NEW MUXTAPE: ROBOTRIPPIN MOSTLY

Oh Honey-Delegation
Sample line: "She aint the kind to show off her mind/ but talking bout love she's clever." Is this an ode to dumb chicks? Don't know.

Big Pimpin-The Dogg Pound
Although Tha Dogg Pound strictu senso refers to only Daz and Kurupt, in fact we all know that on any Dogg Pound track we will also see Snoop and Nate Dogg whose presence is so ubiquitous as to make them almost full members. I cannot recall if Daz or Kurupt had any participation whatsoever in Snoop's short-lived porn career. This song is pretty much what will make Southern California shine evermore in the memories of rap fans: bragadaccio, funk samples, good-natured gang banging and of course Nate Dogg crooning his fucking ass off. Of particular note: spoken word interlude using extended "pen as ho" metaphor at 2:45.

Throw Your Hands Up-8Ball and MJG f. Outkast
8Ball and MJG seem eternally destined to exist at the second tier of southern rap. I think it is because all of their songs sort of turn into really awesome posse cuts.As can be seen in Pure Uncut, Throw Your Hands Up and–their biggest brush with fame–the guest spot on Three 6's Stay Fly, where MJG shat on everybodys' verse. I think that is why they put dude last, they knew that if it went MJG then Crunchy Black people would just turn that shit off. This track with Outkast shows how well they work with other artists–pumping out a great southern pride jam: "people barbecuing in the front yard/money from the first of the month card". This song is also really well integrated rhythmically. The chorus and the first couple of verses stick real tightly to the beat which makes Big Boi's departure from that scheme that much more awesome. Anyway if you are interested in something else, check out a track called Don't Flex which includes the line "got more butt/ than she got body". Oh, and 8Ball is literally shaped like a ball.

Happy Feelingz–Z-Ro
In the parts of the internet where I hang out one sometimes hears debates over whether or not Z-Ro is the tupac of southern rap. Die-hard fans blanche at this comparison for no real reason except to preserve Z-Ro's realness. On the other hand, there will always be people for whom all rap must radiate from the Biggie-Tupac binary. I really don't give a shit, either way, Z-Ro is fucking amazing and definitely tupacesque in that he is sometimes embarassingly personal. My opinion is that Z-Ro is similar to the Tupac as we knew him before they studied his raps at liberal arts colleges. Basicallly before his image was neutered of all thugishness. Remember that Tupac? When he was a startingly complex thug and not a misunderstood poetic soul? That is what Z-Ro is like. Dude raps about trying to kill himself, thanks mental health professional and talks about doing drugs and shooting people eg. "pussy in the middle of the forehead/ I want to see my foes dead." Something tells me that there wont be a class on that at Berkeley anytime soon. Fucking hippies.

PS if you like Z-Ro, cocaineblunts put up a best-of mix.

Woo-Haa (Jay Dee RMX)-Busta Buss
No one needs me to say that Jay Dee was a force of nature or that the "game" will not be the same without him. Interestingly enough, his untimely death seems to have jogged loose something in the interflow and new remixes are everywhere. Here is one of woo-haa!! a song which is annoying at best in its original form. Somehow Busta's pre-scary-ripped insanity is more affective when pitted against the nonchalance of a Jay Dee beat.

No Static-Nappy Roots
What happened to these dudes? I think that they tried to work the "we're country" thing about 3 years too soon, because soon after this people started repping Huntsville and Baton Rouge. They might have also been too likeable, because there are some things (like being country) that only Juvenile can pull off. People with teardrop tattoos generally get what they want. Anyway this song uses a Greg Nice sample to great effect. I hope that these dudes can bring some more shit like this.

Gangsta Party-Yo Gotti f. Bun B, 8Ball and MJG
Do you think that MJG feels bad that people always write 8Ball's name first? That's not what I want to talk about. What I want to talk about is the fact that the first rule of rap is to never invite Bun B to be on your song. He will show you up. Dude never slips. This song is a banger and I don't want to talk about it–just play it as loud as you can.

Grind Baby-PRGz
I pretty much already said what I had to say about this jam.

