Chocolate Peanut Butter: The Magic of the Analog Sound

Chocolate Peanut Butter: The Magic of the Analog Sound

It's a feeling that can only come from vinyl. When the drums kick in and hit your eardrums in a thick and smooth fashion. It vibrates form your headphones to your ear, all the way down to your jaw. You feel almost as though you've got a mouthful of Twix, and when you bring your teeth together, it's almost as if you're chewing something smooth and crunchy.

This is what I like to call Chocolate Peanut Butter: This is the sensation of vinyl; the analog sound.

It's simply not an experience you can get with digital; CERTAINLY not through the speakers of a laptop.

Let me explain for those who don't know*

Analog technology is continuous. When that needle hits the record, it stays on the record. It travels along the grooves of the record, translating audio signals into pulses of sound waves. Analog technology travels from one wavelength of sound to the next, passing through all wavelengths in between. The sound you get is smoother, warmer, and richer, hence Chocolate Peanut Butter.

Digital, on the other hand, calculates sound wavelengths, and plays only those wavelengths. Digital technology does not travel smoothly between wavelengths. Instead, it jumps from one wavelength to another. Ever wonder why digital instruments on your computer sound so choppy in comparison to real ones? It's because your computer is not bothering pass through all the wavelengths in between when transitioning from one wave to the next. The notes themselves sound pretty much the same, but you don't get the same smooth experience.

I've been checking out vinyl for the past few years, but my first REAL MEMORABLE chocolate peanut butter experience was while listening to an instrumental of "Intoxicated Woman" by DJ Oji (not an easily found single, but if you can get your hands on it, it's worth it). When those drums came in, and that chocolate peanut butter feeling set in, I was hooked. Vinyl is now a necessity for me.

So here's the deal:

There will be at least one recommended vinyl album at the end of every blog post. Consider it your dose of chocolate peanut butter. For those who don't own turntables, don't worry. I will be discussing much more than vinyl throughout this blog.

Here's your first dose:
DJ Oji: "Intoxicated Woman" Single (rare, but worth it)

Snoop: From Dogg to Lion

Last month, the rapper formerly known as Snoop Dogg made it official that he was going to start doing reggae music under the name Snoop Lion.

Why the name change, you ask?

During the press conference announcing his change, Snoop talks about his trip to Jamaica, and the inspiration he received while immersing himself in the Rastafari culture. states that while at the temple of the Nybigi center in Jamaica, the high priest asked his him his name. When he replied "Snoop Dogg," the priest responded "No more...you are the light. You are the lion."

In both Christian and Rastafari, the Lion represents the "reincarnation of Christ" (or Jah in Rastafari terms). In other words, according to the priest, Snoop reawakened after entering the temple; he came anew.

Snoop has certainly taken the priest's words to heart on his first single under his Lion moniker La La La. Everything about the song is reggae, from the sound to its Jamaican/Rastafari accent and dialect. Snoop's decision to use the accent questionable, because it is not his regular his regular voice is already smooth enough to sing over a reggae track. He still talks in his normal accent during interviews, which is the same accent he used rapping as Snoop Dogg. It makes his delivery seem a bit less authentic.

Check out the La La La single here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5d2F19K2kew

Regardless, Snoop's transformation IS an admirable one. In the press conference, Snoop explains that he wanted to make music that was inspiring to a wider audience, including young children and the elderly. Apparently, on many occasions, people close to Snoop have told him that his music is too violent and glorifies negativity. Now he has decided to do something different; something that nurtures people.

La La La shows Snoop talking about hypocrites who gossip about people who they are jealous of; something we have all experienced at some point in our lives. While I do love classic Snoop Dogg gangsta rap, I could never relate to the message because I have never lived that kind of lifestyle. I am a Black American who was lucky enough to NOT be exposed to that lifestyle as a child. Not to mention that 80% of hip hop's audience is Caucasian, most of whom do not truly know or understand the gangsta lifestyle either. Perhaps this is a sign that Snoop Lion is successfully reaching out to a wider audience not just with his cool style and rhythm (after all, Snoop did already have worldwide acclaim), but also with what he is talking about. Will the Lion have a lasting effect on Snoop and his listeners? Only time will tell.

View the whole press conference here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EX7EqelDuQg&feature=related

The Journey Travelled for Good Music

The Feeling You CAN'T Get from buying online

Hey everyone. I know it's been two months since my last post. Part 3 of the Scruples for Samples posting has been scrapped for now. I will be moving on to other topics. Thanks to all who've been checking out the blog since my last post.

Now, let's move onto the next topic...

I am writing this post right now with Del the Funky Homosapien's Attractive Sin album playing in the background (produced by Parallel Thought). It was just released this week, and what I had to go through to get it was annoying. Nevertheless, the ordeal made the purchase so much more rewarding.

First, some info about myself. I am the kind of person whom, if I really like an artist, I would much rather buy the physical copy of the album than to just simply download it on iTunes, or order it online. Unless I can hold the music in my hand, I don't feel as though I actually own the music. When I hold an iPod, I can't hold the album itself; only a hub for mP3 data (and all the other stuff you can hold on an iPod these days).

