Noise » Brandon Soderburg

On the Download: DDm, TV Killed the Radio Star

Brandon Soderburg — Thu, 11 Aug 2011 17:44:45 +0000

TV Killed the Radio Star

Rapper DDm, previously known as Dappa Dan Midas (though everybody called him Midas) just put out his EP, TV Killed the Radio Star. In a little over 16 and a half minutes, DDm impersonates a rowdy group of kindergartners, raps over the theme from Martin, concocts a maddeningly catchy in that weird Lil B way song called “Ain’t That Cool,” and on “Bangee Angie” and “Everytime the Beat Drop,” nods to the club music turn that came with his name change. Also, there are Golden Girls samples, a tribute to Good Times, and two wailing soul-beats numbers that look back to his work with Mania Music Group. It’s really good and its brevity makes it an addicting listen.

TV Killed The Radio Star comes just a week after DDm made the cover of Baltimore’s Gay Life magazine, in an article titled “Baltimore’s First Openly Gay Rapper.” And though the EP doesn’t address this revelation, its context hovers in the background of the EP in really touching and fascinating ways. EP closer “Last on Ur Dial” finds DDm rhyming about alienation and people no longer returning his phone calls. It begins with these touching lines: “Trying to be a better man/ But for me to grow momma, you got to understand/ That I confront who I truly am.”

And by not explicitly rapping about coming out, DDm actually makes a bold statement about how little of an effect coming out has on his actual rapping. The EP sounds like all his other hilarious, emotional, shit-talk-filled music. And that should silence any and all of Baltimore’s homophobic rap knuckleheads. Download TV Killed The Radio Star here.

Mania Music Group Adds a New Member: Eze Jackson, of Soul Cannon

Brandon Soderburg — Fri, 17 Jun 2011 15:03:09 +0000

Mania Music Group

A week ago at Joe Squared, Kane Mayfield announced a new member of Mania Music Group: Eze Jackson of Soul Cannon. Right after a passionate mini- set from Mania’s Ron G, Jackson did a five-minute straight freestyle–in the truest sense of the word, without the accompaniment of a beat–that ended with a shout of “Mania!” Jackson will still be a part of Soul Cannon but his solo work will go through Mania Music Group, which is a little confusing, but MMG has always played fast and loose with the definition of a group, focusing as much on single artist releases as group albums.

When Kane made the announcement, Dwayne Lawson, one of Mania’s producers, tapped me on the shoulders, grinning, and said, “Didn’t expect that, did you?” I certainly did not. And so once again, the Mania roster has shifted. Last summer’s Welcome to the Audience added female emcee Milly July to the three-man lineup of Kane, Ron, and Midas, and, lately, Midas has been doing amazing club-rap hybrids with Unruly Records seemingly separate from the crew. So yeah, Eze Jackson, in addition to being in Soul Cannon, is now a Mania Music Group member, which means there’s one more rapid-fire rapper in the group.

Uncle Jesse Drops a Proper Electro Banger with “Samson”

Brandon Soderburg — Fri, 20 May 2011 19:08:00 +0000

via MySpace

Uncle Jesse, club music boundary-pusher and maker of some of the only tolerable moombahton out there (see “Boat Shoes”), just put out “Samson,” an excellent though not exactly categorizable electro track. Let’s start with the drums, which could pound like every other dance song and be just fine, but instead kick and flutter like they’re from some dance-punk song. There’s also a very “Percolator”-like noise bouncing around, and a ghostly horn sample that runs back and forth between your ears and adds some headphone fuckery to the song, which is, you know, appropriate for a pretty rave-like tune like this. But also totally doesn’t need to be there. With electronic dance, it’s often the little things, you know? You can download Uncle Jesse’s “Samson” here.

Erin Schwartz/NPR

The secret is that pretty much every Future Islands song is a huge bummer. Recent acoustic shows (and the EP, Undressed) have revealed the heavy heart behind the super-fun dance beats and, here, as part of NPR’s Tiny Desk Concert series, the group’s kinda stripped down take on new-ish songs like “On The Water,” and “The Inkwell,” and In Evening Air opener “Walking Through That Door” prove it once more. Or maybe it isn’t such a secret, as vocalist Sam Herring tells NPR, his goal is to “make [listeners] cry.”

This performance though is also pretty fun because it’s a chance to see how Future Islands, easily one of the most compelling live bands around, translate all their ragged energy into the confines of a small-ass office without any room for Herring to freak out in, and without an obsessively devoted audience bouncing up and down around them. There’s a special kind of simmering intensity here, as they’re all reining it in just a bit: William Cashion’s bass a little less punchy, J. Gerritt Welmers’ synths not quite so dance ready, and Herring, spilling his guts in an indoor voice.

For whatever reason, NPR’s embed code is currently not working. Find the video here.

Watch the Dan Deacon-scored Hilvarenbeek Starring Dan Deacon

Brandon Soderburg — Fri, 13 May 2011 20:47:09 +0000

Hilvarenbeek: Totally, Totally Broke and Beautiful

Just in case you thought hanging out with Francis Ford Coppola had turned Dan Deacon irreparably fancy, IFC.com premiered Hilvarenbeek, an absolutely insane short film directed by Deacon’s pal Jimmy Joe Roche and scored by Deacon.

