Another $20 Record Challenge

So yeah, I got them records a couple months back for my birthday, and had planned to write the second half of two $20 Record Challenges (where you buy $20 worth of records at a record shop, which tests your skill to uncover gems as well as the record store's ability to not suck a fat dick), and never did, mostly because poverty seems to be embedded in my DNA and I am living in constant fear I will come home to find a bank sitting inside my house with all my shit piled up in the ditch. But hey, welcome to America in 2008. Motherfuckers are arguing over whether or not we're in a recession and I'm wondering if I'm gonna be standing in line for an eighth parcel of rotten apples by the end of the summer. Our credit card had $50 on it, so I bought $48 worth of seeds though, so we can have a fat ass garden. Of course, if the place is no longer our's, I guess we'll have to sneak into the garden to get our shit we grew back, but at the same time, I feel more valuable as a life insurance policy than an actual working member of society a lot of times, so if worse came to worse, I'd probably go out on some outlaw retard tip, holed up in my house shooting through windows which are conveniently already busted up in a couple of spots. Anyways, enough of that talk; here's another $20 worth of records I got in the basement at Plan 9 in Carytown, Richmond, Virginia, which is a hipster hellhole to be sure, where all the workers look like eastern Europeans in Chuck Taylors, but you have to be ahead of their hipster curve and you can still find mad awesome shit because they have crazy amounts of dollar records, of a far greater quality (set to record store standard, not Salvation Army standard) than most dollar bins.

ICE-T - SOMEBODY GOTTA DO IT/OUR MOST REQUESTED RECORD 12-INCH SINGLE - $3
My boy Paul-Ski in high school had co-opted the 7-inch version of "Somebody Gotta Do It" (aka Pimpin' Ain't Easy!!!) from his older brother, and we used to play that shit constantly. Somebody Gotta Do It was a classic old school shit-talking to the nth degree, about wealth in this case, and no lying, I used to be a hardcore ass Ice-T fan, all the way up until O.G. Original Gangster sort of alienated me because I was in college and mad dorks were loving on that shit. And yes, I see the obvious observation, that I was probably a mad dork in college too, and I probably was, but there is a feeling of entitlement you get when you are down with an artist from his first record, then second, and on, and then he has something that blows up more mainstream, and when you're a contrarian fuckface like myself, it makes you think less of it. But also, O.G. wasn't nearly as good as Rhyme Pays or Power, though it's probably better than the Iceberg.
The B-side to this I'd never heard and it's an interesting old school "let's rhyme over a breakbeat and the DJ busting up a Led Zeppelin snippet on the tables. It's like listening to Ice-T do a Schoolly D-style song, just it has that west coast flavor of extra roller skating rink-sounding bells in the beat. And both songs have bonus beats extras, which makes this a smart $3.

SLIM THUG - WOOD GRAIN WHEEL 12-INCH SINGLE - $1
I am a big fan of Houston rappers, even the second-wave of DJ Screw-influenced guys that blew up a couple years back (I have been wishing my man Kingmob would make a H-Town's greatest hits mix with the best Paul Wall/Mike Jones/Lil Flip/Lil Keke/Chamillionaire/Slim Thug/Bun B shit from that two year window where it was going crazy), but Slim Thug is not one of my favorites, mostly because he's always talking about being "the boss". Dude, jobs suck, and most every black person knows this as well as most lower-level white people like myself, so I do not understand why you'd want to advertise yourself as a boss. This is standard second wave Screw-influenced, with the standard Fat Pat slowed down lyric doubling as a hook. I had been excited to see this because I thought it was a track I had heard on the satellite radio with a weird bass kick pattern I wanted to share with the PSY/OPSogist for example purposes upon future beatmaking endeavors, except I was mistaken (it was actually a Chamillionaire song), so this isn't the best dollar I wasted that day. Still, you slow the pitch down on an instrumental track with a Fat Pat hook and motherfuckers (even whiteboys) can freestyle for hours.
Also, added dick in the mouth to whoever decided it made sense to just have Radio/LP/instrumental on both sides of a fucking record (which is even worse when the producer is full of himself and only puts the radio/street versions on both sides with no instrumentals). Not only was the early '90s a much greater heyday for rap peoples putting out better music, musically and conceptually, but shit, they had extra tracks that they put as B-sides or bonus cuts. And all these shitty free "mixtapes" you can get inside these internets don't make up for it.

TAKA BOOM - NIGHT DANCIN'/CLOUD DANCER 12-INCH SINGLE - $1
I got this because at one point I was buying up 12-inch disco singles and just playing them as slow as the turntable would go, and you could find some great loops that way (and who the fuck who is into regular music listens to shitty disco music from the '70s, so it's an untapped genre of samplitude). I eventually stopped doing this because I ended up with so many shitty disco singles that didn't even have a good horn-heavy loopable section that I was afraid I would turn gay. Unfortunately, this single pushes me further towards gaydom. The fact it's on Ariola Records, which is what tricked me into giving it a shot, doesn't make it less gay; I think it's a hairy beer-bellied bear dude's areola they're talking about, although I'm not sure if areola only refers to bitch nipples or all nipples. I never took anatomy, though I play one on dvd.
Wait, "Cloud Dancer" does have a nice acoustic intro with some "oooooh oooooh ooooooooh"s, but it's not really sample material as it sounds more like somebody doing an electronica remix to an L.A. Guns or Skid Row power ballad.

VARIOUS ARTISTS - ORIGINAL EXPERIENCE LP - $4
This is a collection of people I never heard of produced by a guy called Jah Screw on 1-Time Records out of Jamaica, but with no date. It might be good dub music, or it might be early ragga music, or it might be really shitty shit from somewhere in the middle '90s.
Actually, it is even worse than any of those... it is the same shitty synth-pulse beat but with like ten different set of vocals over the same beat. By the third one, it wouldn't matter if you had ODB freestyling while Louie Armstrong scatted in the background, it would drive you crazy. This shit is some Son of Sam's neighbor's dog barking to me.

LITTLE MEEKY - SWEAR PT. 2 7-INCH - $1
Sounds like late '80s raggamuffin (meaning the dude rhymes like the "Pass the Duchie" kids), but it's catchy enough and unsynthesized enough to make it into my never-get-fixed jukebox. Some old dude who does that thing has promised me three times he'd call me regularly to get it in his shop, but fucker always flails. He sounds on the phone like he smells like mothballs and hates black people though. I saw a truck for some other amusement company that actually had "jukeboxes" on the side in letters, but mostly they deal with dollar-operated digital jukeboxes nowadays. Nobody's got that old school actual fan slotted 45 jukebox knowledge. World's gone to hell, in a bootleg Louie Vutton handbag.

THE JIMMY CASTOR BUNCH - KING KONG PT. I/PT. II 7-INCH - $1
I often buy stupid worthless Jimmy Castor singles, based on the ridiculously unquestionable awesomeness of "Troglogyte (Cave Man Song)". There is some serious funk here, and the story of King Kong is Jimmy Castor at his mid-level - not too over-the-top stupid, but not great. The fake King Kong groans during the break are probably more than worth the one dollar though, except I bet like 7000 fag nerd Aesop Rock-loving DJs have sampled it already. It kinda bums me out that the music I do is probably gonna end up falling into that stupid Sage Francis/Aesop Rock college dork kids love it genre. Oh well, I guess I can work for years to get popular, fight mood swings and depression, and then go nuts and blow up like 38 college kids along with myself on some hole-in-the-wall stage in some university town where the PBRs are in full motherfucking effect at the bar.

JOE SIMON - ALL MY HARD TIMES/GEORGIA BLUE 7-INCH - $1
Hey, I know this "All My Hard Times" song, and it's great. Life's got my man Joe Simon pushed around and pissed, but he keeps on trucking along. A great thing to remember, except he should be glad he wasn't around now because diesel's over four dollars a gallon and you can't just keep on trucking no more.
B-side ain't bad either, although I wore my needle down letting it skip over the ending for eight minutes because I was in the middle of masturbating to Penthouse Forum book from 1978. I like old porn letters better because dudes are more about fucking more women back then as opposed to watching more dudes fuck their woman like nowadays porn letters be tripping over.

LITTLE JOE BLUE - DON'T START ME TO TALKING/DIRTY WORK GOING ON 7-INCH - $1
It is blues music, meaning there is chicken scratch guitar solos and the lyrics are about the pain and struggle of everyday situations, usually nasty cheating bitches or dirty britches with no dollar bills in them pockets.
B-side is more of the same, except the 7-inch was sitting slightly underneath that plastic spacer thing for the turntable, so the song had a slow down/speed up rhythm to it since it was spinning off kilter. I need to remember to tell PSY/OPS about that because with a most proper sounding song, you could find some weird ass changing rhythm yet still on rhythm samples in such an accidental mannerism.

