There are 28 results

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  Control Voltage's Friday Five: Damaged Beats from Blawan and Theo Parrish

  September 21, 2012 – After a short break, the Control Voltage Friday Five is back! Appropriately, today's selection is all about letting off pent-up energy, from Blawan's sly sadism to Theo Parrish's total percussive meltdown. …
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  No Trivia's Friday Five: Sherman Hemsley's Proto-Swag

  July 27, 2012 – Sherman Hemsley, best known for portraying George Jefferson on the television show The Jeffersons, died earlier this week. Hemsley twisted a white-created cipher of a character into something closer to a a living, breathing black dude. …
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  No Trivia's Friday Five: Has Gunplay Gone Pitbull?

  July 6, 2012 – Heads up to anybody who was entertained by my interview a few months back with underground comics dude and Lil B cover artist Benjamin Marra. His latest comic book, Lincoln Washington: Free Man, is now available to purchase, via Traditional Comics. Like Marra's Gangsta Rap Posse, it's a pulpy, often absurd satire in the guise of a revenge tale that's not for the squeamish or easily offended. …
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  No Trivia's Friday Five: Meek Mill, a Madvillain Cover, and a House Music Mondegreen

  June 29, 2012 – Three of this week's five songs aren't rap songs. And of the two rap songs included, only one of them is actually any good. The other is like, mind-bogglingly stupid. I don't know, man, this is just what I'm into this week. It's certainly representative of where my head is at. I'm consumed with the idea that rap fusion is finally like, a thing that musicians have figured out how to do, you know? …
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  No Trivia's Friday Five: History Lessons From K.R.I.T. and Del

  June 22, 2012 – How do you honor an R&B legend? Do you drop said legend in 2012, pair them with hip musicians like Damon Albarn and buzzy artists like Lana Del Rey and take full advantage of their straggly old man voice, as is the case with Bobby Womack's The Bravest Man In The Universe? I don't think so. This new Womack record makes a good case for his scruffy old dude mortality, but who cares, because this is music we're talking about. …
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  No Trivia's Friday Five: Waka Flocka Flame Declares Dubstep the New Trap Music

  June 15, 2012 – "Worst Beef Ever" probably needs to become a recurring feature, doesn't it? Devon Maloney already gave you a comprehensive look into the Drake's entourage versus Chris Brown's entourage bougie nightclub battle of early Thursday morning ("Dreezygate"), but, man is this thing depressing. …
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  Friday Five: The Gipper Gets Got by Killer Mike, and One Funky-Ass James Brown Book

  May 25, 2012 – I've been meaning to talk about RJ Smith's The One: The Life and Music Of James Brown for a few months now. I guess it's a biography of James Brown, though it's more like a very long essay about J.B. …
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  No Trivia's Friday Five: Ab-Soul, Killer Mike, More

  May 18, 2012 – One of my favorite songs by the late Chuck Brown is 1988's "That'll Work (2001)," a go-go version of Richard Strauss' "Also Sprach Zarathustra." The credits on the 12-inch read like this: Written by Richard Strauss, arrangement by Deodato, additional arrangement by Chuck Brown. So specifically, "That’ll Work" references Eumir Deodato’s take on "Also Sprach Zarathustra" from 1972’s Prelude. …
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  No Trivia's Friday Five: A Cure for Karmin and Kitty

  May 11, 2012 – I've been thinking a lot about André 3000 starring in this Jimi Hendrix biopic. The biopic is one of the worst movie subgenres because conflating someone's life into two hours and hitting all the "necessary" dramatic beats just never works out. By the time the studio's bad ideas and test-screened audience comments and all that are considered, a life story's been cleaned up and compacted beyond recognition. …
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  Control Voltage's Friday Five: Anthony Naples, I:Cube, More

  May 11, 2012 – Sorry, futurists: This week's selection of records is all about looking back, whether it's Rush Hour unearthing an overlooked gem of New York house, from 1990, or Clone delivering the second installment of its Drexciya anthology. …
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