Del the Funky Homosapien-I Wish my Brother George was Here

All of my students want to listen to rap only. And no, I don't teach at some posh suburban school full of wigger frat boy types. I had years of that already. Now I teach brown children how to to speak white. It's true I am Michelle Pfeiffer in Dangerous Minds (nice try Scott but that joke has been used plenty already). I even have a leather jacket. So I have students who have to wear ankle bracelets and are actually tough kids; and what do they want to listen to you might ask. Oh, how about Drake (look him up, I had to). All these kids listen to rap and know nothing about anything that is over a few months old. I don't get it at all. They ask what rap I'm into and I give them a list of things from the 80s and 90s and they have no idea what I'm talking about. Then again, their parents probably wouldn't either since I realized that I'm older than most of their parents. But for those of us with a memory beyond 20 years, let's recall this little gem. I even remember that this was a marginal hit at some point. Funny that kinds now want to hear Nickelodeon approved Canadian rappers.

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KMD-Bl_ck B-st-rds

Maybe I should start off with a disclaimer for dummies. This isn't some RAC or Blazebirth Hall shit. I didn't make up the cover. I didn't give it this title. I lived with a black dude for years (see, excellent white guy cop out), who happens to be my best friend (thought the ass didn't make me godfather to his child). Instead, this is actually the seeding ground for MF Doom and all the permutations that guy has gone through over the years. This shit was coming around in the early 90s if I recollect correctly, so it seems weird to me that decades later the guy is finally getting some of the cred he deserves. Guess what ninnies, this shit sounded good way back then. Where were you? Oh, that's right...in pampers.

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Showbiz & A.G,-Runaway Slave

Okay, I'm pretty late to the game with all the hype surrounding the whole OFWGKTA phenomenon. I fucking hate Jimmy Fallon (a mountain of coke donning a skin suit) so I missed their performance that got all the hipster kids' to stop their crying more a minute. But going through their catalog, I started to get a little nostalgic. And that leads me to this post. I'm no rap expert so I'm not going to get into the significance of this album or try to discuss it in any other terms aside from saying that it's a classic I can turn to time and time again...that is, when I'm in the mood for rap (most of the time I am not).

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The Egyptian Lover-On the Nile

Look at that remarkable hair. No really, look at it for a while. Spend some time savoring its greasy gloriousness and then prepare yourself for the amazing elctro-rap offered to you by this finely quaffed gent. This isn't anything remotely like that bullshit that passes for rap now days. Much more like Kraftwerk than what shit is on the radio right now. My House (On the Nile) is just so great. It is just a song about how awesome his house is. Oh, why aren't there more songs on this subject (please don't mention "Our House" (either version))? I'm still trying to figure out how he first came up with this stage name, and second, how he thought it was a good idea. Hilarious.

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Quasimoto-The Unseen

Astral rap? Perhaps. I've read that this is the work of Madlib, produced after a psychedelic binge. Not sure if that's a myth or if there's some truth to it. I want to believe it to be the case since this is some pretty out there rapping. All the vocals are sped up so it sounds like a weird kid or some alien (not Alf though, thank god). And the beats..well..it's Madlib, so you probably know what you're going to get. It's a weird one for sure, but not just an oddity. It's actually a good listen. Oh rap, why do you suck so bad now? Why can't shit like this get some radio play? The kids seem to like silly voices (see auto tune), so this should play in the sticks, it just doesn't. Too bad.

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DJ Screw-Codeine Fiend

Time to put a little slow to your roll. Friends have been begging for some Screw for a while and so I finally got off my lazy ass and coughed this up. If you're not familiar with the whole chopped & screwed movement then I should quickly summarize. It involves syrup, lots and lots of codeine cough syrup. And then the music is a reflection on this state of fucked upness. It has to be some of the most psychedelic rap sounds around. There's echos and haziness, and everything is real slow. Screw often times would use popular artists and give them the treatment. Geezus, he was even able to make terrible shit like 2Pac (glad to see that one balled fuck head die, you were never a poet) and The Notorious P.I.G. (that fat sack of shit sucked too--sounded like he never quite finished that 6 foot long bologna sandwich before he started to rap) sound tolerable. That's no small feat considering their suckitude. A few nuts are trying to claim some sort of conspiracy surrounding Screw's death, but people please, look at the cover of this, then look at the title. I think we don't need to discuss this any further.

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Gravediggaz-Niggamortis (a.k.a. 6 Feet Deep)

Oh rap, what has become of you? All that auto tune and singing. What happened to the times when you were great? It all seems so long ago. Alas, while the current state of rap is pathetic, we'll always have classics like this to keep playing. This is probably best remembered as a spin off group for the RZA and Prince Paul, but it really was an entity all itself. People I guess call this horrorcore, but that's a term that just reminds me of some really terrible stuff. This has got to be the most metal rap album out there. Dark, creepy as fuck, violent, and fun. Let's remember rap the way it was.

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