Hilvarenbeek starts out in a church with a hipster chorus humming, led by Deacon himself. Then, there are shots of a dude herding sheep. After that, a viking woman waxes poetic about nature and some American yokel preacher does his down-home take on why nature’s awesome and also terrible. Next, everybody wanders around with automatic weapons and axes. This is interrupted by a farmhand in black metal gauntlets and a Mortician t-shirt who discusses raising cows. And then there’s a montage of everybody firing their guns and swinging their axes, intercut with Deacon singing and toying with a handmade very Deacon-esque noisemaking electronic thingy, a lengthy shot of the clouds, followed by the sheep herder and the heavy metal farmhand expressing the importance of being one with nature, implying some sort of end-of-the-world scenario occurred that’s left only the film’s characters on earth. From there, it gets pretty silly and intense and beautiful, and well, don’t wanna ruin the whole thing, you know? Watch it below:

It’s basically a “don’t be a dick to the environment”-themed short that’s pretty awesome and nutty and features front-to-back gorgeous, horrifying instrumental music from Deacon. The idea that he went all the way to the Netherlands to make something very Baltimore-weird is comforting. RIYL: Jodorowsky flicks, Tony Stone’s digital video viking epic Severed Ways, Kanye West’s Runaway, and that one movie by the Napoleon Dynamite director about sci-fi cowboys.

King Tutt Says Hello to the Bad Guy with New Mix

Brandon Soderburg — Tue, 03 May 2011 20:49:25 +0000

King Tutt

DJ King Tutt’s Say Hello to The Bad Guy mix is an hour of unabashed house and electro. No Baltimore club productions. And none of Tutt’s own electro work either. Just 19 tracks of the cheap, strong stuff. Big booming songs from guys like Tiesto, Laidback Luke, and the Bingo Players. Also: Some Underworld is tossed in there too.

If you’re into this sort of thing, it’s a particularly artful and even kinda patient mix and if you’re not, well there’s not really a better guy to introduce you to this specific kind of house than Tutt. Listen close for an absolutely adorable drop from Tutt’s step-kids. Oh yeah—this ends with Chris Brown’s Benny Benassi-produced hit “Beautiful People.” Man, what is the deal with that song? Anyways, Tutt plays Ultra Nate’s Deep Sugar “Gold Party” at the Paradox May 14. You can download Say Hello to The Bad Guy here.

Baltimore Filmmaker Hilton Carter and DJ Quik Go Out for Milk

Brandon Soderburg — Fri, 29 Apr 2011 21:26:19 +0000

Video still

Baltimore filmmaker Hilton Carter directed the music video for DJ Quik’s “Luv of My Life,” the first single from the Los Angeles legend’s new album Book of David. The video has all the things you’d expect from a Quik video (weed, strippers, elastic sports headbands) but the video’s narrative rather goofily kicks-off when Quik runs out of milk for his cereal and has to leave the house. Somewhere along the way for a new half-gallon, he gets distracted and ends up at a strip club, then in a poker game, and finally with a girl on the way back to his house.

Like most of DJ Quik’s work, it’s the right mix of typical gangsta stuff and humane, nerdy sincerity. And, really, that’s all of Book of David, easily one of the best and weirdest rap albums of the year. It’s basically Quik either rapping grown-ass man slow jam raps or these really bitter, angry invectives against all the people that’ve wronged him. The biblical title is apt: It’s Quik rapping his own brand of Old Testament justice via one-liners like “put some honey on your dick and put it in a blender.” Watch the video for “Luv of My Life” below:

DJ QUIK FEAT GIFT "LUV OF MY LIFE" from Hilton Carter on Vimeo.

New DJ Class Looks to Classic House and, Unfortunately, Chris Brown

Brandon Soderburg — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 19:55:31 +0000

Not all that lol

One step forward, one step back is the story of DJ Class these days. This time around, he’s remixing and rapping over hits from ultimate shitbag Chris Brown. First, there’s “Look At Me Now” featuring an actually pretty impressive double-time verse from Class himself, as well as Jermaine Dupri and Da Brat. Also check out this inexplicable Skype-like video (at bottom) of Class and his Arizona radio station employees mouthing the words to the remix.

Way cooler and slightly less confounding is this remix of Chris Brown’s “Beautiful People.” The original, produced by electro guru Benny Benassi, doesn’t exactly need its energy upped or anything, so Class looks back to a house-music classic “Follow Me” from Aly Us (exactly the kind of thing playing in Baltimore club sets in the genre’s fetal pre-’90s era) and replaces all the Italian fist pump pyrotechnics with something subtler and well, a little more human. It’s the sort of thing to get lost in; so much so that you’ll forget that it’s petulant man-child Chris Brown telling listeners to not “let them bring you down” and to “live your life.

E Major Is Still Better Than Yours

Brandon Soderburg — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 17:26:04 +0000

Better Than Yours

E Major’s Majority Rules snuck in right before the dying days of simple, direct, soul-beat-based hip-hop. By ’08 or so, even the stalwart “underground” began to reconstruct itself and experiment just a bit. And E did it better than a lot of other dudes, with the club-tinged experimental single “Paper Runnin” and last year’s Major Major Mixtape which found go-go experiments bumping heads with slightly off-the-wall freestyles.

