killer mike raps el-p produces "R.A.P. Music"

so this is kind of awesome

hearing killer mike say 'we here to eat the rich' is like seeing spider man use heat vision

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9ASxmiBTzM

this totally bangs

fucking love this

i hope this is as good as that song on ghetto extraordinary where he says "Fuck Hitler" twice a row!

Killer Mike is great, he had me from the first, when he said "catch a beat runnin' like Randy Moss" and stared into my eyes

whole thing is on spotify, "reagan" is (predictably) fucking killer

it's funny, i was listening to it on the train a couple of hours ago and thinking that for the past few years it's been hitherto-kinda-underrated old dudes who've been responsible for the rap albums that sound most ALIVE and banging - quik & kurupt, killer mike, big boi...

read the thread title as "killer mike, rap's el-p, produces"

kinda-underrated old dudes who've been responsible for the rap albums that sound most ALIVE and banging - quik & kurupt, killer mike, big boi...

Kool G Rap yo

I am excited to hear this

"southern fried" is really the only one that's ~the way i'd expect a killer mike/el-p collab to sound like, the rest is pretty refreshing

Love it. El-P keeps it sparser than I was expecting but with a nice booming lowend. w

yeah this is great so far.

"Go!" is awesome, so cool to hear some scratching on a track

Love this very much.

so cool to hear some scratching on a track

yeah, scratch solo is ace. does sort of take things back to the late 90s.

spotify has both the explicit and clean versions of this album. convenient for work listening.

Mike: Rick Ross, man...he's on another level. "So Rick, you were a correctional officer. Now you rap. How do you explain that?" Rick: "Real niggas do real things, for real reasons." I just stood up and shouted: "YES RICK! THAT'S WHAT YOU DO!" I'm a huge Rick Ross fan. HUGE Rick Ross fan. Deeper Than Rap: That was the best rap album of the year.

http://blogs.villagevoice.com/music/2012/05/killer_mike_el_p_interview.php?page=4

love this

this shit bang

2 seconds into butane i thought we were gonna get gabba mike for a sec haha

someone send this to Morbs so he can quote Mike's lines about Obama.

This is awesome, yes. I like the El-P record a lot too but KM is a more interesting dude to spend 45 mins with.

WHY THE FUCK IS THERE A GLEE COMMERCIAL ON MY FUCKING KILLER MIKE SONG

DankProductions5280 13 hours ago

+1 Like

got a rave review from Sound Opinions

does anyone not like this? finding negative reviews of r.a.p. music is like finding negative reviews of black hippy stuff

NME to the rescue!

Fast off the back of last year’s ‘PL3DGE’ LP comes Grind Time Official star Killer Mike’s sixth full-length outing. Built on a somewhat uneasy collaboration between the OutKast protégé and Def Jux founder El-P, it’s a set of two halves whose hands won’t hold. Mike’s an angry, earthy rapper and his standard “hardcore G shit” (‘Big Beast’) chips and bumps against his producer’s strained attempts to lift it skywards with spacey electro noodling (‘Don’t Die’). Worst of the back end is ‘Reagan’ – a politi-rap analysis of the Iran-Contra scandal. It’s a relic – a meandering, studenty thought piece that’s been dug from the ratty recesses of the ’90s West Coast conscious scene. Mike has dabbled with politics in the past, and even made unlikely forays into experimental soul, but ‘RAP Music’ lacks the fury and vitality that usually sustains him. The ambition is to be applauded, but half the album’s a grind. And not the good kind.

does anyone not like this? finding negative reviews of r.a.p. music is like finding negative reviews of black hippy stuff

― littledotheyknow (D-40), Wednesday, May 30, 2012 8:02 PM (59 minutes ago) Bookmark

i would listen just for the possibility of putting a negative review into the world but i don't want to break the 14-year streak of avoiding el-p's music that i've managed since back when that one stupid co flow video used to get played on rap city

I find the political history more interesting than the politics of strip clubs.

...this time.

I wasn't completely sold on this... Lots of interesting lyrical stuff, but I was disappointed that Killer Mike still has the same monotonously aggressive, punctuate-every-other-word, flow as when I last listened to him 10 years ago, when Monster came out. That combined with El-P's heavy beats, which are okay, but kinda too compressed and too busy throughout the album, make thw whole thing hard to listen except in small chunks, despite its shortness. IMO Vast Aire was a better foil for El-P's style, and the Cannibal Ox beats also had more air in them, which is kinda lacking here with everything being so in-your-face.

Also, the label this was released on seems to be otherwise specializing in albums by cartoon characters, what's up with that?

it definitely was surreal to look on the back cover of the CD and see the Adult Swim and Grand Hustle logos next to each other

Adult Swim have had a Stones Throw connection for a while

i would listen just for the possibility of putting a negative review into the world but i don't want to break the 14-year streak of avoiding el-p's music that i've managed since back when that one stupid co flow video used to get played on rap city

I hated Company Flow in the 90s too, but I think El-P has gotten much better as a producer since then. The beats on the Can Ox album are on a whole different level than the beats he did for Co Flow. He still sucks as a rapper though, but the Can Ox album (where he only has one guest verse) is definitely worth checking out.

just gonna throw my opinion that el-p has never been involved in the creation of anything less than great, and that he's also a pretty damn good rapper, into the ring here.

Tuomas do you find it difficult to listen to amerikkkaz most wanted or it takes a nation.... ?

i'm still half-ehhhhh and half-sure-okay on el-p as a rapper, but i've never not liked anything he's done as a producer since the turn of the millennium.

this album is amazing btw.

this is great. so is the new el-p 'cancer4cure'. old dudes in rap otm.

it's pretty good but def. overrated and people are glossing over the flaws - production gets pretty monotonous over the span of the album and the choruses are boring. the choruses are even more of a problem on cancer4cure.

the skits and speeches on "Don't Die" and "Reagan" unnecessarily stretch those tracks.

this is way way better than cancer 4 cure which i found as wearily worthy, if not actually awful, as every el-p thing i've heard

the politics might be the worst thing about rap music, it's all a bit...standard conspiracy theory BS

and the bit where he goes on about worrying whether women will change their names is seriously eyeroll-worthy, he seems an old dude in the bad sense there

It's more complicated than conspiracy drivel, lex. He's pointing the finger at his community for falling for the likes of Reagan, both Bushes, and Obama: "We should be indicted for bullshit we incited." Plus his tone and timbre are A+.

yeah the best thing about "reagan" is that he acknowledges rap's history of bullshit conspiracy theorizing even as it falls prey to it a little bit

killer mike contains multitudes, etc.

i mean it verges on bill hicks style "every politician is a servant of the corporate overlords" simplification but the first verse's implication of mike himself (as well as rap as a whole) for selling violent pulp as a lifestyle and the second's life-someone's-lived specifics almost earn it.

standard rap conspiracy theory shit rules lex!

you sound like someone that's never truly beheld a pale horse :(

danity kane is illuminati politricks >:(

mike's politics, at least what he presents on record, are a little simplistic, but i think it's good that at least someone is putting these kinds of lyrics out there. n/a otm about the hooks and tunas otm about his flow - i like it in small doses but it does get tiring after a while. and to tie this all together, his flow does seem to stiffen up when he's trying to deliver those political punches, which make them harder to take

that was all kind of a mess sorry, ftr i agree with most of deej's stoned twitter thoughts from last night if anyone else read them

the amount of love for this record really does baffle me though, i'll never understand what makes p4k types rally around a certain record, especially rap albums. this sounds like every other killer mike record.

this sounds like every other killer mike record.

