The Tracks of Twenty Eleven

So we reach another year, apparently, the end of the world will happen this year. I couldnt care less about these Mayan cats think. What this post is about is the tracks/music/themes that had a big part of my life through out the last year. They may have come out before 2011 but were important all the same. Also, you all know I listen to a lot of music and I still miss loads of genres but these few youtube links are what stuck out whilst writing this.

Lets get it cracking

Action Bronson - SHIRAZ

After seeing him on a feature with another rapper, I had to find out more. Turns out he is (now) an ex chef turned rapper. Sweet raps about food I can't afford over excellent Tommy Mas beats.

Detroit CYDI - Yeah Bitch

Featuring one of my fave beatmakers in his rap singer group Detroit CYDI. Always had visions of playing this in East London and getting the whole crowd to sing along, maybe next year. Enjoy, Bitch

SebastiAn - Embody

There was a little funk/electro revival going on last year and this was one of the hi - lights. Sebastian was already one of my favourites from out of the ED Banger team (still <3 u Busy P) but this came out of nowhere. Good album too if you like the whole sound. He also proposed to that Royal sister chick via video screen at Lovebox. OOOOOOOOOWAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY

Death Grips - Guillotine (It goes Yah)

What can I say about Death Grips that you cannot make out from the video. One of the best drummers in the world teams up with a 'guy' to produce one of the most out there different albums in all of 2011. The show at the Old Blue Last was a sweaty anger fest.

jonwyane - dat ass

The Wayniac was on my radar from last year but his music was hard to come by. This year saw him start to put out music in a few beat tapes and albums. Next year should be a big year for him I hope. This beat, from the Doodles album kills it. (ignore the drunk walking man)

Lil B - Charlie Sheen

2011 was the year I finally caved into trap beats, swag rap and I guess the leader of it all, Lil B. Another show I caught at the Old Blue Last. Everyone was on stage cooking. Oh, if you know the girl in this video, get her to email me. SWAG WOO COOK

Samiyam - Kitties

Sam Baker released his album on Brainfeeder to much confusion. I think people expected more. Personally, Samiyam can do no wrong in my eyes. Guy is an animal on the 404, this one knocks. Oh yeah, caught him at Plastic People in '11 too. MEOOW

Mr. Muthafuckin eXquire ft. Despot, Das Racist, Danny Brown, EL-P - The Last Huzzah

If Danny Brown dont make it as a rapper, he should get a job as an A&R. Almost blowing his load on twitter after finding the original video of this song The Muthafuckin eXquire went from zero to hero. The guys got together and made the remix to kill the remix. FYI, there is A LOT of ASS in this video. HUZZAH


TELL THE TRUTH - PROD. BY MOVM3NT

I miss Heatmakers. I really do. They have turned to rapping which is awful. Luckily, their sound lives on but in these weird trance pastiches. Made famous by Araab Musik this track is off one of the Trance mixtapes. Works for me.

Lil Z x OtrosCosmosis- I think im flying lotus

Flying Lotus show - Roundhouse, Camden where I lost my coat in the cloakroom for a month. Stood in the crowd shouting this song at people making remixes. When he played it, there was no reaction by the crowd. I think I made a 10 metre circle around me when I went nuts to it. COOKED HARD

Danny Brown - Monopoly

Following up The Hybrid with XXX on Fools Gold records turned Danny into an internet superstar. You can probably guess I like what Danny is doing right now. This was my favourite track from XXX. Includes references to badly seasoned fried chicken and shitting on CDs. Hell yeah

Mono/Poly - Punch The Troll In The Neck

Good to see Charles fully integrated into the Brainfeeder camp now. Another beat maker who will do even better things next year from what I have heard so far. This one kicked it off at the Crooked Tongues party. I was going nuts.(I was playing it)

DA-10 - The Future Is Futureless

The Off The Record night brought me some new friends. Some of these friends own a record label. One of their releases was this gem. Spent months humming the riff to this and got it as soon as it came out. Big up the WotNot music gang