BOBBY GREGG AND HIS FRIENDS - THE JAM PART 1/PART 2 7-INCH - $1
This song is upbeat as a motherfucker. In fact, I'm not depressed anymore. Who cares if I'm broke? Man, I'm able-bodied, and the rain will stop, and I've got work out the ass to do once the sun comes out and it's warm. I just work, and by Monday, I could probably clock $1200. Except, let's be reasonable, and stay home on Sunday to put the garden in the ground and settle for just making $1000 by next Monday. That gets me one month closer on being caught up on the crib, plus stocks the house full of groceries that ain't corn flakes, rice, and frozen squash from the freezer from last year. Thanks Bobby Gregg and whoever your motherfucking friends are. I'm gonna go out in the rain and do some high-speed yoga.
Seriously, this song is awesome as fuck. It makes me happy, although with the wife having had our third kid two months ago, it's been almost three months since I've had sex, much less one that involved a serious amount of foreplayriffic fellatio beforehand, so my idea of happy is probably all sorts of out of wack right now. When they give you a vasectomy, the semen is absorbed inside your body, which freaks me out, but I'm also of the belief is you do not have sex enough, the same thing happens to a regular unfixed dude, and it makes you crazy. Were I a scientist, I'd do research on such manners with semen absorption into the body and sexual predatory actions, but I'm not a scientist, just a housepainter, so I try to explain to the Mexicans who work for me when I need someone to work for me what I'm talking about, using the 300 Mexican words I know.

MILLIE JACKSON - IF YOU LOVING YOU IS WRONG I DON'T WANT TO BE RIGHT/THE RAP 7-INCH - $1
Oh, you know that A-side song as it's well-known, but the B-side is a play off that first song and B-side is the motherfucking shit. It is a definite jukebox stuffer, guaranteed to hold a solid spot in one of my 100 slots, without a fucking doubt. Millie Jackson is akin to Jimmy Castor in that she has some top-notch songs that give her a reputation, except she also has a bunch of dumb shit. I'd like someone to just send me a link to a Millie Jackson megamix of all her awesomest stuff, so I could get excited, but then never download it because I never do. I have a real disconnect between real music and the internets, that borders on mental problem. But then again, that's the beauty of the internets as it allows us all a great spot to develop our mental problems way more fully than our parents ever could, at least not in a safe environment.

OTIS REDDING - (SITTIN' ON) THE DOCK OF THE BAY/SWEET LORENE 7-INCH - $1
Basically bought this specifically for the jukebox since Otis is one of the all-time bestest and this was the only stupid dollar single stupid Plan 9 was offering, slapping $3 price tags on all his other 7-inches. "(Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay" is played out of course, and "Sweet Lorene" is a standard R&B slammer from that time period, talking shit to some hot skank to try and get inside her pussy tissues, but still, it's Otis Redding. It's funny, you get all hung up on modern standards where Amy Winehouse is throaty and bluesy as fuck, but then you listen to one Otis Redding song and realize she's just a stupid ugly bitch hooked on crack with a nice marketing gimmick that tricked a bunch of magazine reviewers.

REVEREND THOMAS L. WALKER - I'LL MAKE IT SOMEHOW/I DON'T DESERVE A MANSION 7-INCH - $1
This dude Ace I used to know was a way better music nerd than me (he used to do album reviews for Spin I think), and he had all these wonderfully crazy black gospel records he'd play. It tricks me into thinking you can just start buying the shit and find gems, which led to me having a ton of shitty ass gospel LPs at one point, but I learned, you can't try too hard. Still, on $20 missions, I usually like to get one 7-inch to give it a shot, based mostly on the title of the songs, kind of like an NFL team's 7th round draft pick as a possible project that pays off. This was that choice for me this time. Way too much choir in the A-side, which killed off a great Hammond organ-heavy start. Basically, all great gospel music should have a Hammond organ plus somebody playing electric guitar who idolizes Wes Montgomery. And "I'll Make It Somehow" is that, just clusterfucked up with too much goddamned choir. B-side was even worse, so thanks a fucking lot Reverend Johnny Walker, now I'm one step closer to the devil. Thrash bands from 1987 never muck up their intrinsic awesomeness with too much goddamned choir.

JONNY OSBOURNE - ONE RUB-A-DUB FOR THE ROAD/DUB FOR THE ROAD 7-INCH - $3
On Top Rank Records, and it delivers fairly well enough. It's no Madlib compilation-worthy ass single, but it's good enough to make it into the imaginary broken jukebox rotation. Man, if I ever get that thing fixed, I could probably write a book figuring out what 100 singles to put into it out of the stupid boxes and milk crates full of stupid vinyl I have.
Of course, the dub side is most enjoyable, as usual for middling quality Jamaican singles of this sort. I'd love to do a $20 record challenge in Kingston. Actually, I am in the process of attempting to set aside enough money to take two weeks towards the end of fall and travel a loop through the southeast, hitting up record stores for a $20 record challenge each day. Except, thus far, my saving up for it has involved me thinking of it and realizing I'm a couple grand behind on regular bills already. But yeah.

(Failed) $20 Record Challenge

Coincidentally, last weekend I also had dreams of completing another $20 record challenge. I thought there were more record challenges documented on this site, but I guess they were all done on our little message board where we all rub dicks with each other, or maybe one of the other 15 blogs we've put together over the past year.

I went to Armageddon Shop in Providence Rhode Island. I was there about a year ago and picked up some pretty decent stuff in their bargain boxes, and figured it would be pretty easy to clock in another successful Record Challenge. Even moreso when I noticed they reduced their bargain box prices from 10 for $10 to 25 for $10 (or .50 cents each) for LPs and 4 for a dollar 7"s. I was excited about the prospect of exiting the record store with 50 records for $20, but it wasn't meant to be. I ended up picking up 11 records from the .50 cent bins, giving up on looking and grabbing 2 full price records putting my total at $28 and change, completely nullifying the golden rule of the $20 record challenge (don't spend over $20).

I may just be out of practice, or it may be because Armageddon Shop is a small space overflowing with records and the bargain boxes aren't exactly prominently displayed. If you've ever thumbed through a cheap bin at a record store, you should know that they're usually kept in some below eye level spot because it's not like stores make any real money off of bargain shit, so if you're not willing to squat for an hour or sprawl out on a dirty floor, thumbing through dusty old records and sneezing along the way, you're fucked.
It's especially strenuous at Armageddon Shop, because their cheap boxes are stored underneath the shelves of the regular priced stuff in an aisle a little under three feet wide, so not only do you have to squat down or sit in an uncomfortable position, but you have to deal with non-tightwads passing through the aisle looking for real items.
Lastly, I was with my girlfriend and her brother. they're both very understanding of my loser hobby, but I didn't want to waste too much of their time looking for stupid shit, so I sped it up a little. Enough with excuses though, here's what I came out with:

Clockcleaner - Babylon Rules $9.99

Clockcleaner are one of the few current non-rap groups I keep up with. They play noisy Jesus Lizard / Am-rep style music. I'm especially motivated to keep up with them because I recently sold one of their 7"s on Ebay for $40 when I was expecting to get like $5 for it. So now I will buy any of their music on vinyl I see because I am a money grubbing asshole at heart and don't mind flipping a record for 1000% profit every once in a while.

Sun Ra and his Solar Myth Arkestra - The Solar-Myth Approach (vol 2) (reissue) $10.99

I don't pretend to be a big Sun Ra fan or anything. I usually dig whatever tracks Madlib uses in his mixes, but the stuff I hear on my own usually sounds like nonsense to me. I understand the guy has like 400 records and I have no clue as to what his best one is supposed to be. I mainly bought this because I've seen all these Sun Ra reissues pop up, and they're usually like $20 or more, so I bought this one on principal. I have no real reasoning for picking this one over the other 10 they had, outside of this particular title being the only one with the promise of colored vinyl, which is a stupid reason to buy a record anyway. Either way, I'm already over the $20 cut off point two records into this bullshit.

Mr. Mister - Welcome to the Real World .50 cent

I am a big closet queermo, so this was my find of the trip. This is the record with "Broken Wings" on it. If I ever get back into making vinyl mixes, that will be the first track I use, almost guaranteeing no one will ever listen to it, but if Diplo put it on a mix, it would be genius. Fucking asshole hypocrite internet.

Risky Business Soundtrack .50 cent

I mainly bought this because it has a Prince song on it, and I don't ever remember song titles so I thought maybe it was some special Prince song I never heard before, but it's just a song from 1999 that I don't particularly like. I should have known that because I spent 3 hours at work reading Prince's Wikipedia biography and every corresponding record entry at work the day after I watched Purple Rain a few weeks ago. It's not a total loss though, because I enjoy the novelty of owning a record that features songs by Prince, Tangerine Dream, Jeff Beck, Journey and Muddy Waters.