^^this is why i like it

though i think ghetto extraordinary is still his best record

the amount of love for this record really does baffle me though, i'll never understand what makes p4k types rally around a certain record, especially rap albums. this sounds like every other killer mike record.

― twittering spinster (k3vin k.), Thursday, May 31, 2012 1:35 PM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark

k3v are you kidding, the title may as well have been "best new r.a.p. music" when they announced the fucking thing

seriously

well also they've been pretty supportive of his last couple of albums so it's not really weird that the trend would continue for a new album that sounds like his others

oh yeah don't get me wrong i like it and killer mike. pledge 2 is probably my favorite mike. it's just always funny when this kind of attention seemingly comes from nowhere. and good for him, he's had a nice career and deserves the buzz

xp m@tt

the amount of love for this record really does baffle me though, i'll never understand what makes p4k types rally around a certain record, especially rap albums. this sounds like every other killer mike record.

― twittering spinster (k3vin k.), Thursday, May 31, 2012 5:35 PM (12 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Has little to do w Killer Mike and mostly everything to do with El-P, imo.

well it's the combination of El-P's production and the idea of Killer Mike as an underrated craftsman who's been toiling away all these years

the amount of love for this record really does baffle me though, i'll never understand what makes p4k types rally around a certain record, especially rap albums. this sounds like every other killer mike record.

― twittering spinster (k3vin k.), Thursday, May 31, 2012 1:35 PM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark

k3v are you kidding, the title may as well have been "best new r.a.p. music" when they announced the fucking thing

― some dude, Thursday, May 31, 2012 1:40 PM (8 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

oh yeah i get this, on some level it was a business decision. and it was a smart one! i'm not knocking him for it or anything, and like i said i'm glad he's getting the wide attention he's apparently getting now

outside of "reagan" this album isn't really more or less political than any other killer mike album

i think the production is good, i think El-P did a good job of trying to make his style work with mike's more southern style and it's a good hybrid IMO

agree

apparently only the clean version is available on spotify smh

?? i am listening to the explicit version on spotify as we type

lol i forgot that the last thing i heard killer mike on was a song called "slumerican shitizen"

all time song title

i really like some tracks on the killer mike fwiw

its def not surprising that this record is big & its not that i don't think good criticism hasn't been written about it, more that once something hits this critical consensus mass i feel like it's no longer about what's happening on the record & becomes a kind of boring general enthusiasm. where you end up hearing people talk about the record in revered tones

its at least a more singular / less uneven record than that big boi one everyone went nuts for, even if i like some individual tracks on that one more

While I agree (2nd para), what can you do? Just not talk about it?

its def not surprising that this record is big & its not that i don't think good criticism hasn't been written about it, more that once something hits this critical consensus mass i feel like it's no longer about what's happening on the record & becomes a kind of boring general enthusiasm. where you end up hearing people talk about the record in revered tones

i agree but i don't know what you want to do about this? i think people are pretty much honestly reviewing the record and just like it a lot. you might have some people who are just following consensus and reviewing positively because everyone else is but this gets balanced by the knee-jerk contrarians. it's more just a problem of too much criticism in general.

maybe the thing going on is some people don't listen to much southern rap unless there's a wite auteur type co-signing it (see also "climax" being probably the most acclaimed song of usher's career)

Lol the first I realised "everyone's talking about it" was seeing everyone talk about how everyone's talking about it

Having lived with it for a couple of weeks the immediate impact def wears off, it doesn't even have the repplay value of big boi let alone quik + k. Totally a fine album but doesn't merit instacanonisation (not that any album does really)

Climax surely not husher's most acclaimed! That's yeah, right?

maybe the thing going on is some people don't listen to much southern rap unless there's a wite auteur type co-signing it (see also "climax" being probably the most acclaimed song of usher's career)

― some dude, Thursday, May 31, 2012 1:21 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

are we living in some imaginary world where southern rap hasn't been dominant for like a decade and embraced by pitchfork types for a long time?

acclaimed relative to its success would be more precise i guess -- "yeah" was #3 pazz & jop, "climax" prob won't be that high

i mean ppl in THIS VERY THREAD have reviewed gucci mane mixtapes on big bad pitchfork

are we living in some imaginary world where southern rap hasn't been dominant for like a decade and embraced by pitchfork types for a long time?

― wack nerd zinging in the dead of night (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Thursday, May 31, 2012 2:24 PM (19 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i didn't say how large a group "some people" is or how much it intersects with "pitchfork types" although obv i'm trolling here

also i think it's pretty natural honestly for the general critical community to be late on something that genre critics/nerds have been raving about for months or years

there are, uh, def other aspects to why people care about this mike album, but that's one of them

"something" is a stupid term, i mean "artists"

i agree but i don't know what you want to do about this? i think people are pretty much honestly reviewing the record and just like it a lot. you might have some people who are just following consensus and reviewing positively because everyone else is but this gets balanced by the knee-jerk contrarians. it's more just a problem of too much criticism in general.

― congratulations (n/a), Thursday, May 31, 2012 1:19 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah and when i raised stuff on twitter i got accused of all kinds of hipster contrariness or what have you. & fair enough, i can say that i was kind of ready for this to be what we all agree is great & that kind of put me off to begin, although i have def come around on some tracks & the production on it.

i mean, rather than being like, 'i wish more people hated this' its more like, i wish this was making more waves, or causing more discussions, that it almost feels like by being so uncontroversially agreed-upon that its the same as when something is universally reviled, the battles arent being fought over it

i'm kinda suprised Fox News hasn't tried to drum up something with the "i'm glad reagan's dead" line, seems like that would be fun for those guys

i mean tbh i stopped paying attention to mike bigga (lol) around the time pitchfork dropped a FIVE STAR TRACK REVIEW on that stupid "that's life" song so dude has coded as overrated critic bait to me for 6 years

plenty of good writing/criticism can come even when almost everyone agrees

well, if you mean, causing arguments isn't a measure of quality, i agree

but when its so politically coded, surely that has to be taken into account?

maybe i'm just used to years of hearing about nwa being targeted by the fbi, how incendiary ice cube records were, the response to 'cop killer,' etc.

i guess lots of critics really supported PE though too

holding mike up to the social agitation standards of NWA or ice cube seems a bit unfair

the state of 'political rap' on a mainstream level at this point is just kanye saying the same "the government invented aids!" shit over and over and lupe fiasco managing to look dumb next to bill o'reilly. below that level of media exposure it's not like what someone as relatively unknown as killer mike is going to cause any controversies OR change anyone's mind.

no one now coud ever have that level of impact like PE or NWA. it's a different world. plus at that time rap was still relatively new to america.

yeah things are definitely different now, but the problems NWA & PE were talking about are still here.

no, the police have been fucked, they won iirc

Mike's politics are definitely more interesting than the average simplistic "conspiracy" rap bull, and def more nuanced here than they were on, say, "Burn" - and anyone for whom the "politicians are killers/corporate shills" angle seems reductive/simplistic...I think I'd better just stfu about this right now.

no stfu-ing allowed, thats why we're having discussions about this

his writing feels a little more forced on the political joints or maybe my listening gets a little more critical when you are talking about the drug war vs banging some strippers.

i guess its privileged of me to suggest that what killer mike is saying is the unspoken subtext of street rap, like, most ppl don't receive street rap that way & there's obviously an audience for this, so why shouldn't they enjoy it?

maybe what i'm feeling is this sense that mike is doing the writers' job for them & maybe thats why he's so beloved; illuminating the context for the genre so the writer doesn't have to. or that writers really like it because what he does is closer to what they do. i dunno just thinkin baout things

the 'reagan' track does stick out as a clunker lyrically to me, i quite like the beat tho. I think I prefer pl3dge to this one, but I still dig it.

with "that's life" and "reagan" there's like a big initial hit of "oh this is awesome" but then like 5 plays later I don't need/want to hear it again. like the message has been received and there's not much to get at beyond that.

the track i really didn't like was 'country fried.' if it was big k.r.i.t. no one would talk about it. i like reagan more.

is mike's first proper album w/ clunky songs like a.d.i.d.a.s worth going back to? i still bang pledge 1 & 3 (don't have 2 for some reason, should sort that.)

yes

pledge 2 is dope as well. 'grandma's house' was my shit

'i'ma shine' was my favorite off the first pledge. speaking of, SL Jones dropped a project this week too all produced by DJ Burn One

that tape is really good. Think it's Burn One's best production job to date

agreed.

