Feb 15, 2021@Sign Language @Jeans @Ordinary Joel @Ricky @Chrollo @Michael Myers
FAM I"VE MISSED Y"ALL!!!!!!!
I've been insanely busy, as it's been mentioned, theres been an uptick in mental health issues along with me taking an extra responsibility with working for the National Suicide Hotline, so basically most of my free time has been taken with that. I am doing very well fortunately, I haven't forgotten about S80 nor any of you wonderful friends I've made here in the past couple of years. I will say this thread is unfortunately on a hiatus, but I do promise I will get back into this and in general interacting with y'all on a more regular basis someday!
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Apr 19, 2024
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Feb 12, 2021
All is not right with the forum, and by large the world, until we see the return of our brother @Fire Squad
Hope you'll be able to get a breather soon homie!Step Daddy, BIGFOOT, Fire Squad and 6 others like this. -
Aug 30, 2020
@Odysseus
#35: Kanye West - Yandhi (Big Country Edition) [8.0/10]
Well firstly, welcome to this demented forum! Although we might not have the peaks of activity we once had from years back, I highly encourage you to stick around with us and see if you like it around here, there's a very hospitable environment that we've fostered along with a host of posters that genuinely care about making sure we're a top quality corner of the internet. We also have a lot of talented writers, curators, musicians, etc. which brings me to this mix, made by our very own & fellow Ye Stan @Donkey Kong Cuntry!
It wouldn't be too farfetched for me to say that Kanye might be my favorite artist in any genre. I have countless precious memories of this man's songs to share, endless moments where his voice gave me that gust of wind to lift me back up from the depths and overall the impression his music has left imprinted on not just us as consumers, but that small, exclusive sphere of fellow musicians can only speak for itself. But even we as fans have to admit, he hasn't been the supernova that he was from ages ago in recent times. Even when I try listening to Ye or JIK there's this sort of awkwardness and lack of confidence that I'd never imagine he'd exist in. We've had glimpses of his greatness, but overall it's been very hit or miss, which is where Yandhi comes into the picture.
I don't want to be verbatim with what BC said on his thread (^linked above), if anything this version is sequenced to perfection and probably better than what Kanye might have originally had in mind. In a way this feels like a karmic reincarnation of TLOP with a twist of Yeezus, except it now involved a new mindset that came with his mental health struggles. The songs are chaotic, sort of like personified undeveloped thoughts that you'd normally experience when you're calming down after a panic/psychosis attacks. It's like Kanye was picking pieces of whatever imagination he can dip into and throwing them into these barebones tracks, normally this is a recipe for a disaster, but its credit to Kanye for summoning the old charisma and personality that make it somehow work. While it's conceptually all over the place, there's a sort of charm that Yandhi inhibits, it's like an aged boxer that's way past his peak but still trying to fight for his life, since who knows what kind of future lays for Kanye. I still take great comfort that, for at least certain portions, Kanye was able to part those storm clouds above his mind and give us the rays of sunlight I still pray he's capable of producing until the hereafter.Last edited: Aug 30, 2020lil uzi vert stan, Odysseus, Chrollo and 6 others like this.Apr 19, 2024 - Apr 19, 2024
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Sep 18, 2020
Even if you don't consider yourself a writer, your eloquence and wit within your writing is something I'd like to emulate one day. Constantly checking into this site and seeing you, @Donkey Kong Cuntry, @Antman, @awhellno, @Sav Stanfield post amazing content is a joy, and somedays I feel inspired to write a review or tidbit about music. One thing that unfortunately stops me from taking that step is the fact my music knowledge and prose isn't up to standard, it's just that I consume and immerse myself in music as a hobby.
Anyways I digress! Great song choices. Mine would prolly be Jezebel or the Is It a Crime?, coz once that sax roars you know you're in for a rollercoaster of a project
And yes! Great write-up on Japanese Breakfast!