He’s been, like so many others, a searching, wandering, really interesting rapper, but nothing’s really lived up to Majority Rules until now. E Major Is . . . Better Than Yours boldly realigns E’s aesthetic. He’s still making sample-based, contemplative rap, but the production’s a bit more woozy (“FTW,” a freestyle over Flying Lotus’ “Massage Situation”) and there are strange tracks like the Peter Gabriel-sampling “The Shape of Things” and just in general, a laid-back, magic-hour feeling to the whole thing. The best track though, is a break-up song and an ode to getting older and being less of a dumbass called “Therapy.” It samples a John Lennon interview and Jerry Butler’s “Make It Easy On Yourself.” You can download E Major Is . . . Better Than Yours here.

DJ Pierre Ups Thee Game with New Mixtape, ThEEEE MiXtApEEEE

Brandon Soderburg — Tue, 19 Apr 2011 18:17:50 +0000

ThEEEE MiXtApEEEE

DJ Pierre just released ThEEEE MiXtApEEEE (not to be confused with Blaqstarr’s brand new The Mixtape) and unlike the multiple-artist, old classics-meet-new club hits mixed CDs he’s known for, this one’s 30 minutes of original productions. This release comes at an important point for the young producer, just a few months after his remix of M.I.A.’s “Steppin’ Up” made it onto Vicki Leekz and just a few days after his remix of Nguzunguzu’s “Mirage” appeared on the Mirage Remixes EP alongside other forward-thinking underground dance producers like Girl Unit and Munchi.

ThEEEE MiXtApEEEE moves along like a club music set but it also allows for some of Pierre’s boldest and most experimental productions. Here, getting people to dance is just one of the many goals. “In The Studio (2 Step)” with blown-out bass and crawling pianos is pretty far from club music–which is great–and even something like, “Dirty Bit Break,” which takes the only good part of the Black Eyed Peas’ “Time Of My Life (Dirty Bit)” and well, dirties it up a bit, doesn’t take the easy route. “U Don’t Bang Wit Me,” a sassy minimal track with shit-talk vocals from TT the Artist suggests Pierre has a future producing for emcees, which before this track didn’t seem possible given his angular, distracted style of beatmaking. Download ThEEEE MiXtApEEEE here. Tracklisting below:

1. “Exclusive Intro Beat”

2. “Let Get This Thing Goin”

3. “Hit The Handclap 2011”

4. “S & M Remix”

5. “U Don’t Bang Wit Me” ft. TT The Artist

6. “All U Bitches”

7. “In The Studio (2Step)” ft. Big Bro Al

8. “Uhh Break”

9. “Dirty Bit Break”

10. “Get High Remix”

11. “First Thing’s First I’ll Rock Ya Body”

12. “Feel On Me”

13. “Party Hornz”

14. “Where The Hornz @” ft. DJ Yadi

15. “Go Boom!”

16. “On The Grind”

17. “Taking It To Another Level”

18. “Come On Drums”

19. “Tell Me”

20. “Run This Club” (M.I.A.’s “Steppin’ Up” Remix)

21. “Throw It In The Bag” Snippet

King Tutt Pays Tribute To Loleatta Holloway

Brandon Soderburg — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 18:36:30 +0000

King Tutt

King Tutt just released this tribute to disco diva Loleatta Holloway, who passed away on Monday.

“Burning Up,” samples Holloway’s 1980 hit “Love Sensation” (familiar to every and anybody via Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch’s “Good Vibrations”), dropping pieces of her vocals into the kind of electro-house production Tutt’s been mining ever since he sorta rocket-propelled past the basic club music elements a few years ago. Towards the end, there’s this pretty thrilling bird squawk sound or something? It really sends the track over the edge. According to Tutt, it was made about a year ago and pulled from the archives following news of Holloway’s death.

DJ King Tutt – “Burning Up” by notrivia

Going for a Ride in Midas’ “Velvet Limousine”

Brandon Soderburg — Tue, 22 Mar 2011 15:51:44 +0000

Midas

Mania Music Group’s Midas (now going by the name DDM) has a hip-hop and club fusion record called American Graffiti coming out soon on Unruly Records. The project was first mentioned in City Paper a few weeks ago in a profile of Unruly borders-breaker Schwarz (he has a beat on the album) and, now, there’s “Velvet Limousine,” the first hint of what American Graffiti might sound like.

“Velvet Limousine” is the kind of bugged-out hip-hop to expect from Midas, and the beat, from Baltimore’s King Midas, is a combination of Neptunes-like dance-rap and electro-ish club. Just hearing Midas rhyming over something even kind of like a club beat is pretty exciting. While dude can rap his ass off, he’s got that rarefied fun-with-words sass found in club vocalists such as Jimmy Jones and Ms. Tony, and who else has that right now? There’s also a video for “Velvet Limousine,” which is basically Midas being Midas, and that means wilding out in a strip club in some baggy Zubaz pants and, like, a Goodwill football jersey. And there’s another kinda Max Headroom-ish part. It’s all pretty amazing. You can download the track here and watch the video below:

Say Wut Takes Club Forward Again with “Alien Nation”

Brandon Soderburg — Wed, 16 Mar 2011 21:14:17 +0000

Say Wut at work

Though it does feature his signature horns and a nod to his early days as NSW (Nigga Say Wut) in that ominous synth-choir sound, “Alien Nation” is a new kind of club track for Say Wut. It’s anchored by a spare flicker of strings and brassy video game noises, but there’s nothing that really resembles a melody in there at all. It’s all just primal club music elements–grunts and shouts, lots of drums–clattering against one another.