This album is amazing and still like the third best Killer Mike album. Another one for the latepassapedia

how do u rank them?

Monster
Pl3dge
R.A.P. Music
Ghetto Extraordinary [unreleased album from 2005, awesome stuff]
Pledge Allegiance to the Grind 1
Pledge Allegiance to the Grind 2

it floors me that ghetto extraordinary never got a formal release

1 pledge 2
2 rap music
3 pledge 1
4 monster
5 pl3dge

ghetto extraordinary is indeed awesome

yeah pledge 2 is the shit

i forgot about this "underground atlanta" thing -- my interest is perked retroactively

this album is better than big boi's, i'll say that much

nah prefer Big Boi's, only because BB has the gift for picking weird sounds and giving T.I. a better moment to shine.

that underground atlanta comp mike did was TERRIBLE. really bad if i remember right

ha, really? shit.

Huh, weird on Spotify desktop the real album shows up, but only the clean version shows up on my phone. Unless I'm doing something wrong, which I probably am.

hit the "dirty" app

maybe I need to get a whole new dirty phone

i forgot about this "underground atlanta" thing -- my interest is perked retroactively

― fapper don (J0rdan S.), Thursday, May 31, 2012 6:00 PM (36 minutes ago)

it was kind of whatever iirc - good pill song and a couple other ok joints but other than that it sucked

also iirc was like 30 songs?

oh ha what d-40 said

this album is a banger

Bit more of a chitty chitty bang bang. Especially next to Schoolboy Q who is exceptional.

you are trolling me.

Not at all. I just don't like the album that much, no need to take it personal.

apparently his next album is gonna be produced by burn one. should be dope.

nice

didn't think to check if there was a thread; been loving this since it dropped and the single is a MONSTER
with a very Driver influenced zombie video that i can pass on
but likely track o' the year material; best bun b feature i've heard in forever

New video for Big Beast is pretty cool and very NSFW

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8-RmM5py1c

lol the first 3 or so minutes i was like oh this isn't that band then o_O naked zombie chicks eating brains

first video to directly rip drive?

kinda diminishing returns on this album

oh man, that video.

album gets better with each listen

It's really good, but while half of it feels natural, another half feels like producer + MC. I've been obsessed with Mike since I first heard him. My ranking:

1. Pl3dge
2. pledge 1
3. rap music
4. ghetto extraordinary
5. pledge 2
6. monster

kinda need to see this live i think

oh shit that reminds me...

i think the last two tracks are amazing.

The whole album is impressive, but I think the back half is stronger.

just getting around to hearing this. awesome stuff.

maybe my fave album this year

Yeah, it def has a shot at being my #1 right now.

"Willie Burke Sherwood" is my jam

I've deliberately avoided everything with El-P's name on since someone on ILM conned me into buying 'Fantastic Damage' 10 years ago and while I like this a lot there's something profoundly unfunky about most of the beats here. Obviously Mike himself slays and the production makes up for its clunkiness with sheer force but in practice I don't really want to go back to it that much.

it is kinda of cramped

it had really rapid diminishing returns for me, was initially really into it but already could not care less

'kinda of' ha whoops

i think this record is pretty inconsistent & wish i'd read what felt like a very honest piece on it because it also has some great songs

I will stand up for everything but Anywhere but Here

"Jojo's Chillin" for me.

aka the best song on the record

i think this record is pretty inconsistent & wish i'd read what felt like a very honest piece on it because it also has some great songs

― protected by viper. stand back. (D-40), Thursday, August 16, 2012 12:08 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

write it!

It's an impressive record that's short on replay value.

Yeah. I listened to it a lot for a couple of weeks, haven't felt any need to play it ever since.

i have similar feelings about it - something about the beats is just exhausting, too trebly, too harsh for headphones

get a hi-fi, man

I don't find it that trebly, (then again there's a fuckload of really trebly rap production from the last few years) and it packs a lot of punch. "Cramped" is the right word maybe. Kinda lumbering as well.

Production is just fine.

Y'all are using words like cramped and lumbering like it's a bad thing.

Seriously tho

oh noes this sounds like weird old noisy 80s rap records halp

not really

if anything the opposite, everything's bright, crunched, maximized. i don't want to make a big deal out of it though. just the way it seems to me.

and it doesn't remind me of the 80s at ALL. except maybe a little of jo-jo's chillin. i dunno, i guess i just don't like the beats all that much. still some great songs though. i love mike's rhymes and his delivery and sometimes the beats don't really get in the way. but it's not really all that "killer" to me. i can't think of any songs on here that you'd put on and the whole room would go "ohhhhhh shit" which is a shame!

this sounds like those weird old noisy sounds my butt used to make in the 80s

u weren't even alive in the 80s

oh, i was quoting whiney there

if anything the opposite, everything's bright, crunched, maximized

yeah it may be 80s in spirit but sonically? gtfo

can u guys stop this he means it sounds like public enemy or mantronix and it does, not "rappers delight"

Rappers Delight was from the 70s bro

lol

i wasn't even alive in the 80's cut me some slack

this does not sound like Public Enemy to me at all, this is not a sample collage record - it's a lot of compressed distorted guitars, synth washes, farting moog basslines, no drum loops all programming, etc. Mantronix eh okay maybe here and there.

I guess rapping about Reagan is pretty 80s

haha

to be real there's a few songs on here i think are awesome. just dont think its a slam-dunk classic record or w/e

jojos chillin is p dope

now that killer mike is calling himself the rap bill maher on twitter maybe folks will rein it in a bit

lol

clearly a slam-dunk classic record
or w/e

http://pitchfork.com/tv/youtube/13-music-videos/373-killer-mike-untitled-official-music-video/

The vinyl comes with a bonus instrumental LP, a free poster and what is most certainly the coolest download card I've ever seen--the flipside of the card is a picture of the sticker-covered ghetto blaster from the album art. This doesn't sound like much, but it made the already-cool experience of unwrapping the vinyl even cooler in this particular case.

Has there really been no discussion of Run the Jewels yet?! Both tracks I've heard have been great, especially loving the production on 36" Chain.

Excited for this.

ditto

full thing supposed to drop this month right? "get it" is excellent.

especially loving the production on 36" Chain.
yeah this song rules

Run The Jewels album now available for free download!