Billy Joel - 52nd Street .50 cent

I hate Billy Joel. Every once in a while I will read an article that makes Billy Joel sound more interesting than he is, but I still have no desire to listen to him. I bought this mainly because I see it all the time in the cheap bins and repetition of things tricks you into buying it, plus maybe there will be a day when I have company and they are looking through my records and see all the crappy shit I have and get disgusted, but then find the one Billy Joel record and think it's a classic record or something, and perhaps they will strike up a conversation about it, and then I'll punch them in the face.

Pink Floyd - Wish You Were Here .50 cent

Another band I don't like that could easily fit into my Billy Joel scenario, but they do have one song I like, but I don't know what it's called or what it even sounds like anymore, but someday I plan to find it. That's why I'll buy a Pink Floyd record if I see it in the bargain bins, because it doesn't happen as often as you would assume, so it's not like I'm investing too much money trying to find this one song I probably won't even lie anymore. I'm guessing hippies are forever scouring cheap bins for Pink Floyd records and they always beat me to it, and that's why I never see them, because judging by the amount of records they've sold over the years, there should be cheap bins solely dedicated to Pink Floyd at this point.

Earth, Wind & Fire - Gratitude .50 cent

I think as a know-it-all music blogger, I'm supposed to know a thing or two about Earth, Wind and Fire, but I don't. I figure if it's something I'm supposed to know about, then maybe this is the one piece of shit record I found that I'll listen to more than once before I chuck it into the DO NOT WANT crate. On the other hand, it could just be bullshit like Billy Joel or Pink Floyd and I haven't been missing much all these years. I'm sure I've heard Earth, Wind and Fire songs and liked them, but I couldn't tell you which ones those were.

Ja Rule - Holla Holla 12" .50 cent

Haha. HOLLA HOLLA. That will never get old. I'll probably never listen to this, but it makes me feel better knowing I have a 12" picture of Ja Rule with HOLLA HOLLA written all big on it. The B side has that song with Jay Z and DMX that I think people liked. I don't remember.

The Fools - Heavy Mental .50 cent

I bought this because the cover says HEAVY MENTAL in those big cartoony heavy metal letters. The ones that are supposed to look like steel. I figured this was just some crap band who released a few records that no one ever cared about, but I checked allmusic.com, and I guess the record they released before this was some unsung classic. They had that one there too, but I didn't buy it. They are also supposed to be some kind of funny rock band, but I don't get the joke. Possibly because this was released in 1982, and people's senses of humor were different.

The 5th Dimension Live .50 cent

I own like 14 5th Dimension records and I don't think any of them cost me over $3. Every time I think I bought the last possible 5th Dimension record, another one pops up. I'm sure liking 5th Dimension means I have remedial music taste, but I don't care. I wish I could find more music that sounded like this, which is why I always will buy their records when I see them, even if it seems they've released at least 10 records with the same five songs on them. I understand "Age of Aquarius" was a huge hit for the time, but come on guys.

Fluid Mask - Flesh Sparks to the Beat .50 cent

I'll usually take chances on records with interesting covers on small indie labels. I had a sneaking suspicion this was going to be an early 90's industrial record, and I was right. This brings me back to the days of being an awkward 15 year old trying to be different listening to shitty music. I wonder if anyone still actively listens to music like this?

Yazoo - The Other Side of Love 12" .50 Cent

The abstract cover and odd font choice kind of threw me off, and I didn't expect a dance record. Upon closer inspection, there's a lot of stuff that gave it away, but I'm an idiot. It was released in 1982 like right after disco but before freestyle/house/techno really came around so it's kind of weird sounding. It was completely awesome on 33 until I realized it was supposed to be on 45. The tortured death metal style vocals you don't usually hear on dance records cued me to the rpm mistake.

V/A New Alliance Records - Mighty Feeble .50 Cent

This was a blank white label record with a white blank cover and a typed out sheet of paper with band and track listings tapes onto it. When you see shit like this for under $1 you HAVE to buy it, or you are too much of a nerd to enjoy fun. This wasn't a mega find unfortunately. Just a bunch of dudes recording noisy songs in their garages and basements trying to be weird and artistic, with bands names like AUTISTIC DVINITY and KAMIKAZE REFRIGERATORS. No idea what year it's from, but after a quick listen, I'd say late 80s/early 90's. I'll never listen to this again, but it's cool knowing I own some shitty Pressed in Low Quantity record that features a bunch of long forgotten bands that no one cares about. It is the apex of how stupid and time wasting record collecting is.

Total failure.

$20 Record Challenge

We had some shit on the message board from forever ago (like 7 months, which is actually two or three internet forevers) where you could drop $20 at the used record store and then share upon what which you founded in the dusty dirty ass dank bins of your local dinosaur ass record store still offering up vinyl, probably in some homo ass college part of town where dudes who purposely make their hair messed up walk by dripping with calculated irony. And as much as I hate those dudes, they are a refreshing break from the internet where everything is collected, datafied, proffered, and gobbled up by others like cybertronic Pac Men trying to eat up everything they'll never listen to and hope they dodge ghostly viruses or overloaded hard drives. Fucking faggots.
Anyways, my wife asked me what I wanted for my birthday (Valentine's Day, in case you fucking faggots want to pretend to be my real friend and go like "Happy B-day Raven" in the stupid cbox like the fucking social misfit robot world faggots you truly are), and I thunk it over and over, and it occurred to me I hadn't been record digging in forever. So she said take $40 and do that shit (which is a lot because up until about a week ago, we were steadily two months behind on the mortgage all winter long... lazy economy and lazy dude don't make a good tag team for financial success), so I did that shit, and have been secretly listening to them in the camper so my kids don't know I already got my present. They'll wrap them up next week and I can open them on my birthday and act surprised. Well, I broke this shit up into two $20 challenges, since I wanted to, and this the first $20 I literally spent at the record store. (Props to Plan 9 Records in Richmond, VA, with the a giant selection of shit in the basement. I'm also glad that homo that prices records only knows hipster bullshit so I could get some awesome shit for cheap. Haha you eastern European looking fuckers... why is it record store nerd dudes who tell you how much you get for your records you stole and are trying to sell always look like eastern European dudes with Fader magazine subscriptions?)

Nashville Original Motion Picture Soundtrack - $1
This is some Robert Altman flick from the '70s starring Karen Black that my local shithole small town video store used to have on VHS. Basically, Karen Black is physically abused as a kid, runs away to be a country singer, gets sexually abused by a couple of Nashville heavyweight superstars, and then I don't remember what happens, but I assume since it was the '70s, she somehow succeeded beyond her wildest dreams and the abusive people all wrecked cars and died or got shot or some bullshit. I got this record looking for samples for the weird country-ish hip hop group Prolo I'm in. At first quick listen, it just sounded like generic crappy made-for-movie country songs, but I didn't give it a solid listen, much less one with the speed slowed down all the way when you really find good samples. The song titles seem promising though ("Keep A-Goin'", "I'm Easy", and "Tapedeck in His Tractor" for example), and a couple of songs were actually written by Karen Black, and if my muddled hipster fuckface mind is working right, she's some sort of awesomely tragic figure from back then, so maybe her songs are glimpses into mad brilliance.

Star Wars Soundtrack - $1
I am no Star Wars nerd by any means. I never had the toys because my folks were poor so I was actually quite resentful of other little snotnosed fuckers sporting all them Han Solos and Chewbaccas and shit when I was a kid - especially kids that had like 13 stormtroopers, just wasting money on toys, and I didn't even have a fucking R2D2 coloring book. But still, this is the straight soundtrack, it was clean as fuck, double album, and only for a buck. How can I lose? I can just slow down the shit like DJ Screw, throw and ASR10 beat behind it, and freestyle sci-fi nonsense and become one of those nerd rappers or whatever they call that stupid shit I read about one time.

Willie Nelson Sings Kristofferson - $1
I'm a big Willie Nelson fan when he's not doing pop country bullshit, and the satellite radio's outlaw station has been playing that new "Gravedigger" song fairly regularly, and it's a great ass song. I really loved that shit he did with that Calexico spic group too. But I've got at least double and triple copies of most of the important Willie records (for your information if you dabble in good country music - Redheaded Stranger, Phases and Stages, Yesterday's Wine, and Shotgun Willie are your best start), but finding one with him doing all Kris Kristofferson songs was intriguing to me. This is partly because double K has become this weird counter-culture figure with me after watching too many old Sam Peckinpah movies where Kristoffersen plays outlaw Jesus to perfection (get Convoy from Netflix if you've never seen it, that shit's easily the greatest made-for-TV movie ever), but also because he writes fucked up soulful degenerate songs. So hearing Willie do "Sunday Morning Comin' Down" is gonna be worth the dollar on it's own, and everything else is gravy.