Clams Casino - Illest Alive

Ill be honest, I slept on this dude for a while. He was giving these beats to rappers I weren't really feeling so I just passed them by. One afternoon, I downloaded his free (he gave these away) instrumental beat tape. Put it on in the background and done some work. Next few days I had them going round in my head and wondering where they had come from. On listening again, I realised that ClammyClams was something special. 2012 and even 13 will be the year(s) of Clams Casino

Dexter - Gimme No More

Kutmah is London's premier beat DJ and he had been haunting me with this beat all year. Every time I saw him play I wanted to know who had created this flip. Luckily, Kutmah is a guy and he told me. The search ended in me being £3 poorer but so much richer in my soul. CHOP

Toto - Africa

As previously mentioned, Off The Record started in 2011 and it has been a revelation for me and music discovery. It actually has been loads of things but there is too much to write here. If there was any one tune that sums up Off The Record and the good times we have every Wednesday, it would be this.

Thank you, lets have a great 2012 and see if Danny Brown can make it a hat trick!

Crooked Tongues Highlight Reel Feat The Shoreditch HeartBreakers

HBTV2: Crooked Tongues and Nike Sportswear Present The CT BBQ 2011 Video Recap from HBTV on Vimeo.

Check out the high lights from the recent party down at The Queen of Hoxton. Ray Juss and Lazebreaks on mic featuring. Hi jacking partys and making girls show their bums before we play bashment. In the words of Footsie, 'its normal'

Making Beats with Brokenhomes

Go to the crib, eat rice and chicken. Make a beat. Duck out

The Tracks of Twenty Ten

I am awake mad early and everyone is just heading to bed. Probably going to see if Ronald McDonald has his staff working today as I want some hash browns.

I don't normally post up youtube vids of other peoples work but I thought I would collect some music here that's been quite big in my year. It will be hard thinking about the stuff earlier in the year but hopefully I can put you onto some good music.

Let us begin

Todd Edwards - As I Am (dance on pants)



This was a big track at the Numbers event where Todd Edwards played. Full on moshing.

Mono/Poly - Red and Yellow Toys



From the Fabric - Brainfeeder night. It never fully got played. Probably for the best, im sure I would of kicked some ones head off.

Doctor P - Sweet Shop



First heard on the Brainfeeder night. I couldn't believe it when I heard it, but its then since gone onto haunt me. Still does damage.

Stop What Your Doing (James Blake Remix)



Everything after 1:00 in... its like life and death all in 60 seconds.

Dizz1 - Here We Go Again



Randomly found by Louis after downloading some video game. Anyway, a great find. Dizz1 got beats

LMFAO - Shots Feat Lil Jon (okaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay)



I went on holiday to Miami and did a cruise. This was the theme tune.

ANYTHING BY OFWGKTA



Footage from their first (and maybe only London show? who knows?) Brokenhomes were there causing mayhem. Raps about Rape, Drugs and absent fathers. Shiiiit, I should be a member.

Waka Flocka - Hard In The Paint



I saw a tweet from my girl Abi that she was listening to the instro on loop. Checked it out. DAMM. I caused a mosh pit at the Vice/Addidas party when this came on. Suze got a bottle of water thrown at her 'cos of my actions. IN THE TRAP

Danny Brown - Greatest Rapper Ever



Danny and I got similar grills. Contains the best line of the year for me. 'Spitting that dope shit/smoking on regulars/writing 16s like internet child predators'

Tall Black Guy - Milkey



This whole album is amazing, don't know how I found it but y'all need it.

Tempz - Next Hype



These words: Par, YEAH YEAH YEAH, TEMPPPPPPPPPPPPPPZ and CLEARRRRRRRR. Normal now.

DJ Spooky - Spartan



Skip to 6 minutes and watch until 8. That's Spartan, that's grime music. Grime tune of the year by a LONG way.