Loving this. These dudes are on fire.

thks for the heads up, sicko

fookinell

saw Killer Mike open for GZA last year. his a capella version of "Reagan" was amazing. looking forward to round two.

bump because people should grab/hear this

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

yes yes

so yeah, this rules

a little too much EL-P for my taste but the title track and "Sea Legs" and "Banana Clipper" slam.

^^

also DO DOPE FUCK HOPE

ok so what's up with Prince Paul showing up to put a molly in the girl's drink and tempting her with Beefeater and UNO cards

haha I was just gonna say that seemed bizarre

Bad Boy.

liking this more than the last one

Yea I'm in on this too

great

I like this most when it's straight up banging, the more grandiose productions kind of lose the vibe.

"get it"-- nothin novel, but beats by defibrillitor paddle. what i wanted right now.

finally getting to listen to this. Love the opener. Thunderous beat, love the trade-offs.

"now come over here and let me give you a tongue kiss on your hot pocket"

ahhh, Prince Paul

its good, all the way solid, el-p and mike sound great, but the beats arent quite as surprising as i wished they were, esp after playing this after yeezus. you kinda know what an el-p record will sound like now dont you? i guess thats not a bad thing, but as someone who used to love co flow and can ox and fandam, i hope that weird/fucked up/fuck what you think el-p comes back at some point, if only a little bit.

I hated the last one so much, there isn't enough room in my heart for this one.

yeah i like this

get it & no come down are bangers

love this. i think i prefer el-p in banger mode vs. weirdo mode.

"i sent they mom a little cash and a sympathy letter / told her she raised a bunch of fuck boys, try and do better / bitch"

i had no idea this record had even happened. amazing

I'm not really sure what a fuck boy is.

basically a "punk"

I'm not really sure what a fuck boy is.

― This Is Not An ILX Username (LaMonte)

a boy you fuck

Spottie otm

show is incredible, mike solo set and despot set highlights (who knew despot could hold a crowd like that?)

kool AD about the definition of an "opener." low wattage, he's rapping more straightforwardly than on a lot of recent tracks (which to me is kind of a relief but also less interesting for being less divisive), no way this guy could come after anyone else.

anyway it's all about mike's solo set. he loves his own words, but he should. sometimes after a song he just keeps going and re-raps his favorite verse(s) a cappella. in other hands it would be pretentious but he earns it. the density (of sound and meaning) in that first verse of "untitled" is a thing to behold.

will catch them in a few hours

see u there boo

Wish I liked this more. I like Mike and I've been a fan of El's since Indelibles, but lyrically, this isn't hitting me at all. I mean it sounds fine, but it's not sticking with me after it ends. Maybe I need a third pass.

^^^
This is exactly how this album is hitting me

Or failing to

I think I agree but Run the Jewels just sounded awesome live so

Mike reigns in El's worst tendencies but El doesn't give Mike enough room to do what he does best so yeah it naturally ends up better than Cancer 4 Cure but not as good as R.A.P. Music. Still a fun album tho.

i like it fine while its on, but i dont really have the need to return to it much. i like the fact its just mike and el-p going back to back, but something about it just seems kinda samey after a while. like it gives you exactly what it should sound like, but not much in the way of anything else (i.e. surprise). but then i wasnt a huge fan of cancer 4 cure - my least favourite el-p album (though i should return to it just to make sure) and RAP music was cool, but a bit too knowing of its whole 'bringing political rap back' angle.

See, I know I'm in the minority here, but I'm more interested in RTJ for El than Mike. And I liked (but did not love) Cancer For The Cure and felt like Fantastic Damage was kinda slept on.

RAP music was cool, but a bit too knowing of its whole 'bringing political rap back' angle.

this is just a terrible thing to say. you kiss your mother with that mouth?

i know it sounds horribly cynical and maybe im just being challopsy. i didnt hate it, i liked a few songs on there quite a bit, but in general i liked it more in theory than how it sounded. part of me misses the killer mike of 'monster', stankonia or 'the whole world' even.

yeah, i just love that album (RAP music), listened to it so so many times last year

by "'bringing political rap back' angle" do you mean that the album had some political songs?

also even if y'all don't love their recent records you should still see them live b/c

AGREE!! I made it to the park in time yesterday to catch his solo set and the one with EL-P and Killer Mike is my new favorite person.

amateurist, i was at that show, killer mike's set was fucking powerful. it was fun to watch the rap show cops chewing gum and trying to act casual.

i never really checked out r.a.p. music but i'm gonna go back to it now.

(i liked despot's banter better than his songs, not that they were bad. he's rap game mitch hedberg for sure.)

R.A.P. Music wasn't anymore "bringing political rap back" than any other Mike album, it just got more press bc an indie kid-beloved producer laced it

jordan we should meet up one of these days, sorry i haven't been to one of your shows yet i'm like a fucking hermit these days

definitely, i think we know some of the same people! it's ok man, i'm terrible about going to shows that i'm not playing (this was the first one in a long time that i was really excited about).

i loved Mike when I saw him open for GZA last year. think I said it itt but he did an all acapella "Reagan" where he was basically HOLLERING "I'm GLAD REAGAN DEAD" over and over at the end, while the crowd was roaring.

was great hearing him do some of his oldest Monster era shit too.

i think we should all just agree to really like killer mike and maybe have our "friend" shelly give him a note

when i first heard them talking about run the jewels i thought they were saying "run to jewels" (a local grocery chain "jewel" +s, which is how lotsa ppl say it) and it was like LOL it's about going to Jewels but no
still, i got the free download and it's soooooooo goooooood
"get it" is my favorite so far http://vimeo.com/69520103

Seems like a good place to post this - El's old boy Nasa has a new solo album that I've been into this morning. This is the dude who worked on The Cold Vein, lotta Aesop and Co Flow stuff, etc, was sorta Def Jux's in-house engineer. Was also in The Presence, who did an apparently-very-slept-on 12" on Jux back in the day that I've never heard. Anyway, RTJ fans may feel this.

http://uncommonrecords.bandcamp.com/

lol at the "I'm Bad" reference at the beginning

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c_rwa4ZbKgA

http://i.imgur.com/4qQaES5.png

poster needs to work on his pickup lines, ain't gonna bring nobody back to the pad with wack game like that.

I'm feeling this album

DO DOPE FUCK HOPE

"get it" is still my jam

this is a badass EP

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ye-w0RFasJ0

so good to hear El P say they are officially a group

Man that's such a joyous interview.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQ5rI461KNE

Goddamn. That's great and I hope it means they're recording new stuff.

that was on the album; it's advertising a remix disc

these are the best people on earth

<3

that was on the album

Wow, my memory is gone apparently. Well anyway, cool video!

Run the Jewels 2 is up there with my most anticipated albums this year and the teaser sounds great.
https://soundcloud.com/productomart/rtj2-blockbuster-night-part-1-snippet

link don't work

huh, was working a minute ago. soundcloud seems down all over.

okay, live now.

what's up with no one telling me that there are run the jewels instrumentals on spotify?
SO GOOD

I can't possibly fathom listening to Run The Jewels and wanting to isolate the El-P half of it.

i know, it's crazy -- and yet, i love it
it's like a totally different album!

