DOWNLOAD: Electric Purgatory Part Two by Greenhouse (Blueprint

Honestly, I just d/l about an hour ago and haven't listened to it yet. I'm pretty sure it's gonna be dope though (Part One definitely was), and it's free if you want it to be, so whatdya got to lose? Check it out. Toki Wright and Aesop Rock are featured on it. And, again, Greenhouse is a duo from Columbus, OH consisting of MCs Blueprint and Illogic. Beats are also by Blueprint.

DOWNLOAD: Electric Purgatory Part Two by Greenhouse (Blueprint

UPDATE: After two listens I can officially endorse. So, get this EP now. And if you missed the first one for some reason, click the "Part One" link above.

Top 5 Jay-Z Albums

A friend obsessed with list making sent me an email this morning that read:

"Top five jay z albums, in order. Go."

So, this is what I came up with on the spot. I'm pretty confident in this. Anyone have anything different? List your top 5 in the comments.

Spoof Of Drake & Tim Westwood

A friend sent this to me today and it was so damn funny that I had to share it.

The Making Of Distant Relatives

Here's some great behind-the-scenes footage of Nas & Damian Marley recording their album, Distant Relatives. It's nice to see that they were actually in the studio together. Not enough collaborations are done this way anymore, and it's noticeable in the songs a lot of the time.

Just Be

Well goddamn. I ran into some great music last night that I'm enjoying this morning/afternoon. Thanks to Kevin Nottingham, who does a tremendous amount of work to gather these songs, I am enjoying another complete collection of samples used for a Hip Hop album. This one is Common's Be. Tons of great music on this one - The Temptations, Marvin Gaye, The Chi-Lites, Sam Cooke, Ahmad Jamal...and, of course, I'm getting put on to some new ones too. And as always, I end up appreciating Hip Hop even more when I hear where such an important part of their final production comes from. The artistry that comes out of sampling is just amazing to me.

So, after this, I'm going to have to break out the Be album again for examination. Despite the complaints I have with Common as of late, no one can deny his past classic material (including Electric Circus, in my opinion, so fuck you), and the brilliant, possibly career-defining opus that Be is.

So be like me and head over to KevinNottingham.com to grab the collection of samples for Be. And, before or after, listen to Be itself again and see what you think.

This Is It

While I, and many others, continue to wait for Ski Beatz to decide to finally release his album, here goes a video of one of his classics - "Luchini" by Camp Lo. Good thing there's so much other good shit being put out to keep me busy.

4th Of July Weekend

I traveled north a bit for the weekend of the 4th, from Cincy to Cleveland to spend some time with relatives I don't see nearly enough. I loaded up the iPod with a bunch of new music I haven't gotten around to listening to yet, and some oldies, and some old oldies - I'm talking Billie Holiday and Louie Armstrong - you never know what kind of mood you'll be in.

I spent most of my time up there lounging with a beer on the deck or a boat on the lake while the kids played. Music was always playing - the kind that all generations enjoy though. So, of course I enjoyed that too. I thought I'd have more time to listen to some new stuff on the road trip portion, but the wife got a new car with Sirius/XM and wanted to check that out. The service is good, plenty of channels; few, if any commercials; and you almost always have a signal. The Eminem station, Shade45, I could take or leave depending on the specific show, probably. I wasn't overly impressed. The old school station was good for the most part. I got to hear the Kool Moe Dee vs. LL Cool J on-wax battle in order, which is always nice - though they didn't finish it. It also seems to be missing some direction as to what they consider old school. They played the Furious Five and MC Lyte. But, they also played Ice Cube. And not NWA Ice Cube, or even Predator Ice Cube. It was "We Be Clubbin'" Ice Cube. That's pretty recent if you ask me. So, it's more of a overall hip hop hits station than it is an old school station.

I did get to listen to Von Pea's (of Tanya Morgan) new mixtape So Motivational: The Most Skullduggery of Mixtapes, which is dope, complete with a Mike Tyson's Punch Out cover. I can definitely get behind this one. Plus he has a song on it called "Cantstandya" which is a Seinfeld reference that I appreciated. I'm actually listening to Tanya Morgan is a Rap Group now. It's a few years old, and I forgot how great it is. The music is smooth and they did the interludes as references to famous skits on other hip hop abums. If you haven't heard it make sure you find a copy. Tanya Morgan is one of the best groups in hip hop right now. They make my city look good.

Other than Von Pea, I have a few more things to recommend. I'll just list them.

Sha Stimuli - Overtime: My Soul To Keep
MC Esoteric - Fly Casualties
The Roots - How I Got Over (*maybe the best of the year so far)
Packfm - I F*cking Hate Rappers
Theophilus London - I Want You (*be warned that this shit is different. I'm not sure how to describe it, but I like what he's doing. Been listening to this for a while now.)
Fashawn - Ode To Illmatic