In 2012, The Orchard’s large catalog grew way larger, thanks to mergers with IODA and IRIS. To manage the influx, we put all of the new tunes onto a 50TB external hard drive, stuck the USBs into our left ears, and swallowed 168 hours-worth of “5 Hour Energy.” When we were finally discharged from NYU Medical, we compared notes and decided that these ten under-the-radar releases deserve your love and affection.
Masta Ace, MF DOOM: MA_DOOM: Son Of Yvonne [Fat Beats]
1990s rap legend Masta Ace rhymes about his Brownsville childhood over MF Doom’s throwback beats. Big Daddy Kane (!) and Doom guest on “Think I Am,” which revisits Doom’s own “Who You Think I Am,” from his 1999 album Operation: Doomsday (same killer Yusef Lateef sample too). Listen to “Slow Down” on SoundCloud.
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Various Artists: Light In The Attic 10 Year Anniversary Single Series [Light In The Attic]
Limited edition 7″ singles featuring covers of LITA artists backed with the original track. They’re all burners, but standouts include Ariel Pink and Dam Funk‘s smoldering take on Donnie & Joe Emerson‘s soul-pop masterpiece “Baby,” Charles Bradley and The Menahan Street Band‘s wrenchingly soulful cover of “I’ll Slip Away” by comeback kid of the year Rodriguez, and a stunning take on Wendy Rene‘s classic “After The Laughter Come Tears” by Sweet Tea [Alex Maas of The Black Angels, and Erika Wennerstrom of Heartless Bastards]. Stream the latter here.
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Matsuki Ayumu: One Billion Year Record [Ample Play]
Q: What would happen if The Apples In Stereo had recorded Fun Trick Noisemaker in Tokyo, Japan?
A: This double-album whopper of fun Lo-Fi Psychedelic Indie Pop, issued by Cornershop’s label. We don’t know Japanese, but we dig fuzzy Elephant Six sounds and kitchen-sink instrumentation. Stream it via SoundCloud.
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Dean Blunt & Inga Copeland: Black Is Beautiful [Hyperdub]
Formerly known as Hype Williams, this mysterious duo has made have one of the most enigmatic albums of the year with Black Is Beautiful, a post-modern collection of sonic vignettes that incorporates Dub, distortion, drum machine rhythms, abstract Electronica, free Jazz, ambient sounds, Lo-Fi R&B and Pop, but nevertheless maintains a strong emotional core. As an added bonus, they also cover Donnie & Joe Emerson’s “Baby” ["2"].
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Badknight: It’s Alright [GHouse]
If you like delicate string-laden Nick Drake-like Folk, put an ear to Bostonians Emily Lenae (vocals) and Devin McKnight (guitar). This seven-song debut snuck out last November, so we’re cheating a bit. Download the standout “Just Like That” for free from their Bandcamp.
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Thee Oh Sees / Total Control split [Castle Face Records]
This has been in steady rotation since I saw both bands play two of the more raucous sets in recent memory at 285 Kent last year. San Francisco garage titans Thee Oh Sees deliver four scorching versions of old favorites recorded in a live session that effectively captures the band’s raw, manic on-stage energy. On the flip, Australia’s Total Control play icy but compelling Gothic Synth Punk that nods to influences like Suicide, Swell Maps and Joy Division. Watch the video for Total Control’s “For Lease” here.
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Agent Ribbons: Let Them Talk [Antenna Farm]
In 2010, this female duo’s second album Chateau Crone caught our ears with unpredictable hooks that jangled like The Aislers Set and “Kinks-era” Lilys. In September, they issued this digital-only five-song EP to whet appetites for a 2013 full-length. Listen to “Family Haircut” on SoundCloud.
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Lee Hazlewood: A House Safe For Tigers [Light In The Attic]
This 1975 album has long stood as one of the Lee Hazlewood‘s most obscure recordings, but it’s on par with some of his finest work. The soundtrack to an equally obscure made-for-television quasi-documentary Hazlewood made as a recluse in early-’70s Sweden, it’s an album that’s majestic, cinematic and uncharacteristically upbeat.
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The Twerps: Work It Out 7″ [Underwater Peoples / Chapter Music]
These Australians scratch our Flying Nun itch with a nonchalant breezy breakup kissoff (“Work It Out”), a snotty escapist youth anthem (“He’s In Stock”), and a bittersweet boy-girl duet (“Recall”). Important: not to be confused with these guys, who look like a good time nevertheless. Listen to “Work It Out” via SoundCloud.
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U.S. Girls: GEM [FatCat Records]
On her FatCat Records debut, Megham Remy has created a hazy and hallucinatory exploration of ’60s girl group Pop and ‘70s Glam Rock filtered through experimental abstraction, DIY recording techniques, and a marked interest in tweaking gender perspectives. GEM is a pop record that tears away many of the genre’s conventions to get to the heart of its most obsessive, hedonistic, and masochistic impulses. Her cover of Brock Robinson’s “Jack” [video] exemplifies this in spades.
Want more? Here’s last year’s list.
Oxnard, CA beatsmith/MC Oh No may not be quite as insanely prolific as his older brother Madlib, but he is every bit as restlessly inventive. Previous albums have taken their inspiration from Canadian composer Galt MacDermot (Exodus Into Unheard Rhythms), psychedelic rock from Turkey, Lebanon, Greece and Italy (Dr. No’s Oxperiment), and rare funk, jazz, folk and rock from Ethiopia (Dr. No’s Ethiopium).