"get it" is still my favorite but it's not the same without killer mike

the instrumentals are sick, can't wait for the new one.

gah me either!

agh i can't stop listening to these
what else sounds like this?

how wd you differentiate it from el-p's solo work

i don't know enough to say honestly -- is his stuff instrumental?

oh my absolute word

there are instrumentals of his stuff but he's also an excellent rapper - wordplay levels set to fiendish, spits legit &c

all three of his albums are brilliant but my favourite is the second one, 'i'll sleep when you're dead'

you owe it to yourself to investigate

there are also company flow/cannibal ox instrumentals but you shd really listen to those albums with aire/vordul involved coz they bring a lot of character & are also good rappers

i know he is an excellent rapper, i just wondered if he had more instrumental albums
i can't listen to rapping while i work -- too distracting! but these instrumentals are lending massive bounce to my otherwise headache-inducing day

i'll check it out -- cannibal ox?

he did an album with Matthew Shipp! it doesn't sound much like Run The Jewels though: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Water_%28El-P_album%29

his beats are generally leagues better than his rapping imo

yeah but his beats are some of the best electronic pop music ever imo

cannibal ox's album 'the cold vein' features some of his best production work and is available in instrumental form. it's fairly regarded as a monolith of underground rap (to the extent where it isn't rly very underground)

god it feels so good to just be able to type this shit on a board where 3than doesn't post

R.A.P. Music holds up very well

i like this cannibal ox album alright but it's a little cold for my personal taste
the RtJ instrumentals are totally sizzlin
that's what i'm looking for i guess

will check that out crut -- thx

it's a cold world out there

has anyone trolled this thread yet

??

god it feels so good to just be able to type this shit on a board where 3than doesn't post

― imago, Wednesday, August 27, 2014 8:47 PM (59 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lol

self-consciously 'conscious', undie, backpacker, experimental, 'new levels', weird 'avant-garde' art rap

just ttly went mainstream, so u can't rly troll it any more, soz. el-p was always a pop artist anyway, haha

just kinda sad this is where killer mike ended up

imago have you ever heard boogie down productions

I get more embarrasses, year on year, for liking niceguysofokcupid rap favorite 'the cold vein'

*embarrassed. seriously tho it is painful for me to hear at this point. i am progressing to the point where the shades of blue-grey on the cover art make me queasy, as does the word 'ox' when encountered in other contexts such as 'ox-tail soup' and 'xb-ox'

at some point in my thirties i imagine I will be on public transport and some algorithmically determined internet 'radio' will serve me with a track from 'fantastic damage' and my heart will shrivel and stop and I will literally actually die of shame

lol i feel u

Wow I hadn't realized this was such a fraught topic.

its tuff

you guys have issues to resolve.
anyway, new album in a month or so.

forks is eagerly anticipating this lol

show us yr blogs

Wow I hadn't realized this was such a fraught topic.

only if you're an overly self-conscious white guy who likes hip hop

um a perfectly self conscious white guy

what about perfect white guys

perfect white guys are too busy cataloging the glyscemic index of their foods to listen to undie rap

perfect white guys rapping in undies

I get more embarrasses, year on year, for liking niceguysofokcupid rap favorite 'the cold vein'

― ♛ LIL UNIT ♛ (thomp), Wednesday, August 27, 2014 6:11 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

ha ha def jux forever get therapy

lol

I remember downloading some mix lagoon put on ilx a long long time ago and it was like all kelly clarkson

I love the shit out of Fantastic Damage. There are instrumentals around, but I'd rather listen to the lyrics. What's a good rap album, lagoon?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J3-Q6zgXl6w

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJkfTfud4iU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qhZT3jAZtJ0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jxvqhlwtlIY

def jux is my therapy man *puts on headphones and just zones out into the ill lexicographical cypher*

I remember downloading some mix lagoon put on ilx a long long time ago and it was like all kelly clarkson

― puff puff post (uh oh I'm having a fantasy), Wednesday, August 27, 2014 8:21 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

uh that sounds like a kelly clarkson album get yr facts straight i am strictly grimy beats mad visual flows

mad poop flows, morelike

Yeah, there's tons of terrible undie rap but The Cold Vein is pretty classic imo.

don't worry everyone, liking the cold vein doesn't negate the other rap you like, and it doesn't automatically make you "that guy"

mad poop flows, morelike

― mookieproof, Wednesday, August 27, 2014 8:28 PM (33 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i rap solid stools while the haters drool / i got sick ass beats with cool sounds like brrrrr and oooool

that has nothing to do with this thread tbh but this thread madeleine'd me into a rememberance of clicking on a mix hoping it would be good and it being kelly clarkson maroon 5 mashup after mashup

that does sound good tho idgi

at some point in my thirties i imagine I will be on public transport and some algorithmically determined internet 'radio' will serve me with a track from 'fantastic damage' and my heart will shrivel and stop and I will literally actually die of shame

― ♛ LIL UNIT ♛ (thomp), Wednesday, August 27, 2014 6:15 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

hahah this is so perfect

my heart will shrivel and stop and I will literally actually die of shame

it's sad he was a herb

*michael drop*

Imago have u heard killah priest

He's got some awesome tattoo the star of david on my esophagus/petrochemical post millennial sarcophagus/dromedary Islamic octopus type shit u might dig, way genuinely weirder than can ox could ever be

^ thees

theres a story that he was supposed to be the final wutang member but he fell asleep on the studio couch and they used masta killa instead

too bad because masta killa sux

on the other hand napping on couches is p sweet

LJ, I'm not gonna take the time to ilx search to see if you're already an avowed fan but I feel like aesop rock could be some real
http://images.rapgenius.com/ec0a1637eba3e8a7c1ac72c2de7ffd51.436x361x24.gif
shit for you

Also Capoadonna was supposed to be in but he was in jail

yeah they let him in

too bad because masta killa sux

― lag∞n, Wednesday, August 27, 2014 11:02 PM (11 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

hey now no said date is a pretty good album

i have never listened to his solo work, his other verses are notably the worst tho

also the cold vein is awesome, dunno why anyone would have ~issues~ w/ the liking of it

El-P's beats clomp more than they stomp that's my basic issue with this whole Run the Jewels deal

Killah Priest 'heavy mental' lp is a personal classic. Good rec for LJ.

lag∞n even if you are only in it for hearing other wu members in looser form you should check the first two masta killa records

two

lol ty folks

i feel i come closer each year to a sincere appr'n of 'mainstream' rap - when i cross this rubicon, it'll be like there's no functional difference between the 'two' sorts. a happy day indeed

LJ just assuming you already know Dr Octagon but if not run tell dat

i got the octagonecologyst record, what i've heard of it is p sick in >1 sense :D

check out Dalek

m8, I been proselytising Dälek for like 3, 4 years now, they're my favourite rap group (vmic)

someone's gonna say New Kingdom now lol

http://rymimg.com/lk/f/l/56381fcbb4d87130b54425bc46376001/4891392.jpg

If you like to hear some actual rap music, I'd recommend Divine Styler's third album, Word Power 2, it has some awesome cryptic Islamic lyrics with a dystopian sci-fi tinge, and cool, dark electronic beats too. Spiral Walls... is basically an experimental rock record made by a rapper, with loads of aimless noodling, that for some reason has gained a cult status. (Maybe because at the time no rapper had done anything like it?)

that's one way of putting it

It's so funny that Divine Styler was put on by Ice-T & that the Rhyme Syndicate album has both DS and Everlast's first appearances

Ha this made me go through some old records, dude you need to check out 13 & God, collabo between Notwist & the hip hop group Themselves

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/39/Gas_Chamber_(cover).jpeg
check this shit out louis, some real out there cloud type shit

guys it's 2014, everything is everything.

but if you want some new art rap shit, there is Hellfyre Club.