Say Wut’s computer producer style was often about maximizing the sound of club music, smoothing it out, making it more electro-like, but here he uses those same sounds toward something aggressively simple. Early club in its bold, minimalist weirdness and Detroit techno-like in its interest in looking to the stars for inspiration, “Alien Nation” is another example of the way club music, even with its significantly lowered profile as of late, keeps on mutating at rapid-speed. You can listen to “Alien Nation” below:

Alien Nation by saywut

Know Your Product: Ken Seeno, Invisible Surfer On An Invisible Wave (NNA Tapes)

Brandon Soderburg — Tue, 15 Mar 2011 19:18:55 +0000

Totall beacharific

Ken Seeno's Invisible Surfer On an Invisible Wave might, at first, look like another contribution to that chillwave/glo-fi/whatever movement that’s still kicking around (beach-themed, cassette-released) but Seeno’s sound–patient, sophisticated, and pointedly clean–is more like a Fripp and Eno’s Evening Star on a budget.

“Everything Is Changing All the Time,” pairs humble horns with gurgling, swampy synths, sustaining a mood somewhere between melancholy and contented. “Either Something Or Nothing Here,” employs a frog’s croak for some light, earthy percussion. “Sunset at Truck Patch” is Terry Riley meeting up with the music found at a Chinese food buffet. Basically, it’s go-for-broke with it’s ambient moodiness and, as a result, is just a lot less bullshit than most of the hypnagogic releases with which it’ll inevitably be lumped.

Though comparisons to Seeno’s group Ponytail are pretty much moot here, there’s actually a similar fusion of whirling disparate sounds, only the goal isn’t cracked-out chaos but stoner contemplation. Positive new age vibes dominate, in the thin waves of synthesizer and crisp guitar and the atmospheric song titles (“The Ocean After the Storm,” “Stained Glass Window”), and though that’s gonna get some eye rolls, music like this should be revived and made significant again because it can be really moving stuff. It just doesn’t need nostalgic conceits and Tumblr-era irony wrapped around it. Thankfully, Invisible Surfer On an Invisible Wave has none of that.

Jon Kwest Delivers All the Charlie Sheen You Need

Brandon Soderburg — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 20:23:53 +0000

Wonderful

From DJ Equalizer’s “Kill Barney” to Johnny Blaze’s “Spongebob Squarepants Remix” to DJ Excel’s “That’s What A Pimp Does,” club music’s always been really good at grabbing hold of some goofball phenomenon and making into a hilarious, hypnotic dance track. So now, there’s a Charlie Sheen club song. It was only a matter of time, right?

Producer Jon Kwest has taken all of those wonky one-liners from Sheen’s manic interview spree last week and chopped them up and made them stutter and talk to one another, creating a #winning (sorry) club track called “Tiger Blood (Sheen Theme).” You can preview and download Jon Kwest’s “Tiger Blood (Charlie Sheen)” below:

Jon Kwest [Bmore Original] – Tiger Blood (Sheen Theme) by Bmore Original Records

Here’s Some More New Weird Blaqstarr

Brandon Soderburg — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 19:12:19 +0000

Blaqstarr

Over the past few weeks, Blaqstarr has been haphazardly tossing out new songs onto his YouTube account. First, there was “Ride,” a club remix of “Rider Girl” from January’s Divine EP. “Rider Girl” is, of course, a slightly less club music-friendly version of “Ryda Girl,” so it’s kind of a strange loop of remixes of remixes, but “Ride” is, if anything, the most straight-forward club production/remix/whatever from Blaqstarr in quite some time. At least since he made a “raw version” of Divine EP‘s first single “Oh My Darling” last spring.

Then, there’s “Never Hesitant,” which is an attempt, it seems, to indulge his singer-songwriter urges and his manic club producer talents all at the same time. “Never Hesitant” begins with some ominous acoustic guitar that kinda sounds like the theme to River’s Edge and features Blaq’s blunted croon and then, for a few moments, a fairly nutty, mid-’90s sounding club track, and then back to the experimental R&B. The video ends with an over-the-top “Mixtape Coming Soon” announcement. Though there’s no official date on it’s release, Blaq did mention via Twitter that he’s shooting for an April release.

Sean Armstrong and E Major Pay Tribute To J. Dilla

Brandon Soderburg — Wed, 02 Mar 2011 16:46:45 +0000

Louder!

For hip-hop nerds, the month of February is unofficially known as J. Dilla Month: The late, great, insanely influential producer was born in February, died in February, and released his existential beat-tape masterpiece Donuts on February 7th, his 32nd (and last) birthday. Sean Armstrong (also known as DJ Face, and part of the group We and Us) and E Major’s Louder! arrived at the very end of Dilla month, which is appropriate, as it’s one of the more cohesive and well thought-out tributes to the producer.

Named after the famous snippet of a Mountain song that Dilla snuck into his beats (a live clip of Mountain’s “Long Red,” with Leslie West commanding an audience: “Louder!”), Louder! is Armstrong and E simply rapping over a few of Dilla’s beats but their song choices–which sidestep the hits and iconic songs–suggest the kind of obsessive combing of the dude’s discography that defines Dilla fans. Two from the fairly obscure Jay Love Japan (“Say It” and “Fantasy”) and a heavy focus on the knotty weird productions: the slow-boiling “Aquarius,” the Giorgio Moroder-sampling “E-MC2,” the swerving “Reckless Driving,” and cracked-out chipmunk soul on “Starz”.

