DJ Premier & Bumpy Knuckles - Kolexxxion

In this era where hip-hop is making more money than it ever has off a raft of jokers that would have never recorded a syllable in the analog era, it's refreshing to see the old school continue to make quality records. Even better, in the first quarter of 2012 we are seeing those artists return to the one mc/one producer/DJ aesthetic that made the old boom-bap records so great. The KRS-One/Kenny Parker BDP record is bananas and now DJ Premier and your man Bumpy Knuckles have dropped Kolexxxion.


Primo and Bumpy are a combination that is pretty unfuckwithable. Kolexxion serves up seventeen hot tracks (nineteen in the deluxe version), mostly new, but there is a Primo remix of Turn Up The Mics and The Lah reappears for nostalgias sake. Listening to Primo rip tracks like The Key, it becomes painfully obvious that most of the new school cut and paste kids have a lot to learn about making quality hip-hop. Bump bodies the mic for the duration here rhyming on and off the beat between ridiculous scratching and beat dropping. Highly recommended to anyone who still remembers that hip hop was light years better last century.

R

OC & AG - Oasis

Well, it's not the long awaited DITC record, but it's pretty close. With the DITC crew spread all around the country at present, it looks like it's up to OC and AG to represent. You can't argue, I'm a Lord Finesse man first and foremost, but put OC and AG together and they can wreck a mike like few other duos. Maybe you heard Weed And Drinks? Well, this whole record bangs like that. Most of the production is by someone called E Blaze, although Lord Finesse contributes a couple tracks and Statik Selectah and Primo drop in for intro and scratch appearances. No guests either, save for the odd female singing a hook. None needed, either.

Oasis isn't trap rap or snap music, it's new hip hop with an old school flavor. Both parties are mad lyrical, but not with needlessly polysyllabic backpacker verbosity, just two brothers riding a beat as smooth as astroglide covered ball bearings. If you like real hip hop, you owe it to yourself to head over to the OC and AG web presence and pick up Oasis right away.

The Halftime Show 11th Anniversary Show download - part two

Now this shit is crazy. Second half of the Halftime Show 11th Anniversary Show set featured DJ Premier, Tony Touch and the Beatminerz. As you might suspect, it's pretty fucking bananas. 

Primo sets it off with some cuts from Heather B and Rakim, then rubs it in for another fifteen or so, before closing by chiding DJs that don't know their cuts and threatening to battle any other 42 year old DJs. Classic! Big Up Primo. Keep tabs on Primo, All Day Records and Works Of Mart here.

Tony Touch steps up next and tears shit up in a pronounced fashion. No deep cuts, or all that many out and out songs for that matter, but even in truncated form it's obvious that Toca is a master of the blend. Plus he thought that he was supposed to spin the next day and showed up in like an hour's notice. Time to prepare aside, you'll nod your head and shake your ass for the duration. Toca's up to Vol. 86 of the mixtape series and is gearing up for a redo of the 50 MCs tape for release 100, so keep an eye out. Check his whereabouts here.

With only fifteen minutes left, Da Beatminerz kinda got the short end of the stick, but Bushwick never has fucked around, so Evil D dropped platter after platter of Boot Camp griminess until the bell rang. Lots of deep cuts, old Smif and Wessum and Buckshot stuff, plus some KRS-One Nelly diss shit for some old school flavor. Boot Camp is always banging, and despite the fact that I'd would have like to have heard more Sean P up in the set, they were pressed for time and Mr. Walt didn't even get on. I shudder to think what crap pre-empted the Beatminerz set, but keep tabs on all things Beatminerz here. Duck Down!

Big up WKCR and The Halftime Show. Thanks to Robbie at Unkut for hosting the downloads.

R

The Halftime Show 11th Anniversary Show download - part one

If you take a trip over to the mighty Unkut.com, with a little bit of investimatigation you can find a free download of WKCR's The Halftime Show with a gang of hot DJs spinning fire for the show's 11th Anniversary. There are two hour and fifteen minute sets for your pleasure. 

Halftime co-host DJ Eclipse chairs the show's proceedings, and casts the first stone on the opening half, throwing down a pretty hot set with some unreleased Common and Nas joints. DJ A-Trak of Kanye infamy drops a set that shows why he spends a lot of time clocking Euros, closing his set with some turntable pyrotechnics that prompts even the mighty Primo to jump on the mike and give props. DJ JS1 from Rock Steady kicks it off with a Fat Albert sample, then wrecks shop on break beat after break beat. Good stuff, but check in for the next half with its sets from DJ Premier, Tony Touch and Da Beatminerz.

R