AND FINALLY

Billy Joel - For The Longest Time



On Christmas day, my bro and I made a midnight snack and we did and 'hum' version duet of this song. I don't know how it started and we both had proper parts. Unplanned and it lasted at least 2 minutes.

Anyway, there is probably loads of tunes I forgot but these ones spring to mind. Lets see what happens in 2011

Brokenhomes in Miami - the lost footage

Here is more evidence that if we ever did music full time. It would last about 2 years. 2 guys, dressed up drinking 40s in a hotel room in Downtown Miami

Numbers live at Fabric Jan 8th 2010 - The Breakdown

Numbers is a collection of labels from Scotland, the info on the sub labels that make em up is easy to find online but these guys are the people responsible for putting out some of the best electronic music in the low swung future hip hop and bass right now.

Headlining the event was the almighty Todd 'The God' Edwards. A house music producer out of New Jersey, America. Now, if you were ever into UK Garage then you would of definitely been aware of Todd's cut up re sampled productions. I’ve been playing this guys records for easily over 10 years and although the detractors say that each record he makes sounds the same, there is no denying the power hidden in the sine wave sub bass and sample skills of the man.

Also on the bill was the one and only Hudson Mo. I first got onto this guys beats through the Beat Dimensions mix CD. Not much was known about him on his own then as he was laying stuff down with Mike Slott under the Heralds of Change moniker. After much searching around the internet I managed to get hold of Hudsons Heeters Vol 1, a beat CD dropped around 2006. After that, to coin a phrase, 'ITS WAS ONNNNNNNNN'. Free Mo played at loud volume can help people fly through time and the free myspace track which landed on his album ZoOoOm had my work colleges telling me to turn my headphones down the first time I heard it.

The was also alot of activity planned for the other rooms within Fabric, room 2 was host to a dubstep/dnb event and room 3 was the launch party of Fabrics latest CD, Elevator Music. An offshoot of dubstep, uk garage, elements of grime and this new UK Bass music. I didn’t manage to sample these rooms which is a shame because I hear it went down in room 3.

I spent most of the evening in the pub on my own doing a spot of Anthropology. Watching chicks get drunk, a guy pump a fruit machine (no homo) and being tempted to try and talk to an old man about football but this guy looked like he was on 'the register'. All the while I had the sounds of devonwho, Tall Black Guy and The Essentials in one ear. I also created the POWER snake BYTE, that was yummy and put me in good stead for the evening.

'Excuse my brother - The Mitchel Brothers'

Don't try this at home kids

Hudson was on before Todd and was doing a live show. I was at Mr Mo's first live show down at Plastic People last year and although I enjoyed standing next to the speaker when Polka Dot blues dropped, the set was pretty in cohesive and obviously he was working out the joys of Abelton. This time, Hudson nailed it. With the livley Oliver Day Soul on mic it was definitely a show! Im not a fan of laptop shows but I could tell there was work gone into this. Hudson kicked off the set with a live drum remix of ZoOoOm which was FUCKING NUTS! I don’t know how it worked but it did and I want that track! The set moved with tracks of the new album Butter but mainly concentrated on his more well known beats taken from Heeters and off the EP he dropped last year. His last show opened with a lot of soundscapes, Star Crackout from the album had been moved to near the end of the show. A beat less haunting track which you can tell Hudson enjoys. Oliver Day Soul got his chance to perform doing a great version of Bopgunn (hit em with the..), Joy Fantastic and Just Decided. Oliver bounded around the stage whilst Hudson gave it the Fly Lo esq head nodding (y'all need to go Brainfeeder to see that!). Oliver finished and Hudons dropped the Tweet - Opps bootleg which probably got the biggest reaction all night. This track BANGS. Can’t wait for him to work with some US artist and bring back the funk that Timbaland left behind.