Now for a quick rundown of what happened:
Del's album was released on Tuesday, and as a huge Del fan, I made sure to get out to the music stores on that same day. I get to the first store, and they were already sold out(!!!) I then called a different store, who said that it was available at another one of their locations. I called the other location, and they claimed to have the cd, so I gave them my name and number so they could hold it for me.
I got there, only to find that they made a mistake; the cd was actually at their THIRD location, who would have to transfer it to the location I was at.
After waiting a day longer than I was told, I was finally able to pick it up from the second location.

The funny thing is: even after that frustrating experience, I would still prefer to take the journey to go buy a physical copy than to order the physical copy on amazon, or download it digitally.

Why?

A lot of the music I purchase is hard to find. There has always been something that I enjoyed about that; the feeling that I'm going after something rare; something precious. This doesn't go to say that an album will be good just because it's rare, but a lot of my favorite music tends to be hard to find anyway. I take every aspect of purchasing music seriously, from finding where it is, to actually going to retrieve it. Music has always been a deep passion of mine, and to take an actual excursion to find good music helps me fuel/maintain that passion. It makes me feel more like I earned it.

Obviously, ordering online will always be faster, but let's face it. The Holy Grail wasn't ordered on Amazon. It was sought after, and only found after overcoming hardships and obstacles. This week, Del and Parallel Thought's Attractive Sin was my Holy Grail.

Now onto the album itself. Del's conversational, and sometimes humorous lyrics sound great over Parallel Thought's production. In many cases, it feels more like he's speaking to you rather than rapping. This is part of what makes Del's style so unique. There are lots of jazz samples, some of them orchestral, all of them uplifting; and it wouldn't be Del album without any touches of funk.

Wanna see what I'm talking about? Listen to this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=spzEbio3XGA
Shouts to Del for all the years of great music!

Hip-Hop: Scruples for Samples (Part 2)

In the last segment, we established that producers who sample are justified in sampling as long they can manipulate the sample into something different. Now the question is, are producers really doing that? Are they being thorough about it?

In an interview, DJ 'Scribe,' founder of the DJ Collective, and the I Love Vinyl New York dance party tradition, tells journalist William "Upski" Wimsatt (Bomb the Suburbs) what he enjoys about being a hip-hop producer:

"...the creative part of hip-hop production is to take music from different genres...and fuse them into a new piece of music, a new whole - something distinct from the sum of its parts - something with a soul all on its own." (Wimsatt, 2001)

As a pianist, composer, and up-and-coming hip-hop artist, I've become increasingly concerned about how hip-hop producers seem to ignore the idea of their music being 'distinct from the sum of its parts;' that samples are not being chopped, mixed, rearranged, and experimented with enough to sound like a truly new song. I just feel that stretching one's creative boundaries through sampling is more than just adding a new drum beat or changing the key of the sample. A lot of samples today can be easily recognized from the original song with a little digital crate digging. The internet makes it easy to track down the source of a sample. (i.e.: YouTube)

A lot of hip-hop heads (myself included) are still wishing and reminiscing about how great hip-hop was in the 90's, both from a lyrical and musical standpoint (I touched on this issue in my post about why hip-hop is not dead). Strangely enough, many examples that I have found of easily recognizable samples were from 90's hip hop albums.* That doesn't go to say that hip-hop songs of today don't have the same problem, but it suggests that the music people are craving may NOT be as inventive as we believe it to be.

What can be most conflicting about this issue for me is that many examples that I can think of are some really nice-sounding beats; the music from the original song sounds so good that it almost makes me want to forget that the sample has not been manipulated very much.

*I have many specific examples in mind, but I think this is one of those times in which it would be better for you to find examples on your own; many of you probably already have certain cases in mind.

Have we been doing enough to push our own musical creativity in hip-hop?

YOU to be the judge.

Quote Source:

Wimsatt, William 'Upski,' Bomb the Suburbs, Softskull Press, 2001

Hip-Hop: Scruples for Samples (Part 1)

Are producers truly making new music, or are they just stealing?

It's been a tradition since the early days of hip-hop; taking different pieces of music and putting them together to make a new song. Sampling stems partially from the ideals of Africa Bambaataa, one of hip-hop's original pioneers of the 1970's, and founder of the hip-hop movement known as Zulu Nation. Determined to stop violence amongst rival gangs in the Bronx, he mixed music from different communities during his dj party sets, uniting people and cultures all over the city. He is described by journalist Jeff Chang (whom I referenced in my previous post) as "break-centered." In other words, he would use his favorite part of a song, and mix it with portions of other songs. He "...pulled out what was precious and tossed the rest." Today, hip-hop continues to be very break-centered, sampling different records from different walks of life, worldwide.

Unfortunately, the ethical issues that come into play with sampling are nearly as old as the tradition itself. In the late 80's, the group De La Soul was sued for using a sample from the turtles for their debut album "3 Feet High and Rising." In a 2010 blog post from Benz & a Backpack Timbaland is said to have been accused of sampling music from Egyptian artist Hossam Ramzy without permission for Jay-Z's "Big Pimpin'." In both cases, the sampled material sounded too similar to the original material. These are just a few instances that compromise the morality of hip-hop.

