August 2012 Hotlist Week 4

Kid606 - "LSDMTB303" 2012

I might need to listen to this some more. There's some cool stuff on here, but it's not hitting me the right way the first time through, but I feel like once I get used to these songs, I'll like this EP a lot.

Melvins - "Stoner Witch" 1994

I never heard this when it was new. Pretty awesome. I still prefer their post 2000 sound more than this era's stuff, but this is some amazing 90's music that I missed out on.

Joan Armatrading - "Starlight" 2012

I like this album more than anything she's released since the 80's. If you've never heard of her, go check out her old 70's and 80's stuff also. She falls into some weird niche in between folk and R&B, but has hints of jazz and blues as well. She's a very talented guitarist with a sometimes Nina Simone-like voice.

Babu - "Konichiwa Bitches" 2012

This mix is ridiculous. A bunch of super funky stuff that you don't normally hear, masterfully cut up and arranged by DJ Babu.

Knxwledge - "WrapTaypesPort2" 2012

I really, really, really hate listening to people freestyle, so that pretty much ruins anything good about these beats for me. It would help if the freestyles were a little better too.

Amon Tobin & The London Metropolitan Orchestra - "Royal Albert Hall (Box Set Disc 7)" 2012

It's always interesting to hear full orchestra covers of songs you've heard a bunch of times, only to see how truly complex and beautiful the original songs actually are. This exceeded my expectations by a lot. I didn't think it would pan out THIS well.

Casual - "He Still Think He Raw" 2012

Casual is trying to inject some life into his career by doing an album like this with DJ Fresh doing all the beats. It sorta works. I do enjoy this more than anything he's released since his first album, but it's still not an album full of bangers either.

Frank Nitt - "Stadium Music" 2012

This is the Frank from Frank N Dank fame. This album has a weird dynamic. It's like he's just trying a bunch of different styles hoping someone, somewhere will like him. Obviously a few of the more Dilla-esque sounding songs appeal to me, but there's some weird misguided sounding commercial attempts on here too. Those songs remind me of bad 90's major label rap albums, where the people at the label would force people to make a quota of those style songs on an album, and 99% of the time, NOBODY liked those tracks. Not the old fans or the intended, hopeful, new pop audience.

Doug Stanhope - "Sicko" 1999

Some older Stanhope. It's cool to hear how much he's evolved since then, but that he's still able to make me laugh with this material too.