festival culture (Jordan)
Posted: August 28, 2014 at 11:11:32 AM
guys it's 2014, everything is everything.

damn when did this happen

idk a few months ago i think

Also check out Why?, Latyrx, Brotha Lynch Hung, Poison Clan

Hey where are all my recommendations? I'm the one who asked!

migos

Also check out Why?, Latyrx, Brotha Lynch Hung, Poison Clan

― ra's al goole (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Thursday, August 28, 2014 11:53 AM (56 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

:)

at some point in my thirties i imagine I will be on public transport and some algorithmically determined internet 'radio' will serve me with a track from 'fantastic damage' and my heart will shrivel and stop and I will literally actually die of shame

― ♛ LIL UNIT ♛ (thomp), Wednesday, August 27, 2014 6:15 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

hahah this is so perfect

― call all destroyer, Wednesday, August 27, 2014 8:35 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

srsly everyone who reacted to this straight fire beautiful vulnerable post with "lol get help" wow u r dumb and prob not very cool to be around

Yeah f those people

I like the post before that one better tbf

yeah I was feeling that one myself actually

idk maybe i'm just kind of bored by undie-bashing. That whole scene mostly petered out more than a decade ago, and it's not like most of these dudes are living high on the hog.

feel the same way about post-rock bashing, to use an analogous genre

when you gaze into the backpack, the backpack gazes back

point is, fans of music that slavishly flatters yr intelligence, that post was self deprecatingly saying "lol look how hung up i am on this trivial thing", and then you all were all "lol cant u see how hung up u are on this trivial thing boom roasted hi5*

it was more an ott response to seeing the "when i was a fool i loved def jux but now i'm a grownup who listens to dipset" story still having legs twelve years later

ha ha def jux forever get therapy

― Now you're messing with a (President Keyes), Wednesday, August 27, 2014 8:17 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

hmmm

lots of bold stands here against unpopular independent label rap music from 12 years ago.

xpost yeah?

it was more an ott response to seeing the "when i was a fool i loved def jux but now i'm a grownup who listens to dipset" story still having legs twelve years later

― Now you're messing with a (President Keyes), Thursday, August 28, 2014 10:37 AM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

otm

otm theres no way these guys didnt get a joke^^

yeah, or it was kind of a lame joke one or the other

probably it

sorry i didn't think it was fire like you did

prob to busy carrying a torch for defunct rap blog beef

still not really seeing why you think "lol Def Jux forever get therapy" is anything but me being ridiculous in response to someone else's ridiculousness. talk about a faulty joke detector...

talk about a faulty joke detector haha right fellas

i actually kinda like run the jewels

i dont really industrial music but killer mike is cool

If you like the artsier end of backpacker rap, with spoken word stuff and off-kilter samples and all, you might enjoy The Infesticons:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lF8pDmgCoRQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxZVRkIMrIY

A few years later the same folks released another album as The Majesticons, this time the idea was to parody rap trends of the era. The parody might be a bit dated 10 years later, but the album still sounds remarkably good. Doing populist rap in the name of satire actually meant there are some really fun and catchy tunes on the album, much moreso than on the decidedly backpacker Infesticons record:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7xmWZ2Tn1ck

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7xmWZ2Tn1ck

Sorry, the last Youtube was supposed to be this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CUJlmIlbvWM

LL, did you check out the clipping record?

i still need to know if imago is an aesop rock fan
this is important to me

recommended: RATKING

His beats are sort of impressive in a kind of bludgeoning funkless way but, speaking as someone with a lot of love for bad rapping, El-P is one of the worst MCs I've ever heard.

i don't like any of this wordy undie shit
not that anyone asked me but

LL, did you check out the clipping record?

― festival culture (Jordan), Thursday, August 28, 2014 1:18 PM (51 minutes ago) Bookmark

is this "clppng"?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-2GozE6XEqg

I have Labor Days on my computer but I don't know how much I like it coz I basically only listen to my music on shuffle mode without knowing what half of it is. There's a lot of good rap - sometimes I track it down, usually turns out to be Def Jux or Five Deez or something

(where is your and what now, ILX, lol)

apparently Aesop Rock has a massive vocabulary, which is cool I guess

CLIPPING is one of the best things in music right now, obv

xp - got it -- i'll check it out as soon as i am not in an office

In the interests of sending this thread somewhere more positive I would point Imago in the direction of the most recent Shabazz Palaces album.

i'd like to point imago out of this thread so we can go back to talking about killer mike

:( i've not even rly been driving this welter of reccies, ppl are projecting their altrap peccadiloes onto me (not unwelcomely). basically the next RTJ needs to drop right now or this won't get resolved

cool, last one then: imago, try labor days a bit more as it actually reminds me of your posting style

like ace would totally rhyme "altrap peccadilloes on me" with "metal plated armadillos homie"

a recommendation that doubles as a zing! take 'em all i spose. also lol

no zing! i genuinely think you're kindred spirits!

copyright ruckus when u sample tarkus

ratking > clipping

alt rap vs atl rap vs al trap

atp rat

that's when you sit in a chalet taking pills listening to the vague echo of a de la soul concert

RUN THE JEWELS TOUR DATES

10/15 - College Station, TX - Hurricane Harry's %
10/18 - Tulsa, OK - Cain's %
10/20 - Little Rock, AR - Stickyz
10/21 - Memphis, TN - Minglewood Hall %
10/22 - Nashville, TN - Exit/In
10/23 - Birmingham, AL - Iron City %
10/24 - Columbia, SC - Music Farm %
10/25 - Charleston, SC - Music Farm %
10/31 - Philadelphia, PA - Theatre of Living Arts *
11/1 - Washington, DC - 9:30 Club *
11/2 - Charlottesville, VA - Jefferson Theater *
11/3 - Carrboro, NC - Cat's Cradle *
11/4 - Atlanta, GA - Masquerade *
11/6 - Dallas, TX - Trees *
11/7 - Austin, TX - Fun Fun Fun Fest
11/8 - Houston, TX - Fitzgerald's *
11/10 - Phoenix, AZ - Crescent Ballroom *
11/11 - La Jolla, CA - Porters Pub *
11/12 - Pomona, CA - Glass House *
11/14 - San Francisco, CA - Mezzanine +
11/15 - Portland, OR - Hawthorne Theater *
11/17 - Salt Lake City, UT - Urban Lounge *
11/18 - Englewood, CO - Gothic Theatre *
11/20 - Minneapolis, MN - First Line Music Café *
11/21 - Madison, WI - Majestic Theatre *
11/22 - Chicago, IL - Metro *
11/25 - Detroit, MI - St Andrews Hall *
11/26 - Toronto, ON - Danforth Music Hall *
11/27 - Montreal, QC - Club Soda *
11/28 - Boston, MA - Paradise *
11/29 - New York, NY - Stage 48 *
12/30 - Lorne, AU - Falls Festival
12/31 - Marion Bay, AU - Falls Festival
1/1 - Sydney, AU - Field Day
1/2 - Byron Bay, AU - Falls Festival
1/4 - Busselton, AU - Southbound Festival
1/7 - Sydney, AU - Enmore Theatre ^
1/8 - Melbourne, AU - The Forum ^
1/9 - Brisbane, AU - Hi Fi ^
1/10 - Auckland, NZ - Town Hall ^

% Red Bull Sound Select show
* with Ratking & Despot
+ with Despot
^ with Joey Bada$$

i got an email from RTJ this morning and 1) got my tix for the show, see you there assholes and 2) the new song is great and i listened to it 2x in a row

also i listened to clipping and it was alright, but not really electrifying to me for some reason

Is there anywhere to get the first RTJ record these days? This thread has piqued my interest.

i dunno, it's on spotify if that's your thing
probably youtube too
if you mean LP, i have no idea but the new ones are for sale

i loled a lot at the bonu$ packages, starting here

'I'm On The Fucking List, Asshole' Package: $7500
Run The Jewels will put you on the all access guest list plus 1 for any Run The Jewels show anywhere and up to 10 shows. You (and not your plus 1) will be welcome in our back stage before, during and after shows as well as be allowed to hang for soundcheck and load in if you find that sort of thing interesting, have full access to our backstage rider which includes a deli meant tray, various cheeses, a bottle of Henessey, grey goose and various energy bars. We will share our weed with you and let you yell at our tour manager. We will pretend to like you and will introduce you to our friends as our “friend”. Run The Jewels requires a half an hour before stage time to not have to deal with you and your fucking yammering in order to do our pre show stretches, vocal warm ups and crying.