Pimpin All Over the World (Go go RMX)-Luda
I am a gigantic Ludacris fan. Maybe you are getting the idea, but there is a certain rap tone which I am drawn to–good natured thuggish/pimpishness. Its like; we're at the club, I'm acting stupid, I don't take myself too seriously but if you cross me I will fucking eat your brains. Or, equally; hey I'm self-deprecating and silly, look at my crazy hair–but no seriously let me take nasty-ass pictures of you and all of your friends. I feel that Luda has at least half of this equation down–his thuggishness is unconvincing, but I do believe in his ability to pimp all over the world. This track and "Area Codes" establishes the kind of pimp-in-the-age-of-globalization motif that Luda mines so fruitfully in his work. Oh and this go-go remix enhances the summery-ness of the original and offsets the cheeziness of the background singers.

That Shit (Jay Dee RMX)-ATCQ
Another Jay Dee remix that is getting close to embarrassing but never gets there. Jay Dee raps about detroit and says: "make the ladies say ho/ and make them hos say ow/ and them owls say hoot." I don't know what that means.

Devin the Dude f. Odd Squad–Just Tryin ta Live
Devin the Dude's oeuvre is mad deep. He is a machine that just generates low-key cadillac music ceaselessly. What is cool about the Dude is that, along with his unique, behind the beat rapping and self-deprecating subject matter, his productions are always really live. It is a good counterpoint to many other southern/Houston rappers whose beats often sound like a 808 preset–all 16th note high hats and no funk. The Dude brings equal parts skittery hats and organ, bass, vocals. If you have been in Texas in August you know why this shit is so slow.

After Laughter (Comes Tears)-Wendy Rene
This song was sampled by the Wu for their track Tearz, a song that I don't really like. The original is amazing, though and should be listened to in lieu of the Wu-Tang song. Actually, somebody, take the Ghostface verse and mix it over this song. Do that.

LISTEN NOW!

Oh and don't trip if you missed the last muxtape, I will up it in zip form in a few days.

Will This Be the Worst Thing Ever Recorded?

Saul Williams, the world's most famous slam poet (not a good thing), and Trent Reznor made an album that is called, wait for it...NIGGY TARDUST. Nuff said.

DUDES.

Cross-posted from the new blog Dudesdudesdudes

Yall,
Some months back Snack and I got the idea that we would start a duo (bass and accordion) called DUDES and play songs with titles like "Hey Ryan, Let's Get Girlfriends With Cool Haircuts." Ideally, we would have 0 web presence and only record cassette tapes. Unfortunately, fate intervened in the form of our burgeoning rap careers and our mutual laziness. We had one rehearsal and we pretty much just smoked cigarettes and enthused about Brazilian psych music (Tom Zé!). Fast forward to now and Ryan is moving to Williamsburg to turn the apparel world on its head by starting a retail store which only sells blank, colored shirts and other hipster-lifestyle accoutrements. Genius. I am still in grad school, marginally employed and spending a lot of time on the internet. That was the situation as of last week. Then, in a completely unrelated stroke of tard-genius I got the idea to write a song about sailing. This is especially odd since I have been sailing like once and I don't like fishing. When it was almost done I sat at my computer and assured myself that surely this was the best song about sailing written in the last two weeks. There was only one way to find out: to challenge Snackface aka RPY aka P to write a superior song about sailing. This idea, together with our renewed interest in talking mad shit (wiffle ball), spurred us to resurrect the DUDES project in the form of a song writing competition. To whit:

1) Every two weeks a subject will be chosen at random by a super-advanced computar program that we will talk about in a few days. At the end of thos 2 weeks, the songs will be uploaded to the blog and the voting period will last the next 2 weeks and so on.

2) Everyone is encouraged to vote. Votes will be sent to a neutral 3rd party who will tally them without informing us of the totals. Our egos are very fragile.

3) Songs must be primarily written and vocalized by the contestant. Otherwise, anything goes–bring in the fucking Polyphonic Spree if you want.

4) Songs must be over 1 minute long.

