Still good. BBD was helping out ABC, which made the production quality of their music way better. This song hit #1 on the “Hot Dance Club Songs” when it was released in 1990. Big ups to David for reminding us of this jam.

This article about genres is long overdue. First off, we’re tired of all the blanket genre labels that keep popping up. Take the genre “electro,” for example. Wikipedia lists so-called “electro” artists such as DMX Krew, Kraftwerk, Afrika Bambaataa, Cylob and even Cat Stevens as artists related to the genre. Electro isn’t listed under any of Cat Stevens’ main Wikipedia page genres, and rightfully so. Apparently he dropped some album called “Was Dog a Doughnut,” that was allegedly a precursor to the “electro music genre of the 1980′s.”

At the end of the day, what is electro? Just some bullshit (for lack of a better adjective) commercial term that was developed by record labels to try and put various artists in a box. When artists are nicely packaged in a box, it’s easier to say what kind of music you like, and therefore figure out what kind of music you’d purchase. However, does that mean it’s accurate to do so?

Ever ask someone, “Hey, what kind of music do you like?” Only to get a response like, “Oh, I listen to everything,” or “Oh, I listen to everything but country,” or everything “but rap,” etc. Everything but country. Why’s that, because country is “uncool,” in some circles? It could also be that country is extremely popular in the US, and was the number one genre of music before hip hop or “rap” took its throne. Calling hip hop “rap,” really is kind of inaccurate as well, because “rap” refers to “rapping,” which is a trend in hip hop music. Calling hip hop “rap,” is kind of a thing of the 90′s though, back when music stores were still brick-and-mortar and not overtaken by digital storefronts.

I actually designed the font for the “rap” genre header on the Universal Music Group page back in 2008, just with a handwritten then digitally edited font, because theirs was struggling. Don’t believe me? Here’s a screenshot of my font on their genre header:

Here’s what their previous genre headers were…

Yes, I took time away from studying for law school finals to work on a genre font for UMG. Why not?

Also, just because I’m a digital packrat and nerdy enough to save screenshots of my desktop, here’s the full shot of my desktop at the time as well as the rough font sketch.

Of course, UMG has since revamped their site–after all it has been four years–but graphic design bragging-rights tangent aside, the mainstream labels package music in genres for sales purposes, even if what genre a musician’s songs fit is debatable. It goes beyond that though, mainstream genres are not even correct or accurate anymore.

The genre “electro” is garbage, and referring to hip hop as “rap” is also lamely imprecise, but let’s take a look at the “chillwave” genre. Aside from being a terribly cheesy name for a genre, since any reference to music with the word “chill” in it has always made us cringe, even the musicians at the forefront of the alleged “chillwave” genre do not even classify their music as such. Back to Wikipedia,

The Wall Street Journal quoted Alan Palomo of Neon Indian on genre, “Whereas musical movements were once determined by a city or venue where the bands congregated, ‘now it’s just a blogger or some journalist that can find three or four random bands around the country and tie together a few commonalities between them and call it a genre,’.”[5] Despite the stylistic similarities listed above, Palomo and other artists have questioned whether chillwave actually constitutes a discrete genre.

So there you have it, now we have random people on the Internet trying to put music in boxes as well, and those genres can become “real,” in that people actually use them? Come on! It’s bad enough that genres are imprecise as it is, but now anyone with a web site that gets traffic can create them?

Human nature makes us want to put everything in a box, from music to gender, even though life can’t just all be lumped together. Trying to simplify the world this way is a terribly unintelligent idea. If someone sees a baby boy on a train dressed in pink clothes that are arguably “girly” it can frustrate them because they can’t tell if the kid is a boy or a girl. That’s straight from the professor of a graduate level anthropology class. The tendency to want to see things in black and white is because it’s just easier that way, aside from that fact that human nature is completely irrational.

People who don’t care about music very much don’t listen enough to actually be able to discern differences between different genres and I also cringe at the number of times I’ve heard people say “it all sounds the same,” about a genre when if you actually follow that type of music, you will notice differences that are substantial enough to split into all kinds of sub-genres. Even then though, with experimental music, and even new music that is more conventional, it is best to classify music with multiple genres and sub genres.

The only reason to use sweeping genres that lump together a bunch of pre-existing genres that truly are different is to dumb things down for people who don’t really listen to music, but just skim through it. That’s right. I’ve heard people refer to all electronic music as “house” or “trance.” Again, come on! Really? It’s those same lazy people with typically dull taste in music that use commercially created terms like “electro” and “chillwave.”