Like many of Dilla’s own releases, Louder! is short (17 minutes long), and features some really sweet graphic design. It’s also free on The Under Sound Bandcamp page.

We’re Not Sure About This New DJ Class Track

Brandon Soderburg — Fri, 25 Feb 2011 19:36:33 +0000

It's never too early?

Earlier this week, DJ Class released a song called “Wacko Flacco” that’s sort of about the Ravens, sort of about weed, and seems to be somehow grabbing onto the Waka Flocka Flame radio rap zeitgeist . . . or something? It’s got AutoTune, pretty much the same sing-rap cadence as “Dance Like a Freak,” and is football-related, which doesn’t make a lot of sense a few weeks after the Super Bowl, but it’s still Class, so the hook with those horns almost works, and it’s a solid-sounding fusion of club and the post-fist-pump dance pop all over the radio right now. But it also remains completely radio unfriendly (hyper-regional, about weed) and just plain goofy. Maybe somebody out there can explain this one. Another weird turn in the strange post-“I’m the Ish” career of DJ Class.

Anyhow, what say you?

DJ Class – Wacko Flacco by Unruly Records

Volcom Finally Delivers Live Saint Vitus Vinyl

Brandon Soderburg — Fri, 25 Feb 2011 19:29:47 +0000

"Play it loud"

Last year, Volcom Entertainment’s “vinyl club” announced a 7-inch from Maryland metal god Scott “Wino” Weinrich‘s old, recently reunited band Saint Vitus. It was supposed to feature live recordings of “Saint Vitus” and “Born Too Late” (those are links to studio recordings, by the way). But “Saint Vitus” b/w “Born Too Late” (VEVC 0014) never showed up, even as the subscription service sent out other releases. Finally, last month, Volcom said they got it “just right” and shipped the record out to subscribers, along with the latest installment in the series, a Best Coast 7-inch. The Vitus record’s been slowly making its way to record stores and mail orders like Aquarius Records and All That Is Heavy since.

And yeah, it’s pretty nice: a blue and purple marble 7-inch featuring two vicious Vitus classics blasted out live. “Born Too Late,” live at the Viper Room in June 2010, is particularly grimy and noisy and soaked in feedback, which is totally appropriate for this seminal, proto-doom track. As is often the case with Wino, tragedy and pain are never too far away; the record’s insert pays tribute to Vitus’ former drummer Armando Acosta and a note on the back dedicates the release to Type O Negative’s Peter Steele with the order to “PLAY IT LOUD!” No problem.

A “Best Of” Rod Lee Mix Not Made By Rod Lee

Brandon Soderburg — Tue, 22 Feb 2011 22:32:52 +0000

Crossfaded Bacon?

Uncle Jesse put together this Best Of Rod Lee mix for the Philly internet label Crossfaded Bacon (which also released Uncle Jesse’s Glen Tech EP). It’s a near hour of spare break-beats, hilarious/filthy lyrics, and lots and lots of Lee’s inimitable throaty shout-singing. And speaking of shout-singing, not sure how a Rod Lee “Best Of” doesn’t feature “Dance My Pain Away”–or “Stepped Up In the Room” for that matter—but really, those are petty complaints because this mix goes nevertheless. With Rod Lee keeping a pretty low profile lately (save for that Steve Aoki remix last year and a bunch of hip-hop tracks on Caddy Da Don’s Day Of the Don) this is a nice reminder of what the “club king” can do.

Download Uncle Jesse’s Best Of Rod Lee mix here.

Alabama Rap Group G-Side Samples Beach House

Brandon Soderburg — Tue, 22 Feb 2011 00:33:29 +0000

The One . . . Cohesive

Huntsville, Ala., rap group G-Side is known for its working-class raps and experimental but distinctively Southern beats. Along with its in-house production team the Block Beattaz, it also has a thing for out-of-the-box, though somehow never gimmicky, samples (Chinese new-age on “Rising Sun,” and um, Enya on “Speed of Sound“). Though their new album, The ONE . . . COHESIVE, has been out since the beginning of the year, it wasn’t until this recent Washington Post review that the (actually kinda obvious now that someone else pointed it out) sample source for “How Far” was revealed: Beach House’s “10 Mile Stereo” off last year’s Teen Dream.

The Block Beattaz took the ringing guitar, the melody, and perhaps a bit of the group’s hazy vibe, and turned “10 Mile Stereo” into the kind of spaced-out minor victory-filled anthem these guys do really well. Through e-mail, we spoke to Cory Parham, better known as “CP,” one half of the Block Beattaz, about “How Far” and Beach House.

City Paper: How did you arrive at the sample?
Cory Parham: Back in August, when we began to put production for The One . . . Cohesive into overdrive, the homie DJ Giraffo from Norway said that he had something that I should hear and possibly sample. So he threw it in the dropbox for me. I let it sit for a day or two because I was going through a ton of music at that time, trying to find the sound that we felt encompassed what we were attempting to convey through the album. When I finally listened to the record, I was completely blown away.

CP: What is it about the sample grabbed you?
Parham: It was one of those moments in your life that something completely grabs you and hits you in that emotional place. That song that says what you feel better than you can articulate it. Then, when I finally made it to the lyric, “They say we’ll go far, but they don’t know how far we’ll go,” chills went through my body. It explained that dynamic of knowing you’re great but God, fate, or life may think differently. We aren’t in control. The song is big. The drums were made for the stage. It had an atmosphere around it. I wanted to make sure we captured that in the production.