For Ohnomite – out this week via Five Day Weekend/Brick Records — Oh No was given unprecedented and unfettered access to the audio archives of legendary (and legendarily filthy) comedian/musician/actor/proto-rapper Rudy Ray Moore, best known as the titular character in the 1975 “Blaxploitation” classic Dolemite. Drawing from that film’s classic soundtrack as well as the 1976 sequel The Human Tornado, 1977’s Petey Wheatstraw and much more including a treasure trove of previously unreleased instrumentals and a capellas, Oh No has crafted an album that harkens back to the golden age of sample-based production, full of elastic funk, hard-hitting drums, soulful horns, and hilarious vocal snippets.
This is no mere sonic homage or exercise in nostalgia though. Like the LPs with which Moore made his name in the late ‘60s and ‘70s, Ohnomite is a bonafide party record. Most of the lyrical duties are handled by a bevy of guests including MF Doom, Evidence, Phife Dawg, Erick Sermon, Sticky Fingaz, Rapper Pooh, and Guilty Simpson, and their brainy lyricism and constant passing of the mic gives the proceedings the feel of an old school cypher. It’s a fitting tribute to a man that helped invent the art of rhyme.
Stream the first single “3 Dollars [ft. MF Doom]” via Pitchfork.
It’s the summer of 2002 at a major label in midtown NY. The interns are all settled in and learning where the extra staples are and how to forward the phone calls. The work flow is flowin’, the AC is humming and the radio has been pumping the classic rock all day. Suddenly The Doors‘ “Five to One” comes on. The volume is up, the drums are pulsing and all of the heads in our row of cubicles are nodding. “Great tune,” says my co-worker. Without missing a beat (no pun intended) our intern turns to my co-worker and says, “Yo…I didn’t know you like Jay-Z! This song is blazin’!”
Should we laugh? Should we throw something at him? HR probably would have frowned upon both options, so we went with the look of frightened surprise and immediate correction. “This is the Doors, dude! Not Jay-Z.” Now strap in and hold on for this next part, cause then the intern says, “Oh,” with a perplexed gaze and an accepting head nod. “So the Doors play Jay-Z songs?”
Shhhhhh…shhhhh. Don’t get angry. Its easy to flip into music guru mode and go off on a passive aggressive diatribe showing off your vast musical knowledge and belittling the intern, but take the high road my friends. Don’t hate on sample heavy artists and don’t hate on knowledgably light fans. Samples bridge gaps and expose different generations to different styles of music, all the while sharing the same line of reasoning behind what makes the song great. It’s a symbiotic relationship, so let’s educate rather than condescend.
Take for example The Incredible Bongo Band’s “Apache.” The drums in that song inspired a laundry list of some of the greatest rappers of all time. Like who? Like how’s this for a list of credentials: 2 Live Crew, Apache, Breeze, Busta Rhymes, Busy Bee, Chubb Rock, Coldcut, Dee Patten, Digital, DJ Jazzy Jeff & the Fresh Prince, Double D & Steinski, Everlast, Faith Evans ft Black Rob, Freddie Foxx, Freestylers, Sound of London, Geto Boys, Goldie, Grandmaster Flash & the Furious Five, Hammer, Insane Poetry, J. Majik, Jive All Stars, Kool G Rap, Kool Moe Dee, KRS-One, Leaders of the New School, LL Cool J, Moby, Nas, Run-DMC, Schoolly D, Sugarhill Gang, Tone Loc,West Street Mob, and Young MC, just to name a few.
And from there we can look to see how fellow rapper and producer MF Doom struck a chord with Ghostface Killah on his monster record Fishscale. Sampling MF Doom’s “Fenugreek,” Ghost’s “9 milli bros.” is one of the most banging tracks on the record.
From Dr. Dre and the rest of the NWA crew popping on a Brass Construction record, listening to “The Message” and creating “I Aint Tha 1,” to Ann Peebles’ “I Can’t Stand The Rain” helping to put Missy Elliot on the map in Supa Dupa fly fashion, we need to show music fans of today that samples use the momentum of yesteryear to propel their favorite artists of today.
And speaking of launching careers, Pharoah Monch pummeled onto the scene (pun intended this time) with the use of Akira Ifukube’s “Godzilla’s Theme (from “Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah”).”
A post about samples wouldn’t be complete without paying homage to the one and only Wu Tang Clan (comin at ya). Their samples are vast and the beats are insane, and it’s a really fun moment when you sit and listen to a compilation like Fallin Off The Reel Vol. 1 , hear El Michaels Affair’s “CREAM,” (Yes, that’s right…not only a sample in the song, but as the title as well) and start envisioning RZA sitting and listening to that record, digging out the sample and laying down the beat.
So there you have it. Samples are all around us and have inspired a generation of artists and fans while simultaneously paying homage and breathing new life into the music of some of the greatest and most soulful artists of all time. And if you don’t know those artists, ya betta ask somebody. Take a cue from the Wu, throw an “S” in front of “C.R.E.A.M.” and scream: Sample Cuts Rule Everything Around Me, SCREAM get the money…dolla dolla bill ya’ll.
