A Jay-Z day should always be a good day in my studio.

It’s no secret, Jay has been my favourite rapper for a long time. In fact, not only a rapper, he’s an artist I respect in many senses: the résumé, the class, the verses, and the creep.

As a loyal fan, I can honestly say that this is the first time I’m really, really disappointed at a Jay-Z album. I mean, even Blueprint 2 had its good moments. And Kingdom Come wasn’t half as bad as what people said.

But this Blueprint 3 record just doesn’t make it for me, sorry Jay.

The promise set by ‘Jocking Jay-Z’, ‘Brooklyn We Go Hard’, ‘D.O.A’ ( or even ‘Swagger Like Us’ ) is far from fulfilled. The only decent songs, in my opinion, are ‘Already Home’ with Cudi and ‘What We Talking Bout’, the Empire Of The Sun joint (I can’t believe I just wrote that). The Timbo and Pharell tracks sound completely outdated. The Jeezy song sounds like, well, a Jeezy song. ‘Forever Young’ and ‘A Star Is Born’ are simply disqualifying. Kanye and No ID being of my favourite producers of all time, I can’t understand where all the magic has gone. And where’s Just Blaze when you need him?

More of all, the Justice D.A.N.C.E sampled song, ‘On To The Next One’ by Swizz Beats, is a big question mark, with the letters wtf behind it. What the fuck?

Shaking my head in disbelief, but it seems like Rick Ross truly has the best Rap album of 2009 so far – if you don’t want to count Drake’s SO FAR GONE mixtape. Somebody get Raekwon and Ghostface on the phone, those Cuban Links better be solid—

Mehdi.

  Picking it up where I left it on the subject of ‘Listening’,

 There are 3 kind of music I like:

   -GOOD MUSIC. 

 Anything good when coming at the right moment. I’m at home, chilling, and ‘Crazy World’ by YOUNG JEEZY plays on the radio. Or in a car riding with the crew and So-Me plays ‘Evil Woman’ by the ELECTRIC LIGHT ORCHESTRA. Or even in the club when A-Trak drops his new DUCK SAUCE ‘You’re Nasty’ or this TODD EDWARDS remix I forgot about. The instant matches the mood, the music is good, I like it, I sing, I dance. Sometimes it brings back memories, or just make me plain happy. It’s good music!

   -Then there’s PERFECT MUSIC.

 I touched this topic here already, there is such thing as perfection in music, sometimes so perfectly executed that you almost forgot SOMEBODY ACTUALLY HAD TO WRITE IT, PLAY IT and PRODUCE IT. Like the whole Thriller, What’s Going On, Songs In The Key Of Life, Catch A Fire, Revolver, After The Gold Rush, Maggot Brain albums, etc… The words match the melody-perfect. The sound matches the meaning-perfect. The anywhere-anytime 5 star selection in your iTunes library-perfection. James fucking Brown.

   -And then, of course, there’s music that is just TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE.

 The kind that strikes you straight when you weren’t even really listening, forcing you to just drop whatever you were doing because you can’t believe what you hearing. The kind you have to take a nap after consumption. The kind you hardly understand how. A good portion of NAS Illmatic is that level, as well as OUTKAST’s Aquemini or JIMI’s ‘Along The Watchtower’. Hear what I mean??

  Sure you do.

 The ELECTROMA movie soundtrack is just full of those. As a little shout out to the big boys I’d love to share this one with you peeps: If You Were My Man by LINDA PERHACS.

       And the sun is out today in Paris-it has its importance.

         Mehdi.

(Boogie Down Teenagers KRS-ONE, D-Nice, and Kenny Parker)

   Peeped this morning on COCAINE BLUNTS, these links to the XXL articles on the making of ILLMATIC, READY TO DIE, and CUBAN LINX. Recommended read for any rap fan or just anybody interested in great stories about great art, ie. how tiny, insignificant and random details can turn raw talent into classic material (and also, if time indeed tells, on how memory can be very selective sometimes).

    One of the greatest mysteries of this rap game is: what was it that made 1988/90 the golden age of Hip-Hop music? ‘It Takes A Nation Of Millions’, ‘Critical Beatdown’, ‘Paul’s Boutique’, ‘3 Feet High And Rising’, ‘People’s Instinctive Travels’, ‘Straight Outta Compton’, ‘Long Live The Kane’, I just can’t stop that list. There were at least twenty absolute Hip-Hop classic albums produced in this two year span. At least.

    Now compare it to the number of great rap records released in the almost 20 year period from 1990 to now. Ten, give or take? Nas’s first joint, a couple of Wu-Tang records, couple of Jay-Z’s, Biggie and Outkast maybe. Dr Dre might’ve produced two or three, ok. After that, left to your own opinion, if you want to call ‘Get Rich Or Die Trying’, ‘Marshall Matters’, ‘Late Registration’ or ‘Tha Carter 3′ great Hip-Hop achievements, it is really one’s opinion.

   Anyway, you get me: there had to be something in the water of these NYC taps back then. Were the artists better? I doubt it, the later developments in LL-Cool-J, Rakim or Big Daddy Kane careers don’t really vouch for it. Was it the music production technique? Probably, as in any mostly youth artistic movement, the limitations of technical means tend to make people search more, if you may. But then again, what do you make of Pete Rock, Premier, or Just Blaze beats, they’re definitely as good as anything on ‘By Any Means Necessary’, maybe even better. No, it has to be something else.

   The usually agreed explanation is the hunger, the restrictions, the grinding, or if you want to summarize THE MONEY***, or the lack of it. Which makes our genre very material-oriented and give reason to the most common critic argued against Hip-Hop. Come to think of it, Graffiti art, Punk music, Skateboarding, anything that was defined against the well-established by kids who didn’t care, to finally end being a solid part of what it tried to destroy in the first place, faces the same issue ADDRESSED BY THE SAME PEOPLE WHO WANT TO AMEND IT SO THEY TOO CAN MAKE MONEY OUT OF IT, in some kind of absurd, adapt-or-die twist.

   It’s almost like Charles Darwin made me want to blast BRING THE NOISE super loud this morning,

      M.

***Nod to DJ Shadow’s Endtroducing track number 10.

   Peeps,

 This being my favorite subject of conversation, please pardon my prolixity.

 I keep trying to understand the ‘causality’ between the music we listen to and the situation surrounding. Why is there some music I like in the summertime, some I prefer in the wintertime? What makes me want to listen to this particular record while driving a car? Or this other one in my headphones, riding the train? Is it the message, the mood? Is it the sound? What is shower music?

 Since I was a kid, hiding with a little radio under my bed sheets at night, listening to Dee Nasty on NOVA (circa 88), I’ve always been convinced that there was also some kind of connection between the music volume and the intensity of light. The darker my room, the softer the level to fulfill the feeling. Which is quite paradoxical of course, because it’s the exact opposite in a club situation: we usually want to dim the lights and blast the fuck up-especially if BoysNoize is deejaying.

 The quest for the perfect setting to complement your favorite music is like Trizzy’s new record: infinite+1. How many records didn’t I understand until I heard them in the right place, at the right moment? This one for example, which I’d like to suggest as a soundtrack for this cold and grey Paris friday: footprints by A Tribe Called Quest. Please let me know how it feels to you in London, in Sydney, in Tunis or in California.

    Mehdi.

Image composed by Arthur KING with pics and stickers of my own.