RTJ2 4xLP
RTJ2 T-shirt
RTJ2 CD
Signed Poster
Stickers
1 of every merch item we are selling on tour
Tears
Deli tray
Yelling

there's also a package where you get to buy the album remixed out of cat sounds for 40k; that one comes with a disclaimer saying they have the right to just take your cash and not do it.

lolol
the one i posted was just the first one -- it gets increasingly funny from there

Is there anywhere to get the first RTJ record these days?

Record stores, or http://store.foolsgoldrecs.com/search?q=run+jewels

Huh first album and instrumentals just added to Spotify for the first time.

hearing killer mike say 'we here to eat the rich' is like seeing spider man use heat vision

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Wednesday, May 16, 2012 7:56 PM (2 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

still v proud of this psot

imago, try labor days a bit more as it actually reminds me of your posting style

― go ahead. make vid where u rap about this new TMNT movie. (forksclovetofu), Thursday, August 28, 2014 7:22 PM (2 weeks ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lol @ this

there's also a package where you get to buy the album remixed out of cat sounds for 40k; that one comes with a disclaimer saying they have the right to just take your cash and not do it.

― the other song about butts in the top 5 (forksclovetofu), Monday, September 15, 2014 7:47 PM (3 weeks ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

btw (since this appears to be the thread where we talk about RtJ), somebody started a kickstarter that is now 2/3 of the way to paying for "meow the jewels"

I'm glad all that money saved from not having to buy albums anymore is going to good use

El is donating his portion though

Mentioned this on Twitter yesterday but how do these dudes get a free pass for "fuckboy"? Pretty clearly a homophobic term, they use it all the time, still get glittering press in Pitchfork etc. I know it's an issue in rap in general but seems especially glaring for RTJ who seem to have little to no audience outside the indie market.

didn't realize "fuckboy" was homophobic tbqh

i think a lot of people don't

yeah i see ~social justice~ people use it all the time in the #misandry vein

as far as i know, there's no evidence that fuckboy is homophobic beyond "it sounds homophobic"

It's a ghey area

I honestly was super stoked to hear "fuckboy" on RTJ because years ago there were a couple of loud drunken rednecks who lived a couple houses down from my wife's mother's place and they would be up late and yelling the word "fuck" all the time, and she started referring to them as "the fuckboys" and I like to think my 60 something small town mother-in-law was some sort of rap slang pioneer.

i thought it was prounced like fart-boys

pronounced

i wondering the same thing tbh, and i'm p sure it's at least historically homophobic (like 'punk') even though it seems now to just be generally derogatory (at least if urban dictionary is to believed, ~which it totally is~)

It's hard for me not to read it as a way to use homophobic language but with plausible deniability. There might not be specific evidence but it's not just they way it sounds, it's the way it's used and the context it's used in. But one good way to find out would be to actually ask El-P and Killer Mike about it instead of just not talking about it at all.

i mean, dudes also say things like "you punks is pussy proverbial pansy panty-holders" and "you can all run naked backwards through a field of dicks." They're about alpha male hardman shit and emasculating their foes in their art, which is a tradition that goes back to 35 years of recorded rap ("he's a fairy, I do suppose, flyin through the air in pantyhose") and beyond.

whoa i totally didn't know that

http://www.teabreakfast.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/kermit-tea.jpg

they should build up not tear down

really wish rappers had kept going in on Superman

my take is, given that the entire genre of macho hardman battle-rap is vulnerable to these critiques, I'll take the rappers who use 'plausibly deniable' homophobic language, & do so in a creative way, over the ones who are about telling people to eat a bag of dicks on every other track

... & yes, I acknowledge my complicity in the societal power structures that create a desire for imaginary rap hardmen v_v;

dudes also say things like "you punks is pussy proverbial pansy panty-holders"

this sort of makes me want to do a Fake El-P thread but it would probably stop being funny half a joke in

it would be hysterical for longer than that but would still inevitably got bogged down in both people being like "lol omg def jux/backpacker shit was SOOO STUPID HAHA" and then former or current fans of that shit saying that nobody got it/gets it

what do you guys think of the new single tho

Its good there all good imma def jux dickrider

*duckrider, fuckin autocorrect

both the singles have been goddamn great. bit more down with "oh my darling don't cry" but by a small margin at best

i think old ILM can take some credit for this: https://twitter.com/ystrickler/status/520335503414267905

http://jezebel.com/a-brief-taxonomy-of-the-fuccboi-rip-1638331191

first time i thought i heard "fuckboy" in rap was mystikal's big truck boys which i always heard as "Buckle up boy/ain't no fuckboy" but rap genius thinks i'm wrong

I could swear Onyx says "see you in the next life, fuckboy" in "Nigga Bridges"

Sugarhill Gang said "Clark Kent y'all some fuck boys" iirc

wait, yancey strickler, former ILXOR, is the CEO of kickstarter???

Yup

where you been mang?

o_O

"Blockbuster Night" is top 5 rap songs of 2014 for me

Run The Jewels - El-P and Killer Mike

Still a great album, but it’s really getting hard for me to like this guy:

https://www.spin.com/2018/03/killer-gun-ownership-nra-video-watch/

it's completely valid to push back on white liberal conceptions of gun control (for a lot of reasons) but choosing to do so on NRA TV was a really fuckin bad look and I hope he acknowledges that instead of doubling down

I saw someone on twitter defend him by saying it's no different than going on Fox news, which basically everyone does, but I don't think that holds up

I hope he acknowledges that instead of doubling down

― Simon H., Sunday, March 25, 2018 10:07 AM (four minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

last night on twitter it seemed like he was...doing both? or splitting the difference? doubling down on his message (nb i didn't see the video) and also saying that he didn't really care about the NRA as an organization, it was just an opportunity to get his side out there

I think him bragging about threatening to kick his kids out of the house if they march is going to make me ignore him from now on

yeah that was bullshit

never heard of him before he hooked up w/ Bernie so i aint invested

the bernie quote that was like 'well i was worried he was an actual killer, but now i understand he is just a killer rapper' is still adorable but ya fuck this guy

I think him bragging about threatening to kick his kids out of the house if they march is going to make me ignore him from now on

― President Keyes, Sunday, March 25, 2018 11:49 AM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

^^^

fwiw none of this stuff is new? like, i think he's been pretty open about his views on gun ownership for a while

There's a difference between nuanced opinions on gun ownership and claiming you'd toss your kids out of the house if they participated in a march for Gun Control.

