David Banner & 9th Wonder ft. Lisa Ivey, “Something Is Wrong” MP3
- story Peter Macia
- photo Alisdair McLellan (F28)
Following on from Nas’ open letter and Killer Mike’s recent, stirring blog post regarding the senseless murder of Derrion Albert, the always outspoken David Banner steps up to address Albert’s death in song. Banner uses the tragedy as a launching pad to rap about many modern problems—violence, racism, sexism and abuse—and in turn, at least somewhat, responds to the criticism that hip hop is not taking a large enough roll in confronting the issues that led to Albert’s death. To Mike’s point though, last year over 30 students were murdered in Chicago alone and this was not an anomaly, either geographically or statistically. It is not something new to many who have grown up in area’s like the south side of Chicago. So that Derrion’s death and the boys responsible for it were caught on tape, that he was an honor student and they were not, that he did not deserve to die and they now apparently do, are all things that have motivated these three artists to speak is powerful. Whether it motivates anyone else remains to be seen.
Download: David Banner & 9th Wonder ft. Lisa Ivey, “Something Is Wrong”
-
posted on Oct 5, 2009 in MP3 / STREAMS tags 9th Wonder, David Banner, Derrion Albert, hip hop, Killer Mike, nas
Ghetto Palms 63: Nas & Damian Marley / Weapon Riddim / Ethiopia Soul
- story Eddie "Stats" Houghton
In a perfect world every Ghetto Palms should connect at least three disparate dots on the map, and today’s multi-colored thumbtacks are puncturing the dread capitals of New York, Kingston and Addis Ababa.
Read More
-
posted on Jul 24, 2009 in GHETTO PALMS tags Africa, Beenie Man, caribbean, Damian Marley, ethiopia, Mulatu Astatke, nas, Vybz Kartel
Beastie Boys f. Nas, “Too Many Rappers” MP3
- story Peter Macia
The Beastie Boys are legends. No one can take that away from them. But just as Tom Watson’s duffed putt on the 72nd hole of the British Open this weekend proved, age eventually catches up with everyone. This is apparently an unmastered version of the track they debuted at Bonnaroo with Nas, but that doesn’t really explain why no one on it raps to the beat. Nas goes at fake drug dealer rappers, and yet his best recent verse was on Rick Ross’ “Usual Suspects.” The Beasties hate on holograms and writers—two things we love with the deepness of the ocean, especially holograms that look like writers that look like us so we can spend the day at the beach while the holograms blog about the Beastie Boys.
Download: Beastie Boys f. Nas, “Too Many Rappers” (via Hey Wil)
Read More
Video: Beastie Boys Bring Out Nas for New Song at Bonnaroo
- story THE FADER
For more videos from Bonnaroo 2009, go to the festival’s Vimeo. FADER founder Jon Cohen is also there tweeting mud and $7 gas station showers on the FADER Twitter. Don’t eat the peanut butter cups, dudes (or do, whatever).
Freeload: Rick Ross f. Nas, “Usual Suspects”
- story THE FADER
Rick Ross has some sort of supernatural magnet heart that sucks producers’ best beats out of their computers. If you are not psyched about Bigger Deeper Than Rap you are trying too hard. It’s like Oprah not liking James Frey after he came clean except A Million Little Pieces was mediocre to begin with and Ross makes jams. Be mad about the lying in general if you want, but have you heard the songs coming on this album? Oof. Here’s another one. And we’re not going to spend one second trying to figure out if Ross is being clever by invoking a movie constructed entirely around an elaborate lie because this just makes us want to drink pina coladas out of six foot tall naked lady mugs and pretend we are rich.
Download: Rick Ross f. Nas, “Usual Suspects”
Freeload: Dr. Dre f. T.I. & Nas, “Topless”
- story THE FADER
Who knows when this was actually recorded, but if it’s going to be on Detox it’s pretty clear Detox is not going to be anything like either of the The Chronic’s, which featured three non-West Coasters between them. Considering all the young talent coming up in LA, we’re still holding out hope that some of this album will be a little less transplanted than this.
Download: Dr. Dre f. T.I., Nas & Justin Timberlake, “Topless” (via Nah Right)
Video: Young Jeezy, “My President”
- story THE FADER
That is John Lewis at the end of this video. Young Jeezy got John Lewis to be in his video! Can you imagine? We would like to launch a rocket into the sky that played this song. It would play it for the Gaza strip and play it for all of the mourning people in Oakland, California. We would like to go back in time and play it for Rodney King and play it for all of the people in Nigeria who have seen their resources depleted by Shell. We want to play it for all of the victims of the terrorist kidnappings in Mumbai. We want to play it for all the people in the United States who do not have adequate health care, who got weaseled into an unfair mortgage they couldn’t afford. Young Jeezy cannot change any of these things, Barack Obama hopefully can help with some of them. But both of them can inspire grandiosity within men and women. “My president is black! My Lambo’s blue!” Shit! If all of this is okay with John Lewis it is okay with us. On Tuesday, when Barack Obama is at work, we at FADER will be in the office and we are happy about that because we know so many people have lost their jobs. We are going to watch the inauguration on mute and play this song.
Special FADER/”My President” bonus: John Lewis screenshot after the jump for you to use as your Buddy Icon.
Freeload: City of God’s Son
- story THE FADER
Remember Prince Paul’s A Prince Among Thieves? Kenzo Digital’s concept album City of God’s Son is a lot like that, except there is no song where Everlast raps as a racist cop. Instead, the project flips the idea of the hip-hop skit into an hour long drug narrative that casts Ghostface, Nas and Jay-Z as a trio of friends growing up together in New York. Nerds can hypothesize about what such a friendship might’ve been like (Rap Power Rangers?), but we’re nerding out in the opposite direction by getting excited that the whole thing is narrated by the oft-sampled Fania legend Joe Bataan. Kudos to Kenzo for the dedication to plot structure and insane work ethic, too. They recommened listening all at once, at night, on headphones, but don’t worry, there are plans to play the work, along with a video component in New York this summer.
Download: City of God’s Son
-
posted on Jan 14, 2009 in MP3 / STREAMS tags city of god's son, freeload, ghostface, hip hop, Jay-Z, nas
Freeload: Ludacris f. Jay-Z & Nas, “I Do It For Hip Hop”
- story THE FADER
We were waiting for the tag-free version and here it is, from Luda’s Theater of the Mind, due November 24th. Produced by Wyldfyer, the same kid behind “Black Republicans” and “Last of a Dying Breed” featuring Likkle Wayne, the latter also from Theater. We love these dudes like brothers, but the only guy we know that they know that’s doing it only for Hip Hop at this point is Dame Dash. (thanks to Young Sav)
Download: Ludacris f. Jay-Z & Nas, “I Do It For Hip Hop”
Nobody Wa s Thirsty
- story THE FADER
We were asking ourselves what Nas has to do with Australian denim label Nobody and an international collaboration bringing water to developing countries, but it’s Nas, so who knows? The Nobody label teamed up with charity:water and Ivan Kane’s Café Wa s (spelling correct) to create a t-shirt, the purchase of which will help provide clean drinking water to developing countries around the world, the same noble cause that Jay-Z took up with the United Nations last year.