CP: How familiar were you with Beach House?
Parham: I wasn’t hip to them initially but now I’m a huge fan. [G-Side's manager] Codie G gave me their material to research and study and I focused on the set they did in Birmingham, Ala., at the Bottle Tree [Cafe and] Lounge. The music was ethereal, which is how people describe the Block Beattaz sound. Through the performance, I saw that they are sincerely, emotionally attached to their music. So much so that I didn’t want to alter the feeling of the song. We made sure that the subject matter and everything was on point. We brought in our favorite guitarist Cody Hampton who played on the track “Huntsville International” and he knocked it down quick. We wanted to make sure we respected their song, while still covering it from our perspective.

CP: “How Far” is credited as featuring Victoria Tate and Kaylan Parham. Who is Kaylan Parham?
Parham: Kaylan is my eldest daughter. She’s 10. She was born right when I started seriously doing music in 2000. She learned to use the computer by sitting in my lap and pressing the record button on Pro Tools. She’s my biggest fan and she happened to be in the studio with me that day when we began recording the song, which was the last one we recorded. This is probably the fourth song she’s done with me but this has meant the most. It’s a testament of what I try to instill in her: The only thing that can stand in the way of your dreams is you.

On the Download: Kane Mayfield’s Mobtown Studios Microshow

Brandon Soderburg — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 21:44:21 +0000

KaneMayfield

Last Thursday’s Mobtown Studios microshow from Mania Music Group’s Kane Mayfield and a live band—guitarist Karlos Brickhouse, keyboardist Dennard Watson, drummer Brandon Segar, and trombonist Patrick Harrison—is now available for download at the Mobtown Studios web site.

Kane begins with a snappy, near Neptunes-like take on his recent single “Wreck,” and from there makes everybody sing the theme to The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, raps his own storytelling rap, and slides into a darkly comic poem about multiple personalities called “H.I.M”—each verse punctuated a screaming declaration of, “I ain’t fucking crazy!” Here’s Mayfield, known for rapping his ass off and cracking jokes, performing near-spoken-word about mental illness: hardly your typical rap show. Mayfield returns to rapping with “Reaganomics,” featuring one of his darkest, funniest couplets (“Rich people don’t have our problems/ they don’t know unless we rob them”) and then he calls for a liquor break.

Emmanuel Lewis-Withers performs a two-song suite of love songs while Mayfield, presumably, boozes it up. When Kane returns for the second half, he announces, “The romantic Love Jones part of this show is over. Now we about to fuck something and get crazy.” He’s only half-serious. The second half, however, is indeed a collection of songs investigating love in its many forms, from lovey-dovey to stalker-scary to heartwarming: courtship rap “Headbussa,” a love poem worthy of a restraining order, a freestyle over the Delfonics’ “La-La Means I Love You” (with Lewis-Withers singing the hook), the cry-for-empathy “Poor George,” and a tribute to his mother and brother called “Flowers.”

The show ends with a 15-minute pentecostal cover of BrownFish’s “F.I.S.H. Bowl,” with Jahiti from the Baltimore reggae-rap group joining in and taking over. Mayfield adds some working-class raps to the song but mostly shouts along to its desperate, paranoid hook: “We’re living in a fish bowl.” Willing to hand the show over to others for entire segments like that, and ready to wander away from rap for crowd sing-alongs, dirty jokes, and some spoken-word, Kane at Mobtown Studios is more like a charming, do-whatever variety show than a straight hip-hop performance.

On the Download: Kil’s Through the Wire

Brandon Soderburg — Thu, 17 Feb 2011 22:16:04 +0000

Through the Wire

Kil, a beatmaker and a former host of Strictly Hip Hop, has put together a surprisingly non-shticky concept album based around The Wire. On his Bandcamp page—where Through the Wire can be downloaded for free—Kil calls the tape “a perfect marriage between two of my loves, making beats and the HBO television series The Wire,” making clear the fanboy nature of the project.

Rather than use the show as shorthand for “realness” or pad a beat-tape with some context, Kil’s gone ahead and captured the mood of the show via a sound collage of whining soul samples, Wire clips, and tangentially related vocal snippets from classic rap songs. There’s special attention paid to scope, with whole scenes from the show rolling-out overtop his production; it’s almost like he’s re-scoring his favorite moments from the show. Highlight : on “What Happpens if We Buck (Powder),” when some hip-hop drums of death arrive right after Colvin mentions “some Biblical shit happening to you on the way to that motherfuckin’ jail wagon.”

Listen To This DJ Pierre Remix of Rihanna’s “S & M”

Brandon Soderburg — Tue, 15 Feb 2011 18:41:38 +0000

DJ Pierre

Norwegian production duo Stargate have put together dance-pop hits like Beyonce’s “Irreplaceable,” Ne-Yo’s “Closer” (which DJ Booman remixed), and more recently Katy Perry’s “Firework” and Rihanna’s “S & M.” All of the songs follow this loud-quiet-loud, build-up blueprint that isn’t too far removed from club music, but still doesn’t really compare given club’s well, far more appealing, loud-loud-loud construction, you know? Thankfully, DJ Pierre has taken all the best elements of Stargate’s work on “S & M” (mostly, those kinda grimy synths), removed all the trying-too-hard manipulative parts, and made a fairly traditional club version, even cleverly looping Rihanna’s vocals in a way that pays homage to DJ Class’ “Na Na Na.”

