions fully took place in Miami, featured Chef Raekwon heavily and was even conceived as a sequel to "Cuban Linx...". Maybe due to the warm Miami surroundings, the music recorded ended up a bit warmer and toned down than its original predecessor; needless to say the title was changed to "Bulletproof Wallets". On the original version that I preseent here, Raekwon was however still featured heavily, sometimes spitting full 16:s, i some cases a few short bars and sometimes only a hook or intro. 

The album Ghost handed in to Epic in the beginning of 2001 was the perfect follow-up to "Ironman" and "Supreme Clientele". Ghost proved once again that he was one of the absolute top emcees in the game; RZA's production and arrangements were straight up incredible, and it was great to hear Raekwon and GFK back together. Unfortunately, Epic Records managed to fuck up the album quite heavily, switching the track sequencing, and completely deleting some of the highlights like "The Sun" (which Coles recently revealed had to be deleted since RZA couldn't find the original record he had sampled), the memorable concept joint "The Watch", Digga's TV-show theme sampling "Good Times" and replaced the RZA's feel-good track "Flowers" with an almost unlistenable watered down version. The result was that the cohessiveness and album flow was completely destroyed.

So, if you are one of the people that were strongly dissapointed in GFK's third opus, make sure to listen to this from front-to-back. Even if you heard many of the songs before, the sequencing here really adds to the overall experience. One more thing; the outro "Street Chemistry" I believe was a last minute addition, so it's a big possibility that this would not have appeared on the intended version; all tracklists and promos I've seen end with "Strawberry". But it's such a dope jam, and is a great album closer but if you want to keep it 100% let the album end after track #16. Oh well, enough talk, so enjoy, turn it up and WU-TANG for life!

EDIT: Some have suggested that the version of "Flowers" included here shows up as corrupted when unpacking the .RAR file, if that's the case, grab it here.

01. "The Sun" (Ft. Raekwon, Slick Rick & RZA)

02. "Never Be The Same Again" (Ft. Raekwon & Carl Thomas)

03. "The Forrest"

04. "Theodore" (Ft. Trife & Twiz)

05. "Interlude #1" (Ft. Raekwon)

06. "Flowers" (Ft. Raekwon, Method Man & Superb)

07. "Ghost Showers"

08. "Maxine" (Ft. Raekwon)

      "The Watch" (Ft. Raekwon)

09. "Walking Through The Darkness" (Ft. Tekitha)

10. "Interlude #2: ICE"

11. "Teddy Skit"

12. "Jealousy"

13. "The Juks" (Ft. Trife & Superb)

14. "The Hilton" (Ft. Raekwon)

15. "Good Times" (Ft. Raekwon & Superb)

16. "Strawberry" (Ft. Killa Sin)

17. "Street Chemistry" (Ft. Prodigal Sunn & Trife)  [*]

GFK Ft. Raekwon - "BULLETPROOF WALLETS"

GIBBS & MADLIB - "Shame"

Super producer Madlib from Oxnard, California is one of the most prolific and original beatmakers in the industry, and when there's a new 'Lib release on the table you never know what you're gonna get. Emcee Freddie Gibbs is one of the most interesting rhymers out there at the moment, so a collaboration between the two should by all acounts be dope as hell. This was more than proven with their Stones Throw debut 12", "Thuggin'", released a couple months back.

Now it's time again, as the dynamic duo is bringing out their second Stones Throw EP, "Shame". The songs pretty much picks up where they left off last time, with Gibbs weaving a vivid gangsta story of a one night stand, while The Beat Konducta hooks up a soulful track filled with mesmerizing vocal samples, vibes and the usual tight drum game. The joint also features vocals by crooner BJ The Chicago Kid which fits the song perfectly. The B-side, "Killer", sees Gibbs go in hardcore over 'Lib's jazz-fusion tinged beat. I really, really hope that we will get a MadGibbs album soon enough, these guy's chemistry together is too dope to end with just a couple of 12" singles. Listen to the A-Side for yourself and decode for youself; you can order the EP on vinyl ($11.95) or digital ($.94).