So IDM is a stylistic origin of chill wave? Really? As someone who has been listening to IDM since the 90′s, that sounds absurd to me. This Autechre track, “Gantz Graf,” is IDM. So then, shouldn’t we be able to hear some influence from it in Neon Indian’s music? I can’t.

Just because Autechre used a lot of editing in the sequencer and digital sound processing to make that track doesn’t really make it anything at all like Neon Indian’s music. Think back to that person who goes around telling people “Uh, yeah, I listen to a little bit of everything, except country.” For reals? So, we might find them in their car rocking out to the Autechre track above? Doubt it. They probably don’t listen to anything that’s experimental at all. Oh the things we say that are driven by our insecurities.

So in conclusion, the question we pose is this: are you a dumbed-down herd follower of a person when it comes to music? Do you actually have enough passion for music that you spend a reasonable amount of time seeking it out, listening to it without talking over it, and enjoying it? If so, maybe then you will hear enough differences from one musician to the next that it will feel completely wrong to throw a musician in a smorgasbord sack of shit genre. <3.

So thanks to me, we saw (and published) this Billy Sorrells video when it was at a wee 200k+ views. Oh, is it at 6.5 million views now? HYFR.

What’s even better is that the other day I heard this Drake song on Pandora while driving to work. Seeing the Billy Sorrells video, then hearing the song that inspired it, was really a game-changer for a song that was already good. And I say hell yeah. Hell yeah.

Not sure what Wayne means when he says, “My nuts hang like ain’t not curfew,” though.

Drake – “HYFR”

Saw this on MTV earlier and it’s so bad. Normally, we keep it positive about the musics, but this song and video are ridiculous. Will.i.am is like junk food for music. Think about all the reasons you wouldn’t eat junk food then think about this song and how weak sauce it is. Will.i.am was working on a business deal with Universal Music Group and we heard he’s a fairly opinionated dude. Not just like strong convictions, but opinionated in a pretentious way. Don’t ask how we know that.

Will.i.am shouldn’t have to tell us how hard the beat is, really. The beat should just speak for itself. Come on buddy!

Then there’s the whole involvement of Mick Jagger. Seriously? Jagger should be thanking Ke$ha right now because since she and Maroon 5 wrote tracks playing on the words “swagger” and “Jagger,” which seems to have created an unfortunate ripple-effect. Now we have to listen to and more horribly see Mick Jagger still performing. Yes, the Rolling Stones made awesome music, but that was years ago, and unfortunately their time has passed. In the entertainment business, sometimes retirement really isn’t such a bad thing. Rather than going hard, Jagger should just go home!

We’ve got that crisis like Jagger, because this song reeks of an older dude trying to be cool for Jagger. You’ve got to know when to fold them, just like if you’re on a casino online. It’s so tempting to go hard though and try to win big when you’ve got money to burn, isn’t it? Call us what you will, but when we gamble, we like to get our video poker on. When we can’t make it to Vegas we hit up: http://www.casinotop10.net/video-poker.shtml, keeping it legal, of course. Unfortunately, much like Mick Jagger, we don’t always know when to fold ‘em. Two words: human nature.

Drake is unstoppable. It’s really all about the intro. here.

Dang. Already over a year old. Still, if you haven’t heard it already… enjoy!

Oh, you heard it here first? Well, the official video for this now radio jam came out. Enjoy!

Cool video. Notice Katy Perry is in it?

MACHINEDRUM – SXLND by LuckyMe Music Art Parties

LuckyMe is proud to present SXLND, the new 5 track EP from Machinedrum.

It’s been a great 18 months for Travis Stewart. Since we released his Many Faces EP in 2010 we’ve seen a succession of new hip hop, juke & 2step projects on labels Hot Flush, Planet Mu and of course LuckyMe. In Summer 2011 we released his underground smash Alarmaa which featured as part of Jackmaster’s FABRICLIVE 57 CD and tore apart Sonar Festival, clubs and Boiler Rooms alike. But now Stewart is back with Lucky Us for a project 2 years in the making – a sparkling take on Deep Chicago and Modern UK House entitled SXLND.

12” EP comes with Digital Download Card with exclusive Scuba Remix and cut-out Geisha inner sleeve.

Head over to thisisluckyme.com to Pre-order the vinyl copy now!

So The Black Opera just dropped their album “EnterMission” on December 13, 2011. If you didn’t get a chance to check it out over the holidays, we suggest you get on it. TBO in your city, bitch!