5) The prize/consequences of teh competition have yet to be determined. Stay posted

I am tired of writing, so I am going to stop now.
I love you.
Sexfizzy

Grind Baby

This track, Grind Baby, by Paper Route Gangstaz samples Weezer and it absolutely kills. The best thing is that it is not ironic nor is it trying to ride on the coattails of the greatness of the Weezer song–it is just a great song that samples another great song. I am really happy that we seem to have gotten to this place in music, where we can all just admit that we live in the same internet and be done with it. Eventually EVERY SINGLE soul/funk/jazz/"boogie" record will have been sampled to death (2012?) and we will have to move on to other stuff anyway–so why not do it now? This kind of sampling seems to me to be the only response to the idiotic attitude that people (blogjays) have had in the recent past towards towards their "favorite" rap artists of the moment (Three 6, E-40, Dipset, Lil' Wayne). This is the attitude wherein the blogosphere acts all giddy when these dudes mention something other than drugs, money or ladies. Juelz says Bon Jovi and half of the graphic designers on the east coast crap themselves. Lil' Wayne mentions a sport other than basketball and dudes in New Era hats and neon Nike dunks have aneurysms trying to blog about it. Isn't this attitude kind of condescending? To suggest, even in the form of verbose, sycophantic Pitchfork reviews, that rappers live in some sort of parallel universe separated from the "rest of us" by a type of cultural one way mirror? We can take from them (16 year old in skinny jeans wearing Three 6 shirt and listening to fidget/bmore remixes of A Bay Bay) but the minute that a rapper tries to participate in the wider, non-rap world, we fall off our chairs. PRGz are putting out a record on Mad Decent, which is good since they are pretty much the most solid, gimmick free label in this Internet dance shit and PRGz deserves all the support they can get.

Grind Baby-PRGz

Crap in a Bag

Are you ever biking around and wonder what all the crap is in your bag? Like the stuff that just accumulates whenever you rotate everything else forming the sediment of your bag? I do, like all the time. So today I decided to just dump that shit out and see what it was. I was pretty proud. Mahatma rice, condoms and weird pills all in one bag? Not one, but two dictionaries? Trash? Click on the picture to see the annotated picture.

NEW MUXTAPE

LISTEN!

Genies Afraid of the Dark-Roy Alton
On the whole, there are far too few songs about genies in my life right now. In fact, there are basically none except for this one and "Never Had a Friend Like Me" from Aladdin. I am pretty sure that this song is about ghosts, though, and not about the kind of genies that grant wishes and live in lamps. I will take what I can get, though. Actually, isn't a soca song about ghosts, like twice as rad as the normal soca subject matter which is mainly doing it and "wineing pon it"? Just saying.

Can we hang out tonight?-Count Bass D

This song sums up everything that I wish I could say to cute girls at the grocery store.
Can we hang out tonight?
Will you show up?
Have fun if you want to, girl,
You aint gotta act grown up
You ask too many questions, baby,
You wonder about my love,
All I'm asking is
Can we hang out tonight?
In fact, I might just walk around blaring this tune and looking at chicks with the questioning eyebrow. Count Bass D is rad, has been rad for a bit. Nowadays, in the world of pimply blogjays, it is common for people to have reservations about the Stone's Throw sort of aesthetic of people like the Count. Fuck them.

?-Moodymann
Moodymann was a big name in house music for a while, I haven't heard anything from him in a bit. The awesomeness of this song corresponds to my theory which dictates that the raditude of dance music is directly related to the amount of black dudes from detroit involved. Sexless white people=death=fist pumping when you should be dancing.

Slide Slide-Basement Jaxx
Old Basement Jaxx. If you were stuck on a desert island and had to pick Daft Punk or the Jaxx, what would you do? You know what I would do.

Stay the Night-Billy Ocean
Billy Ocean is a god among men. "You're a woman, I'm a man/Let's do what nature planned"? Don't tell Judith Butler!