The Good Times in Country Music - Various Artists - $1
This is a shitty sampler by Columbia Records, but it's a double LP and has a bunch of Hank Thompson songs, and I don't have any Hank Thompson on vinyl. It also has, for kitschy factor, Grandpa Jones of Hee Haw doing "Mountain Dew" (which is awesome), and Jim Nabors aka Gomer Pyle aka that singing hillbilly fag dude doing "Wichita Lineman" (which is hilariouser than fuck). Worth a dollar, but it's also one of those records that I'll file in my one section of vinyl that's I call the Raven-might-be-gay section, because it's the type of stuff I imagine metrosexual homos (haha - an oxymoron, I know) would be playing while drinking weird mixed drinks that taste like Altoids yet get you drunker than hell.

The Late Great Red Sovine - Phantom 309 - $1
If you do not know who Red Sovine is, please steal from these robotnets either "Phantom 309" or more importantly "Teddy Bear", or even "Colorado Kool-Aid". Red Sovine is this weird ass old country singer who did tales of ghosts or crippled children or judgemental people being burned by God or whatever. He is one strange fucker. I have only heard about two or three songs out of the ten on this album, including the "Phantom 309" (which is about a hitchhiker who catches a ride with a ghost-driven tractor and trailer without knowing it until he gets dropped off at a diner and tells everybody about the ride he just got), but I haven't listened to the rest, because I KNOW Red Sovine will deliver... no doubt in my mind, so I'm waiting till the weekend to get crazy ionospherically baked up and sit around with headphones on listening to that shit while masturbating to old Penthouse magazines from 1978.

Blood, Sweat & Tears 3 - $1
This is purely for sampling purposes for Solaris Earth Pipeline, because PSY-OPS played me a beat where he had sampled "And When I Die" by these guys, without even knowing we had hooked up a separate beat together a few months back that was a breakbeat snippet of the b-side to the 45 for that song. I don't think we even put anything over top that sample except maybe a drum kick or two. I will listen to this when I am in a "let's listen to a bunch of potentially shitty ass records and try to find golden nuggets of samplitude within".

Sorrells Pickard - self-titled - $1
I have never heard of this guy, but he looks like a crazy fucker and the album sleeve has a glowing endorsement by Kris Kristofferson, talking about how Pickard was a major voice in the anti-commercial underground sound of Nashville at that time. A lot of times when digging, I'll find shit like this and will go to the date to know whether to go for it or not. This one is from 1972, so it's post-hippie early-outlaw era country time, so this might be an undiscovered gem. It also might be butt ass terrible. Usually with unknown country music, my cutoff date is 1976, because after the bicentennial everything got kinda hokey and country radio became too powerful due to the Jews that moved to Nashville to live in a warmer climate while still screwing musicians and songwriters out of their well-deserved royalties. There's also some great ass song titles on this LP that sound exactly like the type of rural back roads hip hop bullshit themes I'd be writing for the Prolo CD we've been fucking around with lately. It also has radio station call letters Sharpied onto the front and back covers, which always makes me happy because that means a radio station had this album at some point. Basically, I'd like to own a mountain and move this camper trailer I do my musical creative bullshit inside of to the top, get a transmission tower, and have my own AM station. So when I see shit with call letters on it, it reminds me of that. I am a romantic at heart, and a cynic online.

David Banner - Cadillac on 22s 12-inch - $1
This is one of my favorite songs ever, and the one track I always try to hype people up to, so if I had found this for $10, I might've bought it. But there it was, tucked into the dollar racks, not a blemish on the vinyl, and I actually looked up and laughed at the eastern Eurotrash crooked face fucker at the counter, mocking his pretentious ignorance. Not only do I have this on vinyl now to play for parties when I am coaxed into spinning records like a retard from my monstrous collection for cookouting ass drunk people, but the single has the instrumental. I don't think I can even explain to you how stoked that makes me. I, to this day, play certain instrumentals off vinyl on at least a bi-weekly basis. David Banner's beat for Trick Daddy's "Thug Holiday" is always in heavy rotation, and I don't think I could honestly tell you one lyric from it because all I ever spin is the instrumental. But this beat is one of my all-time favorites, and actually what I made Boogie Brown listen to with me like 17 times in a row one night, which led to him hooking up some weird ass beat that ended up being this song "South 15 Rider", which is probably my favorite song I've ever made, except unless you grew up in southside Virginia, you wouldn't understand half the references. The great thing about this record too is that both my oldest two kids love that song and know the whole thing (one is almost 9 and the other just turned 4), and they will be stoked to give it to me for my birthday. I mean fuck, I have five turntables of various import in three different parts of our compound, with records scattered throughout the house, a ton in the camper (most of my good shit is there), and even a couple of crates in the trunk of the Datsun sitting in the front yard that has pink Christmas lights strung up in outline of it. They understand me, love me, and know how amped I'll be to get that single. I'm sure they'll expect me to play it, drink my beer, and we'll play our freestyle game while dancing like hyper-ballerinas, which usually degenerates into doing the robot. I'm a white guy so about all I can do is the robot, and I can't even do that very good.

Crime Mob - Circles 12-inch - $1
This is my favorite song I never admitted to in the EWA from last year, and the beat is a major reason for it, although I have to admit when you have a soulful ass beat with those Memphis style kicks behind it, someone like Princess rhyming over it sounds pretty sweet. There's just something about that sound/voice combo, and it's why the various bitch MCs in Three Six over the years always sounded so great too. I have already played this instrumental like seven times and I just got the shit yesterday. There is a b-side called "Shine Cause I Grind" featuring Mike Jones, and as much as I love Mike Jones and as much as I love this "Circles" song, I have yet to develop the stomach to actually listen to that side, because I know rap music, and I know this will be far from a b-side wins again scenario. I'd prefer to just scratch that side out with some fabric scissors and not worry about even trying to listen to it. In fact, I will do that right now...

The O Band - Look to the Left, Look to the Right 12-inch single - $1
This is a random ass disco single from 1977, with b-side songs called "A Smile is Diamond" and "Fine White Wine", and it's on red vinyl. I have a ton of disco singles because after I got heavy into DJ Screw, and pretty much everything on earth had been sampled to death (and Madlib was taking care of any open genres at like three per year), I started buying up a ton of dollar disco singles and playing them as slow as you could make the turntable play them. It was extra perfect when they were actually 45 rpm 12-inch singles, because then you could just put it on 33 rpms, and let it play. There are tons of breaks in disco, but you have to listen all the way through to find a good part with no stupid organs or homo-sounding horns or pianos or anything. Oftentimes, I couldn't find anything good. Even with all the initial promise, I gave this O Band single a first listen tonight, and it sounds like one of those pieces of shit that will go in a milk crate for the Salvation Army. Although the red vinyl would look good hanging on my woodshed by a nail. In fact, fuck a second listen, I will do that right now...

Max Edwards - Rockers Arena 12-inch single - $1
Man, the dub version of this song was great and spooky, as was the b-side called "Still Alive", which is a case of the b-side winning again, was even better and a thousand times awesome. Then I realized it was a 45 rpm single and I was playing it at 33 rpms. At the proper speed, it was just a shitty reggae single from 1978.

Loveable & the Grippa Riddim - Various Artists - $1
The album cover has a chick in leopard skin dress and promises "THE TOP SOCA ARTISTS of the Caribbean..." I think Fader magazine might've talked about soca music a couple of times (which stands for soul calypso), and this is like the third or fourth soca record I've bought used because I'm assuming at some point it will pay off. Except this record, even stronger than the previous two times, just reinforces the fact - not belief, but straight up fact - that soca music is the absolute shittiest godawful music ever created. It's like if you took every ounce of soul from black people, but then told them they had to make music for people to try to dance to. I thought that maybe, just maybe, I'd get at least a goofy party jam out of "100% Wine" by Screw Face at the end of the first side, except no. Even that song, by that artist, seemingly impossible to suck, sucks.