It's about dat time we got a new LP from them soon. Michelle Zauner recently released an EP with Ryan Galloway from CRYING entitled "pop songs 2020" and it's filled to the brim with saccharine goodness!Sav Stanfield, aleeex1923, Sign Language and 5 others like this. -
Apr 19, 2024
Aug 20, 2020
@Koolo @RateThisAlbum
![[IMG]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/6/6d/Bizarre_Hannicap_Circus_Album.jpg/220px-Bizarre_Hannicap_Circus_Album.jpg)
#26: Bizarre - Hannicap Circus [Cocaine is a hella of a drug/10]
The moment I saw this unholy spawn of an album being mentioned in this thread, I truly rued the day I would finally have to subject myself to revisit it. I remember listening to this filthy b------'s incestuous verse on Amityville and just blankly stare into the distance, never before had I been so perplexed in my life (raise your hand if you know his verse by heart). Just when I thought Eminem's violent, cartoonish imagination couldn't cross any more lines, this MFer complete stampedes over any moral boundary that imaginably exists. I truly wonder what Devil's Night would have sounded like without any of his buffoonery, just when Eminem is approaching the peak of his abilities for f---s sake, but in some twisted ironic way, it wouldn't feel the same without Biz's demented presence, I just can't imagine the album without him. His debut, is something I had hoped to have forever banished from my memory, but unfortunately you can never run away from fate, especially not Bizarre.
Jesus, why did I do this? Because of my profession as a therapist, I'm at this point in my life desensitized to outlandish things being said in my face, heck if anything I sometimes chuckle (while heavily cringing) whenever I hear this fat f---'s ridiculous claims. Like Dark Humor sucks enough already lol, not even in music form does it make it redeemable, we get cesspools of s--- like in this case, a lot of the songs are conceptually all over the place. Perhaps if I actually was half-baked maybe I'd find a single iota of joy in here, but Bizarre doesn't want you to have fun, he just wants to f--- his cousin and make you watch it. Somehow I'm legitimately fascinated at how the h--- stic.man, Hi-Tek, Big Boi & Raphael Saadiq ended up on here, almost like the equivalent of being invited to the Eric Andre Show but in music form. Another thing was closer to the end, Bizarre actually tried pulling back the curtains of his psychotic facade and actually tried to rap, thing is he quickly loses whatever appeal (if you even want to call it that) he possesses, most of the time I wished I can shove an ice-pick into my ear canal just to put me out of my misery. Lastly, somehow he actually coerced a decent verse from semi-retired Eminem on here.
Overall, I'm compelled to personally order this cd from Amazon, drive around somewhere and then fling this piece of crap out the car window like a frisbee, with the cd clinically landing in a pile of garbage where it belongs. Still, it was a nice trip down memory lane, except I think I took the wrong direction and ended up sending my sanity to some dystopian h--- where Bizarre reigns supreme.Last edited: Jul 11, 2021lil uzi vert stan, Ordinary Joel, Sav Stanfield and 5 others like this. -
Apr 19, 2024
Aug 10, 2020
@Sign Language
![[IMG]](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/e/e5/Get_Ya_Mind_Correct.jpg)
#4 Color Changin' Click - Get Ya Mind Correct [8.5/10]
Bro thank you for giving me an excuse to revisit this. Actually I want also thank Drake of all people in this. Yes you heard me right, Drake (Soulja voice). My appreciation for Texas rap started around the time So Far Gone dropped and hearing Bun B obliterate his feature on Uptown. By that point we were already past the climax of what was Swishahouse's stranglehold during the mid-2000s, their influence however still permeated in every other corner of the mainstream. Man I uncovered so much music during the Rap Blog-era, coinciding with my Senior Year of high school. This gem, was amongst the many Texas classics I uncovered for the first time 10 years ago.
There's something so intriguing about that slow-motion outer space sound that Swishahouse had in abundance, juxtaposing with everything else I had known coming from the northeast/midwest. Paul Wall & Cham are both extremely charismatic rappers; Paul having impeccable presence & a knack for catchy phrases with Cham's under appreciated ear for melodies and a razor sharp flow. Together they had one of the best chemistries in rap history if you ask me.