A Minha Menina-Jorge Ben
So maybe you have seen McDonald's new series of hipster-baiting ads: dudes in v-necks and moustaches telling you to eat a mchicken sandwich, some girl in cute flats outside of her pseudo gentrified loft telling you to try the mcburger. It was bound to happen and frankly I am glad. LETS ALL GET PAID, BITCHES! But they hit a new high when they transmuted the hipsterness into using the Os Mutantes (aka the only brazilian band besides Bonde do Role and CSS that gets play in Urban Outfitters) version of A Minha Menina in an ad. Oh snap! Why do I remain unruffled? Because I know that it is a Jorge Ben song and I am in possession of the original version–which is slightly less cool than the mutantes version, but I will claim otherwise from now on.

Gobbledigook-Sigur Rós
This is not a Sigur Rós song. Actually it is, but I had to be convinced. I associate Sigur Ros with hangovers, because that is when I play their music–lying in bed trying not to die and imagining that I am on a windswept icelandic knoll and not sweating my face off in Texas. This, however, is some sort of, dare I say, raucous joy-song. Even the title is recognizable gibberish. I am kind of a fan.

Paradise-Young Chris f. Lil' Wayne
Lil' Wayne's new album is not that good. I am very far from saying that he is the greatest rapper alive. NEW RULE: When Salon.com says that you are the greatest rapper of all time, you are most certainly not. This is a Young Chris song and it is a bout being high and wanting to be more high, Lil' Wayne shines on this and Young Chris brings it hard. Even Akon-esque hook singer guy sounds good. Faux-caribbean music!

Somebody's Watching Me-Sweet
I don't know jack shit about this song besides the fact that it rules balls.

Finally Changes-KOT v. Chris Lake
Here's the thing, Kings of Tomorrow have this song called Finally. Chris Lake has this song called Changes. here they have been brought together to form the proverbial voltron of dancefloor bangers.

Can't Satisfy Her-I Wayne
People who are too embarassed to use the term "mashup" generally say "blend." It evokes fewer images of britney spears singing over falco. That said, this is a blend of I Wayne's Can't Satisfy Her with Bad Boys. While I am sorry to see Shyne go, I think that Wayne sounds great over this beat, especially since the original rhythm for Can't Satisfy Her is kind of trife. This song is essentially about how being a ho is not merely something one does, it is something one is. It is a legitimate existential position. ALSO: "she needs more wood for the fire." Holy pun!

Up in the Treehouse-Cody Chesnutt
All of this Afrobama business got me thinking about Cody Chesnutt. I went back and listened to the Headphone Masterpiece–dude filled 2 CDs with some of the most uneven material I have heard in a bit. He fills a great niche, though. People who like ass shaking too much to seriously dig Steven Merritt, yet like the grit of a 4 track tape recorder. Enter Msr. Chesnutt. while this song is not of the ass shaking variety, it is is really sweet.

Hillary

Best Mixtape of the Summer?

Devlin of Devlin and Darko put together this wicked mixtape called Love in the Time of War. Its fucking huge and I recommend that everyone download it immediately. Their blog Fully Fitted is awesome as well.

I SAID A SOY LATTE!

This is the sort of thing that is almost too good to be true. 

Myspace and the Muxtape

So, as you may have noticed, there is something new here at Sexfacerulez...a mixtape! I plan on keeping this mixtape up to date, changing things up every two weeks or so, so feel free to click the tape at your right and stream my thoughts into your mind. DIRECTLY INTO YOUR MIND.

In other news, I have finally started up the Sexface solo myspace page. I threw two new joints up on there and I suggest all of you make me your myspace friend so that you can be privy to all the amazing, next level shit that will be transpiring over there. 

Commercials

Are you ever watching TV at night and realize that the horrible television ads are meant for YOU? For example, I watch the Family Guy every night at 10:30–let's just pretend like that isn't kind of pathetic. I recently realized that all the ads are either for fried chicken, ITT Tech, cheap auto insurance or phone sex. While I think that I am not in immediate need of any of these things (although I might go back to school to get my computer drafting certificate if this whole PhD thing doesn't work out) it makes me kind of concerned to think that I am watching the same show at the same time as a whole bunch of jobless pervs who are uninsured. Doesn't sound like me at all. 

Oh and a more substantial note, I recommend that everyone listen to this internet radio show. Dâm-Funk is a DJ and producer from LA who is currently killing it on the 80's funk tip. This shit is solid gold.