Too Short - Life is Too Short 12-inch single - $3
My first non-dollar purchase, and I would buy this every day any day. This is one of Short's classics, maybe his most classic non-sex song, and to have it on 12-inch now is one of my life's greatest accomplishments this week. The single has an 8 minute long extended clean remix (which is good, because when I spin at parties, it's usually drunk ass families with kids running around fighting with sticks and shit or messing up the horseshoe game, so I only spin clean or radio versions of the rap songs, since I don't need to teach kids to say "fuck", "bitch", and "shit"; I'll let the public schools take care of that), plus the instrumental. I used to make 60 minute tapes of instrumentals where I'd just loop one single instrumental over and over on one side of the tape, and do a second instrumental on the other side. My truck doesn't have a tape player, but I'm getting new tires on the '91 Volvo stationwagon to get that back on the road, and it has a tape player, and I'd say chances are pretty fucking high I'm gonna make a 60 minute mixtape with one side all "Life is... Too Short" instrumental, and the other side all "Cadillac on 22s" instrumental. Fuck, I might end up driving to Oklahoma drunk with a tape like that in the Volvo if it's a warm day and I open the sun roof.

Noreaga - Super Thug 12-inch single - $1
I only found out like last year that the Neptunes did this beat, because I always remembered this as that awesome song where N.O.R.E.'s dressed like a sheik in the desert, and the beat's crazy wild. I've also always assumed, from what I've known they've done when I heard it, that Neptunes beats were mad gay and mad stupid and mad unloungin'. But I like the beat, and had gotten kinda slowed down tonight from playing things on slow-mo, plus listening to Too Short (I'll never spell that shit with a dollar sign - that's some fucking stupid shit), so I just pumped this beat, but it didn't sound right until I slowed the speed down. That's a fat ass beat when you slow it down enough to be shielded from amyl nitrate hits in dance club unisex bathrooms where you are tricked into homosexual activities by the gay dude holding your fucked up ass up on the left side while you are concentrating too hard to kissing the hot slut holding you up on your right side. At regular speed, you run the risk of doing what others have done, and making a point to claim it's not gay if you don't actually physically touch a dick, so having a cute guy named Pete suck your dick isn't technically gay.

Riddim Driven 12-inch single - various artists - $1
I wrongly assumed this was gonna be dancehall instrumentals, but even knowing that such a wrong assumption was easy to make, I felt safe since there was an Elephant Man song and a Capleton song on here. Guess what? It all sucked. I was very sad listening to this. The type of sad where you are listening to something you bought at the used record store and you know you have no use for it ever again. They have turntables there for you to preview shit, but I always think that's a crazy goofy way to buy vinyl. I mean, if I was sinking $15 into a Hawkwind record, I'd probably want to do that, but I'm a dollar bin type of motherfucker, and if you can't throw a dollar away on a gamble for a good record, then you're not a music aficionado. Shit, that's the music nerd's lottery right there, hoping you drop a buck and find some crazy wild classic nobody else ever told you about.

Goodie Mob - Cell Therapy 12-inch single - $3
Damn, another song off the EWA 100 All-Time Jams I found, with an instrumental. I don't have the first Goodie Mob tape anymore, so I didn't have access to "Cell Therapy" in non-robotic format, which geeked me up to find this. Making it even better was the fact on the b-side is the album version of "Soul Food", which is one of the singles I sold last time I forgot what a pain in the ass ebay is in actuality and I decided to sell of some bullshit. I have missed my "Soul Food" single a bunch of times, because it's a great song too, and if you could just eliminate T-Mo's stupid fucking "fuck Chris Darden, fuck Marcia Clark" verse, it'd be potentially even more classic than "Cell Therapy". Oddly, also on the b-side of this single is Outkast's "Benz of Beamer" song, since both were down with each other and on the same record label. "Cell Therapy" instrumental in effect. There's also a remix by some dude named Sideeq which is crazy retarded, but not retarded meaning good but retarded meaning bad.

Shining White Revue #5

Mike Dikk: After a long hiatus, Shining White Revue is back. This is the part of the blog where I give my friend Jay some rap songs to review, but I don't tell him what they are. Since he doesn't know his asshole from his elbow when it comes to rap music, it produces interesting results. Jay has also started his own blog called Dastardly Latchkey, if you want to read stuff where he actually knows what he's talking about.

Song 1: EMC - We Alright

Jay: I think this guy read my diary. I can identify with pretty much everything he’s saying, and that’s further evidence that I would make a crappy rapper. I don’t know if I appreciate the sincerity, dislike the contrived sincerity, or want to eat the summer seasoned cod I can smell from my oven. I think it’s the fish first with the other 2 tied for second. I do get a feeling that this may be Jesus Rap.
I think I’m actually impressed that this dude made a song about pretty much breaking slightly ahead of even. If this were my song I’d have a line that went something like, “What it feel like when you fuck a girl with herpes. Then it’s okay because you didn’t catch the herpes.” I mean, I appreciate the sentiment of this song, but fuck it, I don’t want to be completely identified with. I want the identifying to sneak up on me like a fucking ninja Brownie selling cookies and shit. At first, I want to be a little put off and creeped out, and then I want to subtly realize that ‘Hey, we’re all brownies in this world—just a bunch of Brownies hustling cookies, trying to spray that cheese on our crackers.’
These guys are into Jesus. They have to be. Fuck them. That’s how those Jesus fucks get you: they tell you everything you want to hear, how they couldn’t pay the bills, and how their boss was a dick, and how they sucked at basketball, and then found God and everything changed. I don’t like it when they give me The Watchtower or Awake, and I don’t like it when they sneak their love for the lord into rap songs.

Song 2: Torae - Callin' Me

Jay: I don’t know what the sample is from in this song, but I think it’s fucking Michael McDonald, which automatically makes this song a joke even if I am wrong. I’m assuming everybody looking at this is internet savvy enough to have seen Yacht Rock, and that means you know what I’m talking about. I don’t even hear what this guy is rapping about because I just keep listening to the sample, thinking of the dude from Yacht Rock who played Michael McDonald with a headset on, singing these smooth lyrics around a bunch of g’d out fuckwads who are all like, “We’re gonna come with that Michael McDonald shit and blow this bitch out of the water. Pass the dro cuz it’s about to get smooth as fuck in here and I need a slightly sedating hallucinogenic to calm my nerves. I can really use a massage, so do you think we can order one of those Chinese girls that work in the spa? You know, like room service? Do they do that? Can I order a massage over the phone?”
Anyways, another trend in rap that sucks, and I’m not sure gets much recognition as its own type of jammy jam, is the ‘I keep trying to quit doing/selling crack/weed/hoes but they keep pulling me back in because I was so good at it that they offered me this huge raise and I just couldn’t refuse’ song. I’m sick of that song. Here’s my message to whoever this is: I don’t give a fuck about your rapping, and I don’t really think you’re that good of a crack dealer/doer (whichever it is), so maybe you should just walk away and stop hanging out with the people who keep on pulling you back in, like other crack dealers. They are obviously a bad influence. Maybe you should apply at the post office, or even at UPS if you don’t mind working a condensed shift. I hear they have great benefits.
Also, again with the Nas shit. Nas should make it so he gets paid a dollar for every time someone mentions his name and his last album title in a song or interview. He’d have like… 200 bucks, easy.

Song 3: Solaris Earth Pipeline - Good & Formulaic (demo)

Jay: This is awesome. THIS GUY KNOWS EXACTLY WHAT I AM TALKING ABOUT! READ THE FIRST REVIEW! The beat is insane, and lyrically I don’t know exactly what he’s talking about because I’m typing as I write it, but he said something to the effect of ‘I make you think you’re a part of my crew. That’s what I do,’ but much more cleverly, or at least in tune with the song. I can’t even make fun of this. Sorry. I cannot wait to find out who it is so I can steal it.
It’s going to be awesome when Mike tells me that this is Snow or some shit. Then, I’m either going to have to write a note in my next review saying “Dudes, I was totally joking. That shit was wack. It was reverse psychology I was running on you. LOL,” or I’m going to have to be like, “Fuck it, guys, I like Snow. I can man up and admit it because I am an idiosyncratic dude who can like gay shit because I fess up to the gay shit I like and that exempts me from being gay because I get the joke, am sort of in on it, but am sort of outside of it. So, really, you guys are the ones who suck because I am on a different level.”