DJ PIERRE – RIHANNA’S S&M REMIX by Baltimore DJ Pierre

On the Download: DJ Excel’s “Disco Flow” Remix

Brandon Soderburg — Mon, 14 Feb 2011 15:59:36 +0000

DJ Excel

Don’t know too much about this Phil Adé character, other than that he’s one of those nimble, excited young rappers really repping this whole super-nebulous “DMV” movement, but Bmore Original’s DJ Excel turned Adé’s “Disco Flow” into, well—actually, not all that sure how to explain this one. Excel’s made a club song on speed, with the classic breakbeats rushing by rapid-fire—or really, even more rapid-fire than usual—temporarily letting up for some glitchy sample malfunctions and toward the end, a whooshing, nearly dubstep rhythm. Strangely, Excel leaves Adé’s vocals pretty much untouched. The whole thing might even be categorized as some kind of throwback ’ardkore/jungle remix. Given Bmore Original’s recent experiments with next-big-thing moombahton, and now this, Excel’s developing a global approach to club music that doesn’t really make a whole lot of sense but is really awesome. Throw in “Boys and Girls,” Jonny Blaze’s recent dubstep experiment, and there just might be some kind of club-not-club mini-movement about to happen.

You can download “Disco Flow (DJ Excel Remix)” here.

On the Download: Sean Touré ft. Kev Brown and Ab Rock, “A Day in the Life”

Brandon Soderburg — Thu, 10 Feb 2011 22:08:21 +0000

Day in the Life

Sean Touré doesn’t really give guest rappers Kev Brown and Ab Rock a chance on this one. He kicks off “A Day in the Life” with a verse that captures not only his struggles as a musician, but as a regular dude trying to make it through the day with bills to pay and bullshit-ass gas prices to consider. The thing that pulls together Touré’s verse, though, is at the end, when he interrupts his laundry list of every-dude concerns to tell us something far more depressing: “I’m blowing my girlfriend’s back out/ But two weeks later yo, she started to hurl/ Now all she eat is peanut butter and corn curls/ Next week yo, she changed my world, because nine months later gave birth to a girl—and it wasn’t even mine.”

That kind of pain/pleasure and some more pain conclusion is unexpected, and steers “A Day in the Life” away from the rote independent rapper complaints—remember: Every Baltimore rapper is a struggling independent—and toward something genuinely devastating. That said, “A Day in the Life” goes down a little easier thanks to an elaborately produced soul-beat and awesomely catchy but hardly pop hook.

You can buy “A Day in the Life” on iTunes.

On The Download: Mullyman’s Mullyman vs. the Machine Mixtape

Brandon Soderburg — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 22:04:45 +0000

The machine doesn't know what's comin'

Mullyman’s new mixtape, Mullyman vs. the Machine, is sponsored by noted mixtape shouter DJ Whoo Kid, and in New York last night, there was a party and performance hosted by Angela Yee, morning DJ for New York’s Power 105.1. (Reports of Jimmy Jones dancing to “No Hands” should make everybody sad they didn’t go).

Despite the big-time industry stuff surrounding the mixtape’s release, it’s really more of the same from Mullyman, and that’s impressive. Pretty much every beat here is produced by DJ Booman or Mbahlievable, and other than an appearance by Sean Paul on “Shoulda Done,” the guests are Baltimore and Washington D.C.-based: the Doo Dew Kidz, Nik Stylz, Raheem DeVaughn, and Phil Ade. “I Like Money,” a club music/rap hybrid (with a small amount of electro thrown in there too) is credited to the Doo Dew Kidz featuring Mullyman.

Given the mixtape’s vague conceit–Mullyman’s doggedly independent come-up over the past 10 years—and its relatively high-profile release party, Mullyman’s decision to stick to what he does best and just make an even more rap-filled follow-up to last summer’s Harder Than Baltimore speaks volumes about the guy’s integrity. As his profile rises, his interest in changing up his style or grabbing guests gets smaller. Think about it this way: His 2005 debut, Mullymania had more big-name guests than Mullyman vs. the Machine.

You can download Mullyman vs. The Machine from Mullyman’s web site here.

Q & A: Adam Katzman, North Carolina’s Biggest Baltimore Club Fan

Brandon Soderburg — Mon, 07 Feb 2011 23:26:59 +0000

By Yuri Woodstock

One of the stranger things we’ve heard about as of late is Artistika, a venue in Greensboro, North Carolina, just a few minutes from Quaker liberal arts school Guilford College, that’s hosting Baltimore club shows: A late November Say Wut show, and last month, DJ Pierre, Murder Mark (with Tt the Artist), and James Nasty. I was at the Say Wut show and can say that it inexplicably rivaled most club events in Baltimore and ones with far more resources outside the city. It was pretty weird and pretty awesome. These quasi-DIY club shows are a collaboration between a supportive college, an open-minded nightclub, and an enthusiastic 24-year-old, Miami-born undergrad named Adam Katzman.

Through e-mail over the weekend, Katzman took some time from his studies and scheming to discuss why he wants to bring Baltimore club to North Carolina.

