LIVSFORMER

elanra: This is my country. We need help right now. Please...

Sun, 02 Jun 2013 12:31:16 -0400

elanra:

This is my country. We need help right now. Please reblog and signal boost.

Photo

Wed, 01 May 2013 06:45:51 -0400

djstef415: Mantronix in-store at Bobby G’s Soul Disco Records,...

Wed, 20 Mar 2013 15:42:24 -0400

djstef415:

Mantronix in-store at Bobby G’s Soul Disco Records, Market Street San Francisco 1987

dapperdanofharlem: Check out this week’s edition of The New...

Wed, 20 Mar 2013 15:13:16 -0400

dapperdanofharlem:

Check out this week’s edition of The New Yorker. Kelefa Sanneh wrote a great profile on me for their style issue.

Article: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2013/03/25/130325fa_fact_sanneh

Podcast: http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/culture/2013/03/out-loud-dapper-dan.html

Gallery: http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/photobooth/2013/03/dapper-dans-designs.html

unkutdotcom: Young Fizzy Womack I reblog anything...

Sun, 03 Mar 2013 12:04:50 -0500

unkutdotcom:

Young Fizzy Womack

I reblog anything FILA-related from now on… The legend Lil Fame!

lavishbungalows: COR MEGA RAW FOREVER UR WHOLE TEAM IS PUSSY...

Sun, 03 Mar 2013 07:32:49 -0500

lavishbungalows:

COR MEGA RAW FOREVER

UR WHOLE TEAM IS PUSSY WHEN I SQUEEZE VAGINAS BLEED

part 2

Sun, 17 Feb 2013 19:22:20 -0500

part 2

RA DIGGS 2 REAL FOR RAP FT UNCLE MURDA

Sun, 17 Feb 2013 14:36:55 -0500

RA DIGGS 2 REAL FOR RAP FT UNCLE MURDA

Star & Buc Wild: NYC cable 1998/99 - part 2

Sun, 17 Feb 2013 14:25:44 -0500

Star & Buc Wild: NYC cable 1998/99 - part 2

pshinesthegodaow: R.I.PUNISHER !!

Fri, 08 Feb 2013 02:40:03 -0500

pshinesthegodaow:

R.I.PUNISHER !!

“The stars crying, the same time my thoughts dying. We...

Wed, 06 Feb 2013 14:10:00 -0500

“The stars crying, the same time my thoughts dying.
We used science and math and we formed the alliance.
I sold crack, the same thing my moms buying.
My pops said he’s coming home, but I knew he was lying.

A tear roll down my mom’s eye - my face dry,
heartless, staring at a coffin, I cant cry.
It hurt on the inside, I can’t lie.
This world cold, I’m staring up in the gray skies.
Pull off in the gray five,
it’s hard to fight the pain so a nigga stay high.

The doctor said all the cancer was gone.
My grandmother passed, it’s hard for me to answer my phone.

I grab the AK and break it apart,
look out the windows of my ‘jects, man, its breaking my heart.
This ain’t life, this ain’t living,
the roll of the dice; either dead or in prison

*chorus*

Shots flying, cops dying, pops crying
out. In the bedroom a little girl can’t stop crying.
She got molested, her mom said stop lying.
Only nine, got burnt in the face with a hot iron.

Moms never hugged her, pops always touched her.
Now she’s sixteen, selling her body, but I’ll never judge her.
In a strip bar getting money from the hustlers,
she married the streets, a real man - she’ll never love him.”

wordtothemother: Hip Hop Weekly. Portraits 1980 -...

Sat, 19 Jan 2013 11:02:55 -0500

wordtothemother:

Hip Hop Weekly. Portraits 1980 - 2010.

Wu-Tang Clan.

Incredible photo. Ghostface rocking that World Cup 94 gear.

unclehowie: ILL BILL “The Grimy Awards” CD/DVDCD Track...

Sat, 19 Jan 2013 06:42:14 -0500

unclehowie:

ILL BILL “The Grimy Awards” CD/DVD

CD Track Listing:

1. What Does It All Mean? prod. by ILL BILL
2. Paul Baloff prod. by MoSS
3. I Don’t Know How Long It’s Gonna Last
4. Acceptance Speech feat. A-Trak, prod. by Junior Makhno
5. Truth prod. by Pete Rock
6. Exploding Octopus prod. by ILL BILL
7. Forty Deuce Hebrew feat. HR of Bad Brains, prod. by ILL BILL
8. How To Survive The Apocalypse prod. by Psycho Les
9. Vio-Lence feat. Shabazz The Disciple & Lil Fame of M.O.P., prod. by DJ Skizz
10. Acid Reflux prod. by Large Professor
11. L’Amour East feat. Meyhem Lauren & Q-Unique, prod. by Ayatollah
12. Power feat. OC & Cormega, prod. by DJ Muggs
13. When I Die feat. Tia Thomas, prod. by Pete Rock
14. Severed Heads feat. El-P, prod. by El-P
15. 120% Darkside Justice feat. Jedi Mind Tricks, prod. by C-Lance
16. Canarsie High prod. by Large Professor
17. World Premier prod. by DJ Premier

DVD Video Track Listing

1. When I Die feat. Tia Thomas
2. Exploding Octopus
3. ILL BILL TV
4. My Uncle
5. Society Is Brainwashed
6. War Is My Destiny feat. Immortal Technique & Max Cavalera

IN STORES February 26, 2013.

I used to be the biggest Ill Bill fan, but these days he just sounds hella tired. Gonna check it out for the guests, though…

perfectionisperfected: HD feat. Hen Sippa - “Still Hungry,”...