Song 4: Cam'Ron - Pass The Dutchie

Jay: Pass the Dutchie. Hahaha. Not really, though. Pass the Dutchie is one of those songs that would be so trite to sample that nobody would ever touch it, but everybody would be like “Yo, we should sample Pass the Dutchie. Nah, fuck that, we’re not twelve.” I can imagine Trick Daddy trying to pull something like this off because he is a borderline retard/idiot savant, but even then, it would be crappy.
I can’t even listen to this. I don’t feel like I’m giving you your fake money’s worth with these last two reviews so I’ll write a little m ore garbage, and maybe then I’ll meet my word-per-cent quota. But I’ll listen to this song throughout so as to keep it all relevant.
I went to a Brownies meeting today. My daughter is a Brownie, and my wife was at work because she is my sugar mama, so I had to take her place in line for Brownie-Mom-Who-Brings-In-Snacks. I walked into the room and found out that my daughter is getting skull fucked by these two overweight soccer moms. First, they have this thing called a triad (or something that sounds like the word triad that my mental dictionary could not match up with a logical definition) which is where they sit all of the little girls in a circle and make them chant some bullshit to the effect of: “We swear allegiance to God, the United States, and to the fucking Brownies who use us as pedophile candy with cookies,” and so on. Then they made them promise to cook a healthy dinner for the family one day this week (my daughter is eight and can’t microwave a fucking Hot Pocket), and then made them make coupons for everyone in their families’ promising to do stuff like clean, or feed an animal or something.
Then the triad broke up and the two fat soccer mom bitches made them go to the table and make the stupid coupons. They left the kids to do their thing, and the brown haired soccer started yelling at her other little daughter who tagged along, while the blonde haired one yelled at her daughter who was a Brownie for making a coupon that said “I will clean my sister’s room every day for a week.”
She said some shit in front of all her little Brownie friends, like, “HAHAHA, yeah right. Try something you’ll actually do. Why would you clean your sister’s room when you can’s even keep your own room clean,” and on and on.
Needless to say, I’m not gonna let my daughter do that shit next year. I’d pull her out now but she wouldn’t understand and my wife wouldn’t go for it. I’m probably going to write a more detailed account on my website sometime, and that’s one of those shameless plugs that’s not meant to be a shameless plug because I’m running out of steam and this fucking Pass the Dutchie song is making me want to eat a bowl of doo doo brown. So, Pudskowt, out.

Shining White Revue #4

Mike Dikk: This is the 4th installment of the ever popular Shining White Revue, where my friend Jay, who has very basic knowledge of rap music reviews todays hits without knowing what they are. You either love it or you hate it by now. I've been sitting on this installment for a while now, so the songs aren't quite as fresh as they were a few weeks ago. Here we go:

Song 1: Little Brother - Good Clothes

Jay Pud: This is pretty fresh. It’s on the opposite note of that Nas song from my last review because I can actually identify with this shit. My dad used to take me to Kmart to get my school clothes, and I’d always end up with those sweatpants hoodies that had sweatpant grey sleeves, but the rest of the shirt was designed in flannel. That sucked because big black people would make fun of me and beat me up, and their stockpile of Kmart clothes jokes was endless. So I’d beg him for some not Kmart clothes. I’d ask him to take me to Bob’s, which, if that place is not in every state, is basically Kmart’s kick-ass older brother with a switchblade and backwards baseball cap. He never did until I was about sixteen, and then I upgraded from Martha Stewart to Carhartt, but I had much less clothes. And he also bought me Xavier Macdaniel shoes which came with a free basketball, and Converse Allstars which pretty much sealed my fate. Also, we had a neighbor with 2 boys who were two years older than my brother and I, and they used to give us garbage bags of their old Kmart garbage, and so we’d have to walk around with them fully knowing that we were little scrotum kids, wearing clothes that they probably jerked off on and took doodoo’s on. Anyways, this song is good on that note, but I am sick of it now because I listened to it four times in a row and I’m tired of the beat.
On a side note, I have to talk about something that happened to me back in them days. My dad had a green Carhartt jacket that I stole one day because I had some ugly ass Kmart shit and I was sick of getting made fun of. So anyways, I lost the jacket, which I just accounted to either A) my habit of losing shit, or B) someone stealing it from me at school because I used to leave my locker open for general use amongst girls and some of my friends, or C) I left it in Mike’s room where if something disappeared, it was usually forever. About 6 months later my dad beat my ass when he figured out that the jacket was gone and I confessed like the fuckwad that I was. About a month after that, Mike started walking around with the same jacket that he “Bought from Bob’s.” Fucking bullshit.

Song 2: Ghostface feat. Kid Capri - Celebrate

Jay Pud: Okay, first off, I can respect that he’s announcing that he wants to celebrate. I love to celebrate. Who doesn’t? If I had enough scrilla to buy 30 grand’s worth of windex, I’d be in a partying mood, too. I just wish that he’d have chosen a better way of celebrating than popping a champagne cork. Shit like that, and I’m guessing that this is Ghostface because of the constant references to “ghost,” makes someone that’s supposed to be a super-genius just a cleverer version of a cliché. A genius would be celebrating by brooding in the self-hatred that accompanies knowing that you are somehow smarter than everyone else in the world, thereby making you a freak of nature whom nobody understands, and it doesn’t matter because you wouldn’t want to hang out with those idiots anyway. And is this guy a genius? I don’t fucking know because I never really listened to him, but I guess not because he’s just doing the same shit as everyone else. And the “I just want to celebrate” song pisses me off when I hear it. It reminds me of my dad doing a retarded rendition of the twist at a wedding. Maybe I’m just too dimwitted to pick up on the subtle nuances of his craft. Maybe I just don’t want to try because I know that, ultimately, when I get to the core of it, it’ll be just another rapper bragging about how rich he is and how he picked up his stinky turd, polished it with a magic rag, and turned it into a pile of gold.


Song 3: Fat Joe feat. Lil Wayne - The Crackhouse

Jay Pud: FUCK! I used capitals and an exclamation point because I can’t go into the computer and vomit all over you. If I did that, you’d get the gist of this song without having to waste the space downloading it. This makes me appreciated the song above a little bit more. Not to a point where I think it’s any good, but at least he tried to write some lyrics. This guy is actually talking about shitting on people. Not in a funny way, either. I seriously think that the guy who keeps saying welcome to the crack house, and who talks about shitting on people is an honest to goodness retard and the guy who apparently “runs the streets” is just the idiot who carts him around to Mcdonalds for a happy meal and then maybe to the park so he can swing on the swings. JOEY KEEPS DOING IT. GET HIM JOEY. MEEEEEEHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. JOEY WANTS A CHICKEN NUGGET. If anyone buys this album, I hate them. Sincerely. I can’t wait to find out who this is so I can begin to look in the cars coming through my gas station for this cd. Then I will shit on them, but in a funny way. Seriously, only a retarded would say they are sleeping on a billion dollars. JOEY WANTS TO SLEEP ON A GAZILLION DOLLARS MEHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

Shining White Revue #3

This is the column where I give my boy Jay three songs to review without telling him what they are and he gives his NO HOLDS BARRED opinion on them. Also, Jay knows around 3% of what the common internet rap nerd knows about hip hop, which makes the whole thing interesting to me. -- Mike Dikk

Song 1: Nas - Surviving The Times

Jay Pud: The opening of this reminds me of sitting in a shitty diner drinking coffee after a long night of drinking. I think it’s because it reminds me of that stupid “Beautiful World” song that my wife tells me I’m supposed to love because it’s pretty and the world is supposedly a place where flowers grow without dirt. The flow (can I use the word flow? I feel like a cockstain) is pretty good, I guess, but he just rhymed invincible and miracle, which even I have heard a million times. This is good, but it’s boring. It’s not as good as “Back in the Day” by Kareem, or whoever the fuck sung that. That song told me about back in the day but wasn’t boring. Also, I can kind of imagine Puma with the fat laces over Gucci. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a rapper not on TV wearing Gucci. That’s unfair, because I’ve never seen anyone wearing Gucci at all, and I’ve never seen a real rapper. Only the kinda gay kinds that try to give me a cd at my gas station job and have some guy named Je$u$ listed as their producer. People who do bad stuff (and I’m only assuming he’s talking about doing bad stuff because it’s hard to listen to his lyrics while I’m writing this) wear sweatpants and South Pole bubble jackets. Actually, upon another listening, I’m unsure as to whether he was wearing Gucci or some girl was. I think he got some Gucci and then Gucci power got him a record deal or something. And then he didn’t do bad stuff, but got famous or something. This song is giving me a headache. I’m done trying to figure it out.

Song 2: Pete Rock 'Til I Retire

Jay Pud: Haha. “I’m a gay and I return.” (This is what Jay thought Pete Rock was saying -- Mike) And he’s gonna bring the fire. His name is apparently Pete-Rock, and that sounds like someone who was a “famous rapper” in the 80’s, so I’m guessing that this dude is like 50, and so I’m giving him a crappy lyrics pass because he doesn’t know any better. Do you know why the government will never “be busted?” This may sound like a shitty ebonics joke, but I assure you it’s not, because while I can sort of write in English, I can’t really speak it. Anyways, the reason is, if your case is “I always hate to see a black man in jail,” I assure you that the fucking high up white powers won’t give much of a shit about what you have to say. I hate to see hot chicks not blowing me. That’s all I’m trying to say. If I could talk to lady justice I’d definitely bring that up with her. Why the fuck does every other song I listen to talk about how they are either A) going to bring hip hop back to life, B) worried about whether or not hip hop is dead, or C) insisting that hip hop is still alive. Just because Nas has a stupid album title isn’t necessarily a call for crappy rappers to get into the fight. Or maybe it is, but maybe they should just stop talking about it and do it. This song sucks. I’m trying not to hate…I really am. If this song is by your hero or favorite rapper, I am sorry for being a curmudgeon. Hopefully the next song will be good. This song is not, though.