City Paper: Why did you decide to bring Baltimore club to Greensboro, N.C.?
Adam Katzman: Since Mad Decent, M.I.A., Major Lazer, etc., are all big at Guilford College [in Greensboro], and a lot of their music has significant pieces of Bmore club in it, I figured it best to book people actually from Baltimore. The day after the last show, I interviewed Murder Mark, Tt, and James Nasty on the radio. Nasty talked about artists putting their name on Baltimore but not putting Baltimore on their name. This is something I have also thought about.

CP: What got you interested in Baltimore club?
AK: Well, two things, really. The first was a 2007 M.I.A. show in downtown Miami where she brought out Rye Rye. The second was that cliché that a lot of Baltimore outsiders are guilty of mentioning: The Wire. With Rye Rye, there was really no context. M.I.A. just brought out this limber teenager who danced and rapped faster and better than everyone on stage and I was kind of in the dark with aftershock until a few weeks later when the “Shake it to the Ground” video dropped.

CP: And then, there’s The Wire . . .
AK: The Wire, of course. Around the same time as that M.I.A. show, I was taking a break from college, dividing days between working back stock at American Apparel and reading music blogs. One of them was [former City Paper contributor] Tom Breihan’s Village Voice column Status Ain’t Hood. He excitedly mentioned The Wire and Baltimore club a whole bunch and Breihan has a way of transferring his enthusiasm onto others.

CP: Given Baltimore club’s niche appeal, were you worried about people not showing up?
AK: Well, with any show, the first hours are denial, denial, denial. “People will show up, this won’t be a bust, yadda, yadda.” We’ve had to push the shows back an hour because it was basically me, the bartenders, the bouncer, the club owner, and the artists until co-managers showed up at 10:30 and then it’s an on-rush of, “If you book them, they will come.” So thanks, naked indian! Also, everyone that has showed up.

CP: Overall, how did the shows go?
AK: With the first one, a Say Wut and [Dipset producer and MPC performer] Araab Muzik show, it was a fingers-crossed kind of pairing in that both kind of work in hip-hop, and both deconstruct the traditional pop/rap song structure before folding it back, with a propulsive sense of repetition and release. Because that worked, I wanted to try out a straight Baltimore club show. Fortunately, DJ Pierre, Murder Mark, and James Nasty were interested in making the six-hour drive.

Katzman with Murder Mark and friends, By Jamal Smith

CP: I was there for the Say Wut show and was pretty impressed. It seems like the “straight Baltimore club show” went over even better?
AK: Totally. A lot of the kids at Guilford might be into jam bands, bluegrass, or indie rock, but they’re also really into Top 40. What’s great about club music is that it takes Top 40 tracks and redefines them with a regional bent, but at its base, there’s something universally recognizable about it. I call it the “Girl Talk effect.” Both club shows were amazing. Thanks to Max Cawley, General Manager at WQFS for allowing me to book the shows, and Hugo Pascale at Artistika for agreeing to host them.

Catch Hilton Carter’s “Moth” On HBO Zone Tomorrow

Brandon Soderburg — Fri, 04 Feb 2011 22:37:08 +0000

From "Moth"

“Moth,” the first short film from Baltimore music video director Hilton Carter, is on Comcast On Demand all this month, and tomorrow has its television premiere on HBO’s original programming-oriented channel HBO Zone East at 2:45 p.m. It then shows again at 9:45 p.m. and a bunch of other times throughout the month (just search “Moth” on HBO’s schedule).

The short’s official description reads: “Sophie, a beautiful drug abusing young actress, flies into Los Angeles from New York, for a job. While staying at the home of some family friends, who just happen to be out of town, Sophie finds her boredom and unhappiness to [be] the least of her problems.” That kinda undersells “Moth,” though. Imagine a 1980s horror flick directed by Chantal Akerman and you’re close.

Moth Trailer from Hilton Carter of FRESH KILL on Vimeo.

Carter, a MICA graduate—”Moth” had its premiere at MICA in 2009—did the video for Blaqstarr’s “Oh My Darling,” and has also shot videos for rappers like E Major (“Nuthin’ Nice”), Ab-Rock (“Who Do You Think You Are”), and Verbatim (“Get Dat,” a personal favorite).

Listen: Jonny Blaze, “Boys and Girls”

Brandon Soderburg — Thu, 03 Feb 2011 20:53:45 +0000

Dubsteppin'

When he isn’t telling everybody to “pray [their] pain away” on a Christian club refix of the Rod Lee classic, it seems Jonny Blaze is scouring the blogs or flipping through back issues of The Fader, or something.

A few days after releasing a club take on Glasser’s “Mirrorage,” he’s put out “Boys and Girls,” perhaps the first proper hybrid of club music and dubstep. (Benga’s “Baltimore Clap” is more of a dubstep and club hybrid).

Blaze gives “Hello” from Brooklyn dubstepper AC Slater the same cut-up club music treatment he gave to the theme from Spongebob Squarepants, and creates a pretty cool interaction between dubstep’s wobble bass and club’s “Think” break. He also takes up dubstep’s explicit experimentalism, allowing “Boy and Girls” to devolve into glitched-out noise toward the end and stretching the whole thing past the six-minute mark. This is like one of those last tracks on the second side of a club 12-inch WTF freak-out and, well, those don’t exist much anymore.

BOYS AND GIRLS by DJJONNYBLAZE09