At 13 tracks--not including the hilarious skits--these two glide over all these minimalistic, jittery sounding instrumentals. The hooks are amazing, the raps are perfect, although it's an album where I would say the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. So shoutout to Texas for giving us under-appreciated gems, shoutout to all of y'all that experienced that same epiphany in high school for diving deep into this d--- genre and shoutout.....to Drake.
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Apr 19, 2024
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Aug 10, 2020
@cpt awesome WPG joint acc
You know, I do have a history of appreciation for Bluesy/Roots rock--I mean heck I'm Mexican so I've murdered every drunken La Bamba karaoke session! Some other examples of my fondness for it include Jimmy Page's experimentations with it on Led Zeppelin, Gary Moore & his jaw-dropping guitar work, plus a little bit of early Fleetwood Mac even.
#1: The Weight Band - World Gone Mad [9/10]
The one thing that's always struck me about these contemporaries are the tortured, poetic souls that they harbor deep inside. From the moment you hear their wistfulness and unease in that powerful title track, it sets the contemplative tempo for the rest of the record.
As I've ventured deeper in the album, the themes really struck me. It's a conversation that we ought to be having: Are we losing our societal values? Are our traditions hanging on by a loose thread? Is the world truly going mad? There's this nostalgic sort of Woodstock-ish spirit that lives in the band; a harkening to a significant & transformative time in this country's history. They bare their souls with their instruments, almost like you step into a vintage flashback of their lives when each solo & beat comes into play.
Nevertheless thank you good sir for recommending me this, I had a great time stepping out of my usual comfort zone for music. I have a strange urge to dust off my acoustic guitar and try to mimic those chords I heard, with a bottle of Jack Daniels somewhere in that picture.Last edited: Aug 10, 2020 -
Jul 24, 2021
Thy, Ordinary Joel, Chrollo and 4 others like this.Apr 19, 2024 -
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Nov 12, 2020
@Bourbon Ben
#58: The Stooges - Fun House [9.5/10]
This was admittedly my first time ever listening to The Stooges. Mind you I still have a ton of frontiers to check out when it comes to super classic rock; I'm a huge proponent of Velvet Underground, Deep Purple, Black Sabbath to name a few. But there's plenty of exploration for me to go around, if anything I hella appreciate these recs, always more stuff to add into my never ending catalog. Whenever you go back to listen to stuff like this, you immediately draw the influences and legacy this left behind, I can quite literally see the cauldron of Punk/Garage Rock bubble as they spin that paddle in each subsequent guitar riff. Needless to say, if you didn't know already, the lead singer of this band was Rock God Iggy Pop so you already know what you're in for if you're familiar with his work!
This is just a fireball of monstrous riffs and vintage Iggy banshee wails from top to bottom. It almost feels so dirty listening to that g.d. guitar being shredded, you gotta take a clean shower after you immerse yourself in the music. Iggy himself was such an eccentric lyricist, half the time you'll be head bopping along and you hear something out of the blue like WTF? There's no shortage of entertainment, as with most of the albums from the old days it's short-form with longer songs so it's very digestible. Honestly I can see why this is a seminal record, there's almost a before and after of Rock's landscape when you hear this and then go ahead to the Sex Pistols/The Ramones, this was the tipping point of a revolution that was going to take over Rock, all it needed was the spark from this masterpiece.dkdnfbdjdkdddjdjfvcgfl, lil uzi vert stan, Sign Language and 4 others like this. -
Apr 19, 2024
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Aug 14, 2020
@Winter
#16: The Diplomats - Diplomatic Immunity [11/10 8.6/10]
It's been close to 17 years since I left my childhood home in the Bronx, even though that neighborhood was a hellscape, there's this odd fondness for the simplicity of the struggle. We can never forget the sun-soaked summers of our childhoods, to give you my picture, I vividly remember the neighbors on the block are outside cooking barbecues and the cars passing by are blasting rap at ignorant levels. My youngest uncle was an avid rap fan, he would swear by me and everyone else Cam'ron was the best thing since sliced bread, or well in our case tortillas lol. Sometimes he'd take me to cruise around Harlem just to listen to Come Home With Me, there's something so satisfying about geographically correct music, especially when you look around and see everyone grinning to the voice of Killa coming out of the car. But no one was prepared for the tidal wave this album was about to produce...
