When you get into a discussion of “greatest producer of all time” — somewhere Pete Rock has to be mentioned. I’m going to say the same about groups and Camp Lo (perhaps a contentious thesis–fear not! I shall defend it in a future post) But for now, enjoy this ridiculously great mixtape from these...

Wu Tang record covers, re-imagined Blue Note Style. Most excellent.

Not exactly golden, and more trip-hop than hip-hop — but I’ll allow it. Female acapella/beatboxing group tears it up. I kind of love how they don’t shy away AT ALL on what it takes to create the “bass synthesizer”...

Poundcake, by Harmony. Not sure why this song popped in my head this morning, but upon watching/listening again for the first time in a while — there’s A LOT going on here. To wit: – It’s not a GREAT song, but it’s a pretty good song. Kind of weird, the random samples and the broken structure. – From Lauryn Hill to T-Pain to Pharoahe Monch, it’s always interesting, those people who can sing and also choose to rap. – The easy low-hanging fruit type observation to make here is — hey, wow, women in a video don’t have to be half naked. More interestingly, I feel like no one today would consider this video even remotely sexual — despite lots of gyrating and romance type talk. – What exactly are they getting at with this particular “Sucker MC?” Who are they trying to make fun of? It’s like classic LL Cool J or Kane, mostly — but with oddly rapey overtones? – Poundcake? What does poundcake have to do with...

Judgment Day, the first single from Method Man’s Tical 2, was a criminally underrated quasi-sequel to “Bring the Pain” — it’s almost a more polished version of the same song. Furthermore, the bigger budget post-apocalyptic video fit the song PERFECTLY — and let’s be honest, this video as a full-length movie would have been pretty...