After some room viewing and looking for the pill heads on the stairs, we headed back to Room 1 for the biblical sounds of Todd Edwards. Now, I use the word biblical because Todd is a devout Christian and quite a few of his tunes feature this message. Tracks such as Wanting Jesus with the legendary UK Garage outfit Tuff Jam, Shut The Door (Healed from Within Dub) and a whole host of other tracks. Now, the main reason for Todd Edwards being as big is he is, is down to DJ EZ. EZ has played and supported his music throughout the years and I think was the first person to actually bring him over to perform. An event I went to in Atlantis in Croydon, that was A LONG TIME AGO. Being fair, Todd isnt the best DJ in the world, in fact, I think with a bit of Ray coaching, my old dear could do better but this is his only outlet from behind the Akai S6000 so we have to give it to him. Todd doesn’t play anyone else’s music, it’s a 4x4 fest of straight Todd dubs and when it’s loud and there’s a vibe. It goes OFF! The thing with Todd Edward tracks is they are pretty hard to remember, you can’t really sing them or hum them but on hearing them, the track is instantly recognizable. I went with my mate who LOVES Todd Edwards tracks, not as much as The Britsh Vybes Council but he could easily play hours worth of Todd tracks.

Todd kicked off his set with new and exclusives of none I knew, but that didn’t matter, the whole of room one was jammmed and bumping up and down to the skippy chopped beats and that simple but effective sine wave sub bass. Todd was throwing out glow in the dark crucifixes for the crowd. Kinda like new 'age' rave. Probably freaked a few people out but at least he didn’t give a sermon this time. The new music was fun but I just wanted to go up to him and ask him to draw something from the archive. He did, and when it hit it was like a mosh pit! He drew for the pirate classic, As I Am (dance on pants is what we used to sing). Everyone went nuts to it and that was the hi light of the set, he even wheeled it. He moved into some other exclusives, a Craig David - What’s Your Flava dub that I’ve NEVER heard and a special track dedicated to the people of London which was banging. Was a good set by the man but would never touch the EZ and Todd sets from back in the day.

After all this I was wrecked and cut out. Was a good night held by The Numbers lot and expect good things for the future. It’s also good so see people actually taking notice of UK Garage now.

A very influential genre of music.

Brokenhomes baby

Cover the labels, they can't bite ya s***

When I was younger I was into the whole DJing thing and the mystery of the DJ. I used to watch this film alllll the time with one of my best mates from when I was little. This scene where Martin Lawrence who plays Bilal the dragon breath DJ speaks to Kid about the selection for the party. He mentions about covering the labels so that any other DJs present couldn't copy the stuff he was playing. Now he is talking about easily accessible vinyl. Today's DJs could get soooo deep with the music but I feel a lot don't take full advantage. Back on my DJing days on North West London's premier pirate radio station, Lush 107.6FM. I used to pride myself in playing tracks other DJs wouldn't or couldn't play. Early broken beat, electro, battle records. These tracks were never faves, but they just made me stand out from the other DJs who were on the station.

Another note, DJs have become very lazy when looking for music. They rely on it being sent to them or it being plugged by someone else. I have been tapping up a few producers for a while now, keeping their names almost a secret. Its the old skool DJ in me that wants to stay one step ahead of the pack. DJs should enjoy 'diggin' in its virtual form. With so many genres crossing and freely available music (not stealing) sets should become incredibly varied and diverse. All we need now is the open minds on the dance floors or propping up the bar.

'I aint scared of you mutha f***ers!!'

Earlier today, the stand up comedian turned actor Bernie Mac passed away. The above youtube clip has been watched by my brother and I countless times. Its a sad loss for stand up comedy so spend 6 mins of your life watching this clip. YOU DONT UNDERSTAND!

As predicted - Dean Alexandrou in a new Prem advert

If you check a couple of posts back I predicted a friend of mine would probably be featuring in a video like this.

Anyway, it went and happened.

Check out Dean's other work on youtube and see if you can spot Colindale Mcds!

After a nutmeg comes...

Now, if this video is real then I would be very surprised. Anyway its a good watch for the new FIFA Street game.

Looks like something Dean A would be in

Moonkicks and the like

They dont have a min vrit they got a...

These guys like chicken, I like chicken. Its alot

And I played this game, ages ago...