It's crazy, my last summer living in NYC coincided with 50 Cent's ascension, Hov's Black Album singles & especially Diplomatic Immunity. I will blindly defend this album to my grave, regardless of how many times I roll my eyes when I hear Freekey Zekey & Jim Jones' voices on the skits. Yes you can also point out the conflated flaws that usually hit double-LPs with filler, but the strong points on here outweigh any of the bad. Especially looking at what Juelz Santana brought to the table, he had the charisma and hunger on this album that had us all convinced he was gonna be a future torchbearer for the region.
The real reason why this album is still regarded as one of NY's last heyday hoorahs, well one of the two, is because of Cam'ron's insane performances on here. Rocafella era Cam was a different breed; the wordplay, the imagery, the internal rhyme schemes and yes those silly nursery rhyme bars were all at its peak here. I can't even do justice on describing what he did on I Really Mean It, nobody else could have pulled that off. I'd be remised to not mention the glorious soulful beats The Heatmakerz & Just Blaze contributed to this album, the Dipset sound is one of a kind.
If it isn't clear by now, this album means a lot to me. I wish all of you could have seen what I saw with the cultural zeitgeist the Diplomats brought onto the city. Pink Rovers, pink shirts, my Uncle's smile whenever Cam started rapping, it's still all so lucid to me all these years after. Be thankful for your childhoods my friends, and the especially the music that defined it.Last edited: Aug 15, 2020lil uzi vert stan, JXY, Ordinary Joel and 4 others like this. -
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Aug 11, 2020
@joeyp363
#7: Hopsin - Raw [100/10]
Apparently Hip-Hop was born 47 years ago today. 13 years after, a more important event happened: Marcus Jamal Hopsin was born. The messiah, the apotheosis of talent, excellence, bravado, creativity. Once I saw him in that 10 second cameo as a movie extra in Max Keeble's Big Move, I knew he was destined for greatness. That greatness took form of this album, multiple years after being stranded in Ruthless, who properly didn't harness his staggering potential.
Raw...is breath-taking. Not a single time does Hopsin take even a single breath as he makes Sumerian tablets & Hindu sanskrits look like nursery rhymes. Future, Thug & the rest of those wannabe rappers can NEVER ever equate to what Hopsin performs on the mic. It's astonishing, I...can't really describe what I feel when I heard him dismantle Eazy-E's wife and every mainstream rapper on Sag My Pants. Yes.
For the record I did listen to this album in full
, I'll never disrespect my man Joeyp like that.Thy, Sav Stanfield, JEB and 4 others like this. -
Apr 19, 2024
Aug 10, 2020
@Grimace
Oh d--- I remember this one, it was a late night sometime in I think my 2nd year of my undergrad studies when I went on this insane binge of listening to the 80's classics for the first time. Simon & Garfunkel are staples here in NY (for better...and worse in some cases lol), there isn't one outdoor pizzeria or park in Chelsea & Queens that isn't blaring out S&F come summertime. That same night I also heard U2's The Joshua Tree, which is another album every average American has heard at least one song from. Gotta love Adult Contemporary AM radio & every supermarket!
#2: Paul Simon - Graceland
The thing however with this album, although it came out in the 80's, it doesn't have a lot of blatant quirks that defined most of the generic pieces of music of that time. Graceland is rich in diverse pop, taking a lot of cues from what David Byrne set out to do with Talking Heads Remain In Light with heavy influences from Worldbeat/African Zulu hums. So we get this really awesome mix of like Jangle-Pop that compliment Paul's vivid storytelling. The B-Side still sounds so ahead of it's time, even now that I've gone back to this, if you don't hum along to Homeless you must have no soul.
Overall this is easily a classic album, from both the strength of Paul Simon's song-writing & this rich tapestry of African sounds. I highly encourage anyone to at some point in their lifetimes to pick up some snacks, grab your headphones and dive into the past to visit these pristine masterpieces.Chrollo, Ordinary Joel, Sav Stanfield and 4 others like this. -
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