The Black Opera – “Black City” (mp3 download).

SPREAD THE WARNING. theblackopera.com

Dirty shit from Saen this week.

Tanya T6 – “I’m So Tired Of You:”

Wow. Tanya T6 proves to us once again that her sizzling voice goes with so many flavors of instrumentals. Loving everything we hear from T6, this song is no exception.

Do yourself a favor and check out more music from her! <3 you T6.

thebestoftanya.com
youtube.com/tdormevil
twitter.com/tanyat6
facebook.com/tanyat6

Rapper A.B. Dadon is not waiting for the New Year. He has other plans and that’s staying out of The DA’s office and in the studios planning out his next moves. A.B. Dadon has been in the scene for 2 years collaborating with heavyweight producer Dame Grease , Max B and Uncle Murda on several tracks, so it’s no surprise Just a weak ago AB was at the infamous QUAD studio finishing the soon to be released street CD ‘Cold World2’. AB enlisted All Area Crew to shoot his Video SWAY. Cold World 2 is slated to drop 2012…but in the meantime enjoy the toast to the Good Life Swaaaaay. and join the movement www.abdadon.com. Follow AB on twitter @Abdadon.

Dame Grease recently revealed that he will be acting as executive producer for DMX next LP

New York, NY, December 28, 2011 – Vacant Lot Records is proud to announce that Multi-Platinum Selling Producer Dame Grease will be executive producing DMX next LP.

When DMX, made his mark in 1997, it was Dame Grease aggressive sound that provided the rapper with a podium to dominate the rap industry to the tunes of platinum records . Before becoming a stable on every mixtape, The LOX relied on the sounds of Grease in order to acquire the street buzz that landed them their deal on Bad Boy Records in 1996. Fellow Bad Boy Mase sought out Grease’s distinctive sound and gave him the opportunity to provide production on Mase’s triple platinum Harlem World. This led to Grease’s work as the primary producer on DMX’s classic debut It’s Dark and Hell Is Hot, where Grease helped the Ruff Ryders mold both their image and their sound into what would become one of the most well-known Hip Hop crews. During this time Grease chose to create his own Vacant Lot production company.

In 2001 Grease made the accession from producer to composer by providing the score for the Steven Segal/DMX blockbuster Exit Wounds. In addition to his work on the film, Dame Grease also reunited with DMX on the soundtrack for X’s top-ten hit “Ain’t No Sunshine”, an updated, yet much darker remake to the Bill Withers 1972 classic of the same name. Grease continued his work as a composer in on the 2003 box-office hit Cradle 2 the Grave, starring Jet Li, DMX, Gabrielle Union, and Anthony Anderson, as well as 2004’s Never Die Alone.

Coming Back into the game hard DMX is considered by many to be one of the greatest heavyweight rappers to still do it . Back in July Grease revealed to HipHop Dx that he’s currently working on DMX’s album, but it was announced recently DMX has appointed Grease to executive produce his next LP. as told to Hip Hop Dx Grease says: “First and foremost, I’m pretty sure the world know about it,” said Dame, who produced the bulk of X’s debut It’s Dark and Hell is Hot. “[DMX] came home two days ago, we’re working on a brand new album with [him] right now. Was in the studio last night, we back in the studio tonight. We’re working on a brand new album, good energy, the songs is phenomenal. It’s actually a good dose of what we need in Hip Hop right now.” Since the interview the album has been completed.

Grease is multi-tasking, currently he released 75 tracks for lease on soundcloud and continues to put his Signature on every Wave Mixtape Release on datpiff. Aside from releasing a slew of mixtapes Grease recently put his gritty beats on Jae Millz & Lil Waynes song “Forever Winning” and colloborated with the white girl Mob Kreayshawn on the track “Rum & Coke. In preparation for 2012 Grease is not only executive producing DMX LP but also putting out his own LP Martial Law with a soon to be released date.

Redefining the traditional definition of Harlem Renaissance Dame Grease cutting edge style marks him the musics brand ambassador.

ALL I WANT IS MOOG PORN FOR CHRISTMAS (FREE DOWNLOAD) by Mochipet

REINDEER GAMES by Born I Music

Hot jam.

The newest record from Born I Music arrives just in time for winter and is aptly titled “Reindeer Games”. Produced by Thailand’s own “Eazy” Zaw Lin of IAM Music/Thaitanium fame. Another preview from Born I’s upcoming album “KING OF KINGS”

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