Song 3: Cunninlynguists feat. Phonte & Witchdoctor - Yellow Lines

Jay Pud: Seriously? See, now I’m beginning to think that Mike is purposely trying to make me seem super white and all “I don’t understand.” This is black chick music. And trust me, you name a race, archetype, fucking stereotype, class, anything that you have, and I can peg their music because I work at a gas station and I know what people listen to in their cars. Or this is a black dude trying to get pussy song, and I know those when I hear them coming down the street because my ears perk up and I smell money. No man or woman alive is a better tipper than a black man trying to get pussy, at least around my block. Is that stereotyping? Probably, but not hatefully. White dudes who are into rap who are trying to get pussy always have the radio on, (Hot97, or maybe some hits station) because white chicks dig the radio. I think black chicks win out on that battle, because if I was a girl I’d much rather some dude try to lay it on me all smooth like with something like this then the Superman song. Either way, I can’t imagine that anyone not trying to sleep with a black chick would listen to this.

Shining White Revue #2

In case you missed this last time, I give my boy Jay three songs to review without telling him what they are and he gives his NO HOLDS BARRED opinion on them. Also, Jay knows around 3% of what the common internet rap nerd knows about hip hop, which makes the whole thing interesting to me. -- Mike Dikk

Song 1: Lupe Fiasco - Superstar

Jay Pud: This reminds me of something—of Lupe Fiasco, who I think it is. I dig it a lot when the Maroon five sounding guy isn’t singing, but I’m predisposed of liking people who rap like this. It’s kind of—unpretentious sounding I guess. Maybe it’s actually Bono or some shit. I don’t know. I dig it. Call me gay for it, I don’t really care too much. This is the type of thing that I can listen to without feeling like a douchebag when I pull up next to a black guy. Although, less because of the chorus. The chorus would make me feel like a dick because it’s kind of like “Hey, I can bump this shit because it has a white dude in it so I have some small kind of ownership over it,” so for that sake, I kind of wish Boner wasn’t singing on the chorus. How can I be a deep, true rap appreciating white dude when I can’t even go three minutes without a white dude singing over beats? I wish I had the motivation to try.

Song 2: Mike Jones - Turnin' Heads

Jay Pud: Fuck. I hate Mike for this shit. I reviewed this song last week but he said superman instead of turning heads. This is a cliché. A super duper cliché of all that I can’t stand about rap music—right down to that stupid Mike Jones effect on that microphone during the chorus. “They used to laugh at my belly now they wanna rub on belly, something something else—“ fucking stupid. I think I’m missing the gene that makes me comprehend shit like this. Maybe it’s because if I saw whoever this was in the streets I’d be scared. I guess I’m supposed to like the club banging beat, but it just sounds like the shitty instrumentals in some crappy video game. I bet when I see who this is, he’s gonna have lots of tattoos, lots of shiny stuff, and a towel. I don’t know why the towel, I guess rappers from down south must sweat a lot or some shit because it’s hot. Maybe it’s just a part of southern life—me making the assumption that this is from the south—that you have to carry a towel around, so I don’t wanna say it’s strictly a rap thing, but I never see country musicians with towels. But they have big hats so maybe they don’t need to wipe the sweat from their brows. Either way…garbage.

Song 3: Jay-Z feat. Pharell - Blue Magic

Jay Pud: Isn’t Jay-Z supposed to retired? Here’s where you can enter your own stupid Michael Jordan joke, or whatever you have on tap. This is what it is. I can’t say that I’d ever listen to this song if I had it on my ipod, and I have a bunch of Jay-Z on it. His songs vary from good, to really good, to feeding himself a spoonful of ego filet on a platinum, diamond encrusted spoon. I’m listening to this for the third straight time as I write this review, and here is my prediction for it: black people will like it, white people who like to pretend to be black will love it, girls will like it, and I will not like it. There’s something about having a dude singing over the chorus, as happens in some form or another in all three of these songs, which strikes me as incredibly gay. I don’t mean in a sissy kind of way, I mean in butt sex kind of way. This song is kind of the worst of the three in that sense, because the dude just reminds me of my father singing, and my father sings like a tone def Huey Lewis with no musical timing whatsoever. Either way, I’m glad I can stop listening to this song now.

Shining White Revue #1

Mike Dikk: I'm trying a little something new here for the sake of uniformity. Things that will (hopefully) become recurring columns/gimmicks will have a cute little banner (like the one seen above) that I make from scratch in my basement using wood shavings and spare pipe cleaners.

The first "column" is by my life long man friend, Jay Pud. Jay doesn't use the internet much, hence me posting this for him and doing the intro.

Here's the explanation of his column. Every week, I will give him three current singles without telling him what they are, and he will review them in real time while he listens to them. At the same time, I will provide you, the reader, with a chance to download said songs, but since you use the internet unlike Jay, you probably already have them. Since Jay does not use the internet and doesn't care to be a music dork, or even listen to all that much rap music in his free time, his opinions and views will be completely genuine and IN YO' FACE, which is something that we may be seeing on the internet for the first time since the 90's, and possibly the first time ever on a blog.

Don't worry, every week I will explain this concept over again until you get it.

This is where my part ends, the rest of the words are Jay's.

__________________________________________________________________________

Song 1: Aesop Rock - Non Shall Pass

Jay: This guy is white. He has to be. Because I can tell that he is white without knowing who it is, he loses a few points off the get-go. The beat is pretty good, though. I almost wish I had a looped version of this beat playing constantly through the tumultuous times of my life. I think he’s going all militant, too, and as much as I hate it when black rappers do that, I hate it even more when white rappers try to do it for them. I guess if I said that this was no good I’d be full of shit, though. The “I’m trying to help” sample just further proves my point about the aforementioned white rappers “trying to help.” They shouldn’t.

Song 2: Wu-Tang Clan - Watch Your Mouth (From the upcoming 8 Diagrams LP)

Jay: This is obviously Wu Tang, and I knew that before they told me that it was Wu Tang. I can sniff Wu Tang a mile away like a fat sweaty vagina at a hot dog stand. And like most white people, I like the Wu Tang. Unlike most white people, I’m not ashamed to admit that I’m not that hardcore of a guy. So while I’d listen to this if it came on in someone else’s car, I’d never spend my own personal free time listening to it. I don’t see anything wrong with being a passive Wu Tang listener, because I just don’t give a fuck, because I’m not from the mean streets, I’m from the trying-to-be mean streets but really just drug addled white streets. On my streets, people love the Wu Tang because they make white people feel like they knifed somebody. I never knifed anybody. My brother did, and it was scary as fuck. So is it good? Yes. Do I care? No.

Song 3: Soulja Boy - Crank Dat

Jay: If I had to guess I’d say that this guy’s name is Souljah Boy. This sounds like any of the other Three-Six mafia type stuff that my untrained ears have been exposed to. I think he just said either “Soup’s Up,” or “Supersoak,” but either way I can imagine this as the type of garbage that white people listen to really loudly in their cars to prove their blackness. I’m actually surprised he didn’t say anything about primered Honda Civics, but then again he might have. I didn’t really know what he was saying other than “Superman, HOOOOOOOOO.”

REVIEW: Skipp Whitman - Free Agent CD

Skipp Whitman - Free Agent (Self-Released)

This is going to be more like a "concept" review since I am reallynot in the mood to use my normal Mainstream Propaganda style I generally use when people ask me to review their CD. That's when I usually scan the press sheet, listen to some songs and then use a few great eye catching sentences in hopes of my words ending up in someone's future press sheet. This is clearly unimportant to you.

Skipp Whitman contacted me through Dumpin's Myspace page, making him possibly the first person on the internet that has actually read the Dumpin Myspace page. For that alone, I would buy him a beer if he was in town. Skipp is unlike the majority of Myspace rappers, meaning, he has a real CD, he doesn't jack other people's beats and he has played shows in real life before, and I couldn't find any Youtube videos of him "freestyling" over the "Cannon" beat in his mom's basement. These are all incredible accomplishments when you're wading through Myspace's dirty music cesspool.

Skipp comes from L.A., by way of Boston. I personally think that was a good move, since Boston is the worst city in America (I'm sorry Skipp. I'm sorry Dart Adams). I guess I should mention I'm also a Yankees fan, and any hatred I have toward Boston is derived from that. There is no real detection of the Bahstuhn accent though in case you are a hater like me.

