My name's Jake Bourey, and I've dedicated a significant portion of my life to music and deciphering the science behind its beauty. As you can guess from my blog's title, I'm especially passionate about hip-hop. I post and review the best songs hip-hop has to offer, old and new. Most are in the “underground” genre, considering that’s where the vast majority of hip-hop's true art resides these days.
NPR - Talib Kweli On Mainstream Hip-Hop & Honoring The Old School
“Sex, drugs and party, party, party. That’s where it’s at in the mainstream. But you’d be fooled if you only got your hip-hop from the mainstream. One of the biggest hip-hop artists in the country right now is Macklemore, who doesn’t do anything like that….But the things that move people are not just found in the mainstream culture. So when we talk about hip-hop in general, hip-hop is preoccupied with life. You could find a hip-hop song dealing with any subject matter, but the stuff that’s being promoted and marketed and the corporations are spending major money on is the decadent stuff, which is mostly about drug use and sex. That’s why people get a skewed perspective of hip-hop. Hip-hop fans themselves aren’t even listening to that stuff.”
Played 124 times.What’s your favorite song(s) by Talib Kweli?
“Only in America could you find a way to make a healthy buck, and still keep your attitude on self-destruct.”
- MF Doom
This is actually profound as fuck. Our language defines our emotions, and our emotions define us. We our defined by our language, and the specific words, verbs, adverbs, adjectives, and nouns we use and choose to utilize to recreate the mental world in which our brains live. We create ourselves though the reflection of our environment and the people we associate with…remember that shit.
It’s funny…because it’s true. He was never shit.
Not going to lie though, I did enjoy dancing to his only good song back in early high school, but that didn’t last long. You know what I’m talking about.
Cage - I Never Knew You
Cage doesn’t have too many tracks that I would consider ridiculously amazing, but this is one of them. When I first discovered this song all I could do was play it in my dorm with the volume cranked way up and the bass set to max. You definitely need to be in the right type mood to fully enjoy this song. It’s that special kind of music that can envelop you within its essence, and you forget what you’re doing as your brain is drowned in sadistic lyrics and grungy guitar. Nothing really like it. Obviously not everyone enjoys Cage’s darker music, but if you do, you definitely have an appreciation for this song and what it artistically accomplishes within the underground realm of dark grungy hip-hop.
“You’re always dying inside that much closer to home. On a crowded street corner surrounded by people all alone.”
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My Song Rating: 9.6 out of 10
“The only wealth I have to give is not material, and if you need much more than that, I’m not available.”
“My self respect? I leave that In the lost-and-found where the black girls get their weaves back.”
Necro - Underground (Instrumental)
This is my all time favorite instrumental to freestyle to. If you’ve never heard of Necro before, all you need to know is he’s the filthiest and most violent hip-hop artist I know of, at least for how famous he is for it. He’s also made beats for everyone from Wu-Tang to Cage. One of my other favorite Necro instrumentals to freestyle too is Agent Orange by Cage. Essentially what I’m saying is he’s probably my favorite producer to freestyle too. It has that raw repetition at just the right speed.
Played 343 times.
20th May 2013
Notes: 103