One of my favorite artists, Count Bass D has a t-shirt that summarizes the production aspect of sampling ethics in one sentence:

"Sampling ain't biting*, as long as you flip it fresh."

*Biting: to copy or mimic

Put in layman's terms, if you can take a sample and change it, mix it, and chop it to the point where it is unrecognizable, where it becomes a new sound, it's acceptable.

Consider this. All musicians, hip-hop or not, gain inspiration from the music of others. In order to compose, one must be familiar with music on a certain level. It is hard to create a full composition without having some musical knowledge, and inspiration from music that already exists; it is your foundation for composition. With your knowledge of music, you imagine how you might change and evolve a sound you have already heard. You experiment in your mind and with your instrument based on your foundation. After you are satisfied, a song is born.

Now, imagine a person who uses samples for hip-hop music. They have a foundation just like any other musician. They are able to experiment, try out new ways of implementing that foundation by mixing, cutting, etc. The difference is that having a sample allows one to directly reference the original record; to reference their foundation. So inspiration from samples can be molded into any new form of music via turntables physically, just as musical knowledge and inspiration from a song you remember in your head can be molded and shaped mentally.

End of Part 1

Part 2 coming soon!

Hip Hop is NOT Dead. Never Truly Was.

Putting an age-old argument to rest

Some of you may have read that title and thought 'are we honestly still arguing about this in 2012? I thought that was over.'

I thought the same thing until I saw comments on youtube about it.

On numerous occasions, I have YouTube'd old rap videos from the 90's, and many comments posted are pretty similar.

To those who YouTube old school hip-hop vids from time to time, tell me if this sounds familiar:

Man, I miss the 90's. M.C.'s were real back then. Not like today's artists. They're garbage! "R.I.P. to the real shiznit."

I'm sick and tired of people telling each other that hip-hop is dead. I believe that when people say a culture is dead, what they mean is, it's not popular anymore; it's old. 

Here's a question: When a culture or trend becomes "old," is it safe to assume that it's dead?

Fact is, people have been saying that hip-hop is dead for years, even BEFORE the 1990's(!!!)

That's right. Hip-hop journalist Jeff Chang cites the late 1970's as "The First Death of Hip-Hop." During this time in the Bronx, NY (the birthplace of hip-hop), kids who had grown up on hip-hop of the early 70's had become tired of it. These kids were finishing high-school, saying that they had out grown hip-hop, and that they didn't need it anymore...it was a kids' game. 

Despite this, hip hop was just getting started, and lived on throughout the 70's and 80's. 1988 is still considered one of the BEST years in hip hop, and marked as the beginning of hip-hop's 'Golden Age.'

Fast forward to 1994 and, once again, people are skeptical about hip-hop truly being alive. Common's 'I Used to Love Her' is a prime example of this. In the song, he personifies hip-hop as a girl he used to know and love. This girl changed throughout the years, and eventually became unrecognizable and undesirable, due to her cross-over into the commercial world. While Common doesn't literally say that hip-hop is dead, he DOES suggest that the hip-hop he had once loved had been lost; that it's as GOOD as dead.

In other words, the time period in hip hop that so many of us hip-hop heads seem to be craving today was being forsaken by people DURING that period. A common complaint I have heard about hip-hop throughout my life is that rap has become too gangsta, too negative, or just isn't well thought out in terms of lyricism. Others say hip hop is dead because people are only in it now for money, and not for the sake of making something new, creative, and thought-provoking...and I am certainly NOT the first blogger to mention the lack-of-creativity argument.

Remember this, folks: Hip-hop is an open door; an open door to creative instrumentalism, creative poetry, creative dance, creative art. People are going to do with hip-hop what they please. Some will do it for the fun of it, some will do it for commercial success. Every one of us has a choice of how we use hip-hop, if at all. No matter how many people claim that it's dead, there is enough evidence to prove that there are people who still approach hip-hop with a certain ethic: be honest, be yourself, and push for what you believe in. That's hip-hop's original philosophy; THAT'S what keeps it alive There are many rappers today who still push for those ethics. Perhaps not so much on the radio, but all you have to do is do some digging on the internet. (I'll be coming at you with some examples of that in future posts).

Those who are passionate enough about hip hop, will find a way to keep it alive. There's always gonna be some posers, sucka mc's, wack d.j.'s, etc. As long as there is at least one person with the fervor to do right in hip hop and by hip hop, it's alive.

Bottom line: STOP LYING ABOUT HIP HOP BEING DEAD!

Peace.

Hey,

This blog is dedicated to discussing music, and analyzing existing viewpoints about music in hopes of getting a conversation going. As an up and coming artist, I want to share my own views as well as hear the views of others to develop an understanding amongst music lovers...that's everybody(!) Any song or topic that inspires me will likely be talked about on this blog. I will be posting my own music as well at some point.

I'm a hip-hop and jazz artist, so there will be a lot of talk in regards to those genres, but I don't want to rule out any other category because I listen to everything.

Enjoy!