Category: Music

Happy Birthday, 9th Wonder

IFWT_stitch5[1]In celebration of 9th Wonder’s birthday, here’s a quick listing of my favorite 9th Wonder productions.

Little Brother – “Whatever You Say”

9th Wonder broke into the business with the underground Hip-Hop group Little Brother (best MCs out of the Carolinas). His trademark was taking obscure soul samples and using them as the foundation for LB’s tracks. 9th’s beat were perfect for the musings of Rapper Big Pooh and Phonte. Their first two albums1 were classics, and many of the cuts from those LPs stay in heavy rotation on my iPhone: “Lovin’ It” (their breakout track), “Say It Again” (shows how witty LB’s lyrics can be), “The Becoming” (“I LOVE this Rufus sample).

My favorite cut is “Whatever You Say”. Great sample (Cleo Laine’s “I Believe You”) and a great story (the classic boy-meets-girl, girl-disses-boy).

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My Favorite Albums: Mos Def and Talib Kweli are Black Star

blackstarby_yumgsta-d4qil6k

I first heard Black Star in the summer of 1999. I was between my senior and “super senior1” years in college and was interning in New York (working on Long Island, living in Brooklyn). It was a special time in my life; I was evaluating my next steps through all prisms (social, spiritual, economic) and was making key decisions about the direction I wanted to take.

New York was the perfect backdrop for my sometimes poignant, often pointless ponderings on life. The city was a hotbed of activity and I took in my fair share –readings at Nuyorican Poets Cafe, jazz at the Blue Note, way-too-late nights out at countless Reggae clubs, and long walks throughout Manhattan.

It was on one of those long walks that I came across Black Star; by chance I walked into a free concert in Central Park. N’Dea Davenport was the featured performer. She was good… but the real stars were the lyrical duo of Mos2 and Talib. They flowed effortlessly on stage, as if they had been doing it for years.

I wrote their names down in my quotes book (along with the line “Your skin is the inspiration for cocoa butter”) and went on about my business… forgetting about them after a while.

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My Favorite Albums: Al Green’s Call Me

Call MeI’ve never used this phase before (and I hope to never use it again), but nothing else describes Al Green’s Call Me as well as the oft-used term “Grown Folks Music”.

I was first introduced to a few cuts from Call Me in the summer of 1995, on a double date 1 with some friends from high school. My buddy (RIP Leon) supplied the wheels and the music – a 1991 Saab and Al Green’s Best Of. While I knew most of the tracks, two in particular stood out: “Call Me (Come Back Home)” and “You Ought To Be With Me”. There was a heft and grit in Al Green’s voice that I hadn’t heard since discovering Billie Holiday. He was raw and vulnerable…. but at the same time, tough, proud, and matter-of-fact.

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My Favorite Albums: Incognito’s Positivity

Spring 1995 41WTQ5EAWZL[1]: I was a senior in high school, preparing for graduation, submitting college applications… and getting ready for my senior prom. My senior year had turned out to be pretty good, and I was aiming for Senior Prom to be my magnum opus. I wanted to be the best dressed, smoothest, most sophisticated cat in the building.

By April, I had just about everything in order: Date confirmed. The ride on lock (my mom’s brand new Buick LeSabre). A black, single breasted tux with a midnight blue vest1. A day-of appointment to get a fresh cut.2 All that remained was completing my mixtape. Continue reading “My Favorite Albums: Incognito’s Positivity”

My Favorite Albums: Midnight Marauders

My love of A Tribe Called Quest’s Midnight Marauders1 starts, like most stories, with a girl.

I was a junior in high school and was on campus late one Saturday evening for an anti-drug rally. There were some girls from a neighboring town in attendance and I had taken a liking to one of them. The rally ended at 10PM, but their ride was late… so I chivalrously (and maybe selfishly) volunteered to wait with them. It was cold, but that’s ok: I let lil’ shorty wear my Starter jacket2 (and didn’t wash it for a month afterward because it smelled like her) while we passed the time by trying guess the hard-to-decipher lyrics to the chorus of “Electric Relaxation”.

“Electric Relaxation” was to 1993 as “I Need Love” was to 1987. Q-Tip was the smooth operator; Phife Dawg was the realist (I love the line: ‘I like ‘em brown, yellow, Puerto Rican, or Haitian’). The beat3 (a masterfully reworked sample of Ronnie Foster’s “Mystic Brew”) was an instant classic4.
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