I’ve always been a fan of Phantogram, especially the hip-hop tinged production. You can tell Josh Carter (the duo’s producer) grew up with Tribe and Outkast, like so many of us did. I got in touch with him to talk about his top 10 most profoundly influential records. For Wax Poetics, read it HERE.
If you’re of a certain age and don’t mind brainy, unsolicited opinions, check out this little side podcast we just started. Featuring longtime Nerdotrious contributor Nate LeBlanc and hometown hero Demone Carter, aka San Jose’s MC Dem One. We discuss old man topics with cool weekly guests renagin from industry insiders and artists (as of this writing, the legendary Prince Paul and venerated MC Myka 9 have been on… with much more to come!) Take a listen to those episodes if you have dishes to do or errands to run– and peep upcoming episodes HERE. #DBRP
This project with DJ Platurn has literally been 10 years in the making (more if you count his lifetime’s worth of sourcing these records). The project is out at the end of the month on San Jose’s Needle To The Groove Records.
The mix is an astounding collection of obscure Icelandic funk, proto-rap, rock, soul, and disco, all expertly put-in-place by Platurn. The release comes with liner notes (by yours truly) and is limited to 1000 CDs with a booklet of awesome ephemera. To gain a bit more perspective on the BTI, here are some past blog posts which aided in the realization of the project. Peep the nice mini-doc (by Kicker Dixon) above and kindly purchase HERE).
I helped edit this very thorough, very detailed piece on the mythical– and perhaps rap’s most underrated, known-yet-unknown producer ever– Paul C. If you’re curious as to why Ultramag’s Critical Beatdown (and a few others of that era) sounded so hard and so advanced, it’s all because of Paul, his deep record collection and forward thinking studio techniques. This piece examines his history and tragic death, exploring more of what eventually became huge hip-hop lore. Written music journalist Gino Sorcinelli. Read it HERE.