I suppose I should talk about the music. Well, I'll tell you this. It's pretty good. Skipp stays humble throughout the album and never goes beyond his limitations. He raps about what he knows, and that's normally what I look for when it comes to the rap. On the song "Whiteboy", he reminisces about growing up as a wigger (Is this term offensive now? I can't remember). It's a tale I sadly relate to all too well. It's easily the standout track on the disc, and it's pretty catchy to boot.

That's another thing about this Skipp Character, he did most of the beats on here himself, and for the most part they're all pretty bangin'. If I were him, I'd be shopping the beats around, if he doesn't do that already.

The disc includes a handful of guests, including Statik Selektah and Skyzoo, who is not only somewhat underground famous, but he's also named after an old disco song I enjoy. I am like most old codgers where I don't like too many guest appearances, but there's just the right amount on here, and none of them really ever outshine Skipp, which is the main problem of having too many guest spots in the first place.

This is the constructive criticism part of the review. As far as I know, Skipp is still unsigned. I'm not sure what he's aiming for, but he seems more than capable of getting "signed" to a decent independent label, but that may not be what he's looking for. I think his only real problem is what I commended him on earlier. He's humble and he raps about what he knows. I may enjoy tales of growing up listening to the "wrong" kind of music and shopping at the mall, but I am also not the American buying public. He may need to spice up his game if he wants to get far. I still think he could fall back on his production though.

Overall, I'd say at the very least you should check out his Myspace page. The "Whiteboy" song is serious and could be easily thrown on a mixtape or two. Here is hoping every rap CD I get to review via Myspace is at least this good so I don't have to tear it apart and have dorks Myspace threatening me. I am too old for that.

Skipp Whitman on Myspace (You can find purchasing info there too, if you feel so inclined)

$20 Record Challenge

(Not my actual records. Just a random pic from the interweb.)

We started this thing a while back on our message board no one looks at called the $20 Record Challenge. Basically, you go to a record store and see how much shit you can get for $20. Vinyl only. Hence the "Record" in the title. The point being, to see how frugal of a shopper you can be without spending astronomical collector prices for bullshit. There's no real point to it, except for a handful of people to nerd out over their record purchases. It's very similar to Travis from WYDU's Shopping Trip posts, except I don't provide downloads or tracklists because I'm not that generous.
If you would like to read an old one of these I posted over at EWA, here you go.

I'd also like to state that I'm not a typical Record Collector Nerd. I am a person who happens to own an above average amount of records. I am not into paying collector prices for shit and if I find out one of my records is worth a decent sum of money, I usually sell it instead of brag about having it. I will buy just about anything for a dollar if it has an interesting cover. So if you happen to be a Record Collector Nerd and you're reading this post wondering why I'm bothering with wasting my time talking up a Trammps record I bought for $1, it's because I don't give a shit and you're a douche.

Anyway, I'm not positive what my total came up to, because a couple of these records were more than a dollar, but for the most part, they were all from the dollar crates. They were purchased at Last Vestige in scenic Albany New York. I originally went there because the movie 1408 (GO SEE THIS!) has inspired me to make a grimy Screwed (but not Chopped) version of "We've Only Just Begun", and Carpenters records can almost always be found in $1 bins. I saw the cover though and I realized I already own the Carpenters record that song is from. Here's what I came home with:

V/A - Deram Dayze: This is an old Psych-Pop comp, and despite the fact that I don't really like The Beatles, I dig on a lot of this obscure Brit Psych shit for some reason. This is one of the only records I paid more than a dollar for, and the only one I've listened to so far. It's a little less Psych and a little more Pop than I would like, but it's still pretty decent.







Prince - Purple Rain: Another record over a buck. Five to be exact. This is actually the third vinyl copy of this record I've bought. The first one I got from some junk store and it was scratched to shit. Then I bought a second one in better condition from the Last Vestige dollar bin to replace that one. My friend was also looking for a copy of this, and I ended up giving him the copy that was in better condition, so I figured it was time to finally bite the bullet and pay $5 for a listenable vinyl copy of Purple Rain. I'm sure most people own this, and it probably makes me a little gay, but whatever. I was slightly let down that m copy didn't come with the limited edition poster as the promo sticker on the cover promised.

Prince - Around the World in A Day: Not my favorite Prince record by any stretch, but it's the record "Raspberry Beret" comes from and it was in decent condition and only a dollar, so I didn't pass it up. This makes me a little gayer than if I were to just own "Purple Rain" because that's the safe Prince record to own, and anything else might have gotten you beat up in High School. I own other Prince records too, so I might as well start making out with dudes right now.





The Trammps - Disco Inferno: The aforementioned Trammps record. I bought this because my roommate jokingly told me to bring back something he could dance to. Plus it doesn't hurt to pad my obnoxiously large Disco record collection despite the fact that I don't even like Disco. I do enjoy the cover however. I'm guessing it was constructed to show off the power of early computer graphic design. There's a lot of disgusting colors proudly displayed on here, and none of them really go together. The pic on the side doesn't really do the color contrast justice. Someone purposely fixed the levels on that so you wouldn't vomit on yourself. The 70's were a simpler time, I tell ya.

The Sylvers - Showcase: I've quickly come to learn that the Sylvers were originally a group that sounded a lot like the Jackson Five, and even managed to out Jackson Five the Jackson Five on certain songs. Then at some point they transformed into the Roller Disco Boogie band that has heaps of records in second hand shops. Without looking at their discography, I'm guessing this record came out at around the start of their Roller Disco Boogie phase, and it probably sucks, but those first few records you can listen to over and over again for an infinite amount of time, so I've recenly found myself picking up any Sylvers records no matter how shitty it's most likely going to be.

Paul Kantner - Blows Against The Empire: Paul Kantner is one of the dorks from Jefferson Starship. I bought this record strictly because of how fucking wacked out the layout is. The cover itself is pretty out there, but the inside is a gatefold featuring metallic silver ink on a black background. There's all kinds of space landscapes and clever pot leaf placing going on. I didn't even know metallic silver ink was something you could print and mass produce back in 1970. I will probably never get around to listening to this record, because it won't ever live up to the high precedent the inside gatefold has set, but I'm sure glad I own it now.


Def Leppard - Pyromania: This was back when Rick Allen was still rocking two arms. It's hard to believe, but this record sold like 13 million copies back in the day. I'm not even sure if every release in 2007 combined sold 13 million copies. I didn't buy this so much because I'm a fan of the music, but moreso because I'm a fan of the Made for VH1 Def Leppard biopic. VH1 has a knack for making biopics that manage to just slightly go over the line of realism in order to make an otherwise boring story sensationally awesome. I highly recommend tracking down the Def Leppard Biopic, even if you don't like them. I forget the name, but I used to own it on VHS, if that counts for anything.

Stevie Wonder - Innervisions: I only have an electronical copy of this record, so I figured I'd buy the real thing. It's one of those records that everyone should own, and most everyone does own it already. I am a cheap fuck so I was waiting for it to show up in a bargain crate in decent shape instead of paying top dollar for it. I suck.







The 5th Dimension - Greatest Hits: Not only do I already own all of 5th Dimensions essential releases, but I also own at least one other Greatest Hits record. It seems they put out official albums and Greatest Hits albums at an even 1:1 ratio. I'm not even sure why I got this since I'm damn sure I have every single song on here already. You never know when you'll need 5 copies of "Aquarius" I guess.






Be-Bop Deluxe - Sunburst Finish: The only reason I bought this is because the cover features full frontal nudity. I've never heard of Be-Bop Deluxe and I doubt this record will ever make it to my turntable, but it's hard to pass up full frontal nudity for a dollar. Especially when there's a flaming guitar added to the mix.






Stanley Clarke - School Days: There's a good chance this album isn't that great, but I really like the cover. The "painting" looks like what modern day video games look like, but it was made in 1976, so that makes it really futuristic.








Doonesbury's Jimmy Thudpucker - Greatest Hits: When I picked this up, I laughed at the idea that someone put out a record related to the Doonesbury comic strip. Then my friend Scot made the very dead on observation that that was the first time Doonesbury has ever made anyone laugh.

Trip 66 - Limited Edition 5 Song EP: I thought Trip 66 was an early Alternarock band, but the label says this was on Ruff House, which wasn't really known for Alternarock. It turns out they WERE an early Alternarock band. I don't know how Limited this EP really was since there were several hundred copies in the $1 bins. The vinyl is transparent purple though, and it's a 10", so I guess it was worth my dollar. Maybe I'll melt it down and make an ashtray out of it.