In that, one I probably don't agree with (but just as likely don't have enough info on), and the other is despicable.

showing up on a video clip for an org that has a history of being for gun restrictions, but only when black men show up with guns, seems like a bad move

from a good thread picking apart the appearance

Overall thoughts. People who are drawing a comparison between Killer Mike on NRATV and Leftists on Fox News are incorrect. This is not really a nuanced conversation on Gun control or the history of Black gun owners, it's sole purpose is to have a black face parrot talking points

— The People v. Brandon Sutton (@PrettyBadLefty) March 25, 2018

love how this guy goes from genius to idiot pawn of the machinations of the nra just for having a non-partyline opinion and not being as white as bernie. racists.

to clarify, 'racists' --> ppl like those in the above quoted tweet, not the ppl posting in this thread

Brandon Sutton is black, you absolute moron.

Anyway, RL Stephens takes a different tack.

The truth is that when NAACP leader Robert F Williams organized a community defense program against the Klan in NC in the 50’s, the group was chartered by the NRA. This story is more complicated and politically contested than we often acknowledge.

— R.L. Stephens (@RLisDead) March 25, 2018

the NRA in the fifties was not the NRA of the '90s and today. I'm sure the Tweet feed goes into this discussion.

Brandon Sutton is black, you absolute moron.

WOW so was the person who said this

"We've got to take the neighborhood back. We've got to go in there. Just forget telling your child to go to the Peace Corps. It's right around the corner. It's standing on the corner. It can't speak English. It doesn't want to speak English. I can't even talk the way these people talk. "Why you ain't where you is go." I don't know who these people are. And I blamed the kid until I heard the mother talk. Then I heard the father talk. This is all in the house. You used to talk a certain way on the corner and you got into the house and switched to English. Everybody knows it's important to speak English except these knuckleheads. You can't land a plane with "why you ain't…". You can't be a doctor with that kind of crap coming out of your mouth. There is no Bible that has that kind of language. Where did these people get the idea that they're moving ahead on this? Well, they know they're not, they're just hanging out in the same place, five or six generations sitting in the projects when you're just supposed to stay there long enough to get a job and move out."

the NRA in the fifties was not the NRA of the '90s and today. I'm sure the Tweet feed goes into this discussion.

― morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, March 25, 2018 5:56 PM (nine minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

narrator: it didn't

kinda uninterested in any exoneration of the nra after the revolt at cincinnati

I said nothing about "exoneration." It's a fact that the NRA before 1968 was a different organization.

oh no, im not directing that at you, thats to RL's thread/simon

uh me neither?

https://pitchfork.com/news/killer-mike-apologizes-for-nra-interview-in-new-video-watch/

There's a lot here that makes sense, even if the timeline doesn't quite clear up his "march right out of the house" remark, but I still question the very idea of appearing on "NRA-TV" (which I didn't even know existed until today).

xp sorryyyyyyyyyyy just to rl's thread

*vindicated for hating run the jewels all along*

getting sassed again:

Killer Mike gotta take a year off of being woke. pic.twitter.com/mJrXfrKRKJ

— Vince Valholla (@VinceValholla) April 8, 2018

killer mike is a fucking ninny

wanna rethink that one, k3vin?

ok had to google "ninny racist" and yeah, apologies, mods please change to "jackass"

*googles quickly*

oh good, reckon we can get about a hundred posts on whether nincompoop is a derivation of pickaninny or not

oof getting sonned by joy ann reid must be truly mortifying

He went after her?

He did indeed...badly.

...apart from the instagram comment Alfred posted?

And that is what I meant.

and I was answering Simon with an eyebrow raised

I see no Joy-Ann Reid fans on ILX, just shaking heads at how ridiculous Mike's been

KM makes up with JAR (he's going on her show), backs off from the NRA, and endorses the Socialist Rifle Association, which I just learned exists

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bhl0jEXjjZq/?hl=en&taken-by=killermike

well their reddit is certainly excited about it.

https://www.reddit.com/r/SocialistRA/

Mentioned this on Twitter yesterday but how do these dudes get a free pass for "fuckboy"? Pretty clearly a homophobic term, they use it all the time, still get glittering press in Pitchfork etc. I know it's an issue in rap in general but seems especially glaring for RTJ who seem to have little to no audience outside the indie market.

― Immediate Follower (NA), Thursday, 9 October 2014 15:33 (six years ago) link

F Yes 🌴 Our summer of love is heating up as @NikkiGlaser hosts the hottest, wildest group in the Cayman Islands. Three gorgeous women must decide: is he an FBOY or a Nice Guy? All the @FBOYIsland fun streams July 29, only on #HBOMax #FBOYIsland #SummerOnMax

— HBO Max (@hbomax) July 12, 2021

fuck·boy
/ˈfəkˌboi/
Learn to pronounce
nounVULGAR SLANG•DEROGATORY
a weak or contemptible man.
a man who has many casual sexual partners.
Definitions from Oxford Languages

is kinda funny that ILX went from tut-tutting the usage of the word cos of their collective incorrect understanding of what it meant to using it, if not often, at least 'regularly', if I use ILX search to confirm (which I just did)

where is the outrage over "punk" which is far less ambiguous? or all the dick sucking stuff. which I'd have hoped these dudes would have grown out of

tbf I do recall at least el-p using the bad f word in the past but (no excuse) that was rampant back then. I still wish he would stick to making beats. which I feel used to be a more common opinion than it is now

I first heard fuckboy in reference to people like bieber & if anything it was about overbearing heterosexuality as well as general dickheadery. it could have a homophobic resonance on occasion but there's far more blatant stuff surely

lol i had no idea 'punk' originally was a homophobic term

searching around and it seems like 'fuckboy' did sometimes have homophobic connotations in the past but that usage had largely disappeared or been overshadowed as it got popularised as a slang term last decade

In prison slang "fuckboy" and "punk" mean basically the same thing

"punk" is ancient homo argot

About 20 years ago a couple of dumb redneck guys were often at the lake house down the road from my inlaws and they would set off fireworks late at night and constantly yell "FUCK" all the time so my wife and her family all started calling anyone who was loud out in the woods 'the fuck boys'.

I was super confused when I heard the first RTJ record and didn't know how they picked up slang that my 50-something midwestern mother-in-law invented.

you can go back just a couple of years earlier in the killer mike discography and find some much-less-veiled homophobic terms. "fuckboy" is a step up.

I've got some bad news about ATCQ

i was enjoying BORN LIKE THIS the other day until "batty boyz" came on, this shit is everywhere

yeah that blatant homophobia is hard to ignore, especially in dancehall

i say dancehall cause that's where doom got the batty boyz slang from

yeah it was basically the f-word equivalent at my school

oops Killer Mike's got Chappelle on his new track

DBNS

That was really disappointing to see. Feels like a misreading of a large part of the audience he's gained since Run the Jewels blew up, but then again I see a lot of uncritical praise for the songs on Twitter so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Not sure how big the Anti-Chappelle Rap fan contingent is

The Chappelle intro is easy to skip at least. It's gross but not really surprising - KM hasn't taken issue at all with TI's creepiness about his daughter or any of that, BFFs with Bill Maher, etc..

not to mention appearing on NRA TV

I can understand that appearance, as he believes in Black gun ownership as a means of self-defense given the lack of support from police, which makes total sense to me in the current climate. He was a bit naive to think the NRA wouldn't pervert why he was actually appearing, for their own reasons, which is why he apologized afer.

*after