Sat, 19 Jan 2013 06:35:25 -0500

perfectionisperfected:

HD feat. Hen Sippa - “Still Hungry,” (YouTube, 2013).

I imagine this is off of No Dayz Off, which drops February 15. Perfect song title and subject, because I think it really is why HD rapping better than anyone else in the Bay right now. He’s motivated and isn’t getting lazy or complacent. Hopefully critics/bloggers/twitters/humans outside the Bay other than David Drake and H.L. (and maybe The Martorialist is into him?) will start to recognize this guy is great.

HD is one of the best doing in the Bay area… in the world matter of fact…

Photo

Thu, 10 Jan 2013 12:34:42 -0500

"When we are dead, seek not our tomb in the earth, but find it in the hearts of men."

Thu, 03 Jan 2013 11:16:03 -0500

“When we are dead,
seek not our tomb in the earth,
but find it in the hearts of men.”

- Rumi (via moroccanstateofmind)

willystaley: On one of his stronger tracks this year, “Stove on...

Thu, 03 Jan 2013 11:15:30 -0500

willystaley:

On one of his stronger tracks this year, “Stove on High,” E-40 makes a rather bold claim. Assuming the voice of a wise street hustler offering unsolicited advice — something he has always done, but one which, in his middle age, has become strangely endearing — 40 says this: ”They can see through walls with radio waves, not infrared/the Xaver 800 is now nationwide spread.” I have no idea if this is true or not.

This isn’t new territory for E-40, who likes to talk about police technology. It was him on “Loyalty and Betrayal” warning potential high-speed specialists that CHP uses “a device called a spike strip.” And on the album before that, there he was on “Rules and Regulations” saying that “technology now allows po-po to look inside walls and see inside homes.” That was in 1999.

E-40’s story hasn’t changed, or gotten more accurate, but it has gotten more specific, which makes me want to believe it. A brief Google search on the Xaver 800 doesn’t indicate that police forces are using it across the country, but it wouldn’t surprise me if this highly-tactical hostage-situation sort of technology ended up used against dope dealers, as 40 suggests.

One aspect of the War on Drugs that I was completely unaware of before seeing The House I Live In is this: in certain jurisdictions, asset forfeiture in anti-drug cases directly funds the PDs that do the policing. You read that right. When cops take money and cars and whatever else in a raid, they can use that money to fund their operations. Perverse incentives abound! Innocent people’s cash can get confiscated, but that’s not the worst of it.

Here’s one incredibly interesting bit from a Cato Institute report as quoted by Drug War Facts:

[Asset forfeiture] has a unique application in the case of paramilitary raids. SWAT teams are typically expensive to maintain. Federal grants and free equipment get them up and running, but local departments are often then forced to foot the costs of keeping members up to date on tactics and weapons training as well as the upkeep of equipment. Because the more traditional uses of SWAT teams—emergency situations like barricades, hostage takings, and bank robberies—don’t bring lucrative forfeiture opportunities (or federal funding), police officials feel increasing pressure to send SWAT teams out on drug assignments, where the assets seized come back to the department and can help offset the costs of having a SWAT team in the first place.

And here’s where E-40’s claim about the Xaver 800 gets interesting to me. I mean, it seems unlikely that, say, Oakland’s SWAT team might have something specifically designed for counter-terrorism and hostage situations until you consider the fact that Oakland’s SWAT team probably hardly does much else besides bust drug dealers. Well, it has to justify and fund its existence in some way, right?

And this gets to a deeper discomfort I have about police and technology. I think the two relate.

Every time there’s a high-profile homicide in New York these days, it seems to get solved due to the widespread proliferation of video cameras. Video cameras that no one monitors, I assume. They’re just there in case a murderer or robber walks by one of them. And when they do, there they are on the front page, or online in streaming video. The Crazy 8 Killer, the 58th Street homicide, the Queens Subway Pusher, etc. Whenever I see this, I like to think about the Old Bowery and what it would be like to go to a movie theater down there and tell some young Irish thug that 100 years from now, in this same city, you wouldn’t get away with any of the shit you pull today thanks to the same technology that delights you so much right now.

But for law-abiding citizens, that’s a good thing. I do wonder, though, how happy we’ll be with our smartphones in, say, 30 years. When every dollar (or yuan-pegged dollar) we spend will be tracked, tied to a location and vendor, and then logged in some Arctic server farm to help advertisers and law enforcement keep better tabs on you. I mean, what if you really need to buy a shitload of Sudafed or fertilizer? Will an algorithm understand your alibi? Or will there be perverse incentives that almost guarantee it will not?

dapperdanofharlem: I did a Q & A with Australia’s Sneaker...

Thu, 20 Dec 2012 12:11:39 -0500

dapperdanofharlem:

I did a Q & A with Australia’s Sneaker Freaker Magazine. It’ll be available in January, 2013.

yamborghini: lets talk about how influential this group/record...

Sat, 15 Dec 2012 09:58:58 -0500

yamborghini:

lets talk about how influential this group/record is

YES

lavishbungalows: Henny Tha Don - “Miss You” (2008) You might...

Mon, 03 Dec 2012 07:30:42 -0500

lavishbungalows:

Henny Tha Don - “Miss You” (2008)

You might recognize this voice from “G’d Up” here which Bigga turned into one of his early classics when he did the remix for it. There is some Tim Vocals comparisons to be made here. Both harlem crooners with street rapper lyrics. On this song though he’s movin thru more Drizz Take Care territory with the singin to a bottle under a blue light moodiness. Minus the versace silk shirts, chalice and millions of adoring fans. More like no cup at all and under a lamp post holdin onto a crumbled up picture from wallet of deceased homie starin at that shits guzzlin a whole bottle of XO on a friday nite.