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The Roots - Rising Down (feat. Mos Def, Dice Raw & Styles P)

I’ve been a fan of the Legendary Roots Crew since as long as I can even remember. What makes them so incredible is their consistency and innovation. For many other artists, the two qualities usually can’t go hand in hand. You either get the same good formula used repeatedly or you get a new sound but the artist fails to ever recreate the sound or anything better than it. The Roots have proven over time, that they are not the case.

With Rising Down, The Roots turned to a darker and more social/political sound with their 10th studio album. “Rising Down” most effectively showcases the sound. Set with heavy claps, grungy synths and hard drums courtesy of ?uestLove, Black Thought with the assistance of emcees Mos Def, Styles P and Dice Raw rap about their pessimistic views on the present society. Each emcee fires lines off criticizing every present problem from outsourcing to global warming. However, where some emcees would fall short for coming off as too “preachy”, they are able to get their point across and still create one dope song.

- michi

Lyrics

Hello hello hello hello…

(Mos Def)
Every anywhere heights plains peaks or valleys
Entrances exits vestibules and alleys
Winding roads that test the firm nerve
fortune or fatal behind the blind curve
The engine oil purr, lights flash to a blur
speed work through the earth make your motor go scurrr tonight at noon watch a bad moon rising
identities in crisis and conflict diamonds
blinding staring at lights till they crying
bone gristle popping from continuous grinding
grapes of wrath in a shapely glass
ingredients influential on your ways and acts
zero tolerance to raise the tax
it don’t matter how your gates is latched
you ain’t safe from the danger jack
made it way before they made the map
or a GPS this is DEF leader

(Chorus-Dice Raw)
I know where I’m going even when its dark and being led down that road
Hello hello hello hello…
you don’t see that somethings wrong earth’s spinning outta control
Hello hello hello hello…
Everything’s for sale even souls someone get God on the phone
Hello hello hello hello…
Northside nigga Southside
Hello hello hello hello…
shits popping off Worldwide
Hello hello hello hello…

(Black Thought)
Between the greenhouse gases and earth spinning off its axis got mother nature doing back flips the natural disasters
its like 80 degrees in Alaska you in trouble if you not an Onassis
it ain’t hard to tell that the conditions is drastic
just turn on the telly check for the news flashing
how you want it bagged paper or plastic?
lost in translation or just lost in traffic?
yo I don’t wanna floss I done lost my passion
and I ant trying to climb yo i lost my traction
they making me break my contents under pressure
do not shake I’m working while the boss relaxing
here come Mr. tax man he leaving a fraction give me back some matter fact next pay check it’s like that son
I’ll fuck around and have to hurt a few men
They probably chalk it up as a disturbing new trend hello

I know where I’m going even when its dark and being led down that road
Hello hello hello hello…
you don’t see that somethings wrong earth’s spinning outta control
Hello hello hello hello…
Everything’s for sale even souls someone get God on the phone
Hello hello hello hello…
Northside nigga Southside
Hello hello hello hello…
shits popping off Worldwide
Hello hello hello hello…

(Styles P)
Should I say hello or should I say that hell is low
And my nigga are niggero I’m an African American
They sell drugs in the hood but the man he move the medicine He’ll prescribe you augmen for everything
a little stuffy nose tell you get some Claritin
you know I’m hip to it and its hard to claim the land
when my great great great grands were shipped to it
look at technology they call it downloading
I call it downsizing somebody follow me
Does a computer chip have an astrology
When it fuck up could it give you an apology
Could it
Should I say hello or should I say goodbye
Try to understand how smart and how hood am I, It don’t matter though
until we learn that the world don’t turn right ,we all oughtta’ scatter though

I know where I’m going even when its dark and being led down that road
Hello hello hello hello…
you don’t see that somethings wrong earth’s spinning outta control
Hello hello hello hello…
Everything’s for sale even souls someone get God on the phone
Hello hello hello hello…

The Roots - Clock with no hands

This song is the truth.  Partially because it is my truth.  I remember the first time I got the Roots CD Game Theory, and I used to skip past this song.  Then one day I listened to it.  My godmom’s father had just died on the day that I went to see him, before that I hadnt’ seen him in like 2 years.  So it was weirdly on time. And strangely haunting.  Anyway, I was sitting in the car with my best friend at the time smoking the sweet green, and we were listening to this song.  I realized that all along this CD was foreshadowing a lot of my life.  It was the summer of many funs, much laughter, and a lot coughing.. lol.. This song just celebrates that times of our lives that we will never visit again and only be able to remember.  It’s very nostalgic in a way.

Black Thought is so crazy with his word placement, and it’s all so true in this song in how we feel and how we approach life.  Now I’m in a state where “I was married to a state of mind”, but now I’m divorcing it.

Do something powerful, so you don’t have to look back and regret.

[Black Thought]
Yeah, sitting in the staircase, holding back tears
Looking over mad years worth of photographs
Pictures of some places I ain’t never going back
Some people I used to love, why I ain’t show them that?
The skies was overcast, when I was sober last
My head is spinning, couldn’t tell you if it’s slow or fast
It’s starting to get too clear, I got to go and grass
To y’all it’s a shame but life is what we know it as
Waiting, navigating the plot, without plans
In the car, it’s hard to read as a clock with no hands
How your man’s goin’ get up and stop with no yams
All it take is one break, it could pop the program
Whether sinning or not, my back bending like I’m sentenced a lot
I feel some brothers is beginning to plot
It might have been a close friend I forgot
Who started up and ain’t remember to stop
I bet these niggaz going remember the shop

[Hook]
People think that I’m crazy, just cause I wanna be alone
You can’t depend on friends to help you in a squeeze
We all deal with shit on our own
And sometimes the beef can grow, get out of hand
Yeah, you know it gets full blown
I never said that you mean the world to me
Maybe it’s best that you never know

Yo, I’m like Malcom out the window with the weapon out
Searching for somehow to find a minute or the second now
Precious time is money that I ain’t got to mess about
Need it from the horse’s mouth or from my eye with less account
Lessons with my back to the wall, scoping my session out
Stay a little edgy at times when I ain’t stressing bout
Haters don’t know shit about me, they the ones that talk shit
Those that love me send it out, so I ain’t got to force quit
Cause I’m doing better now, don’t mean I never lost shit
I was married to a state of mind and I divorced it, man
I’m from where brothers moving product from the porches
People locking their doors, clutching to their crosses
The block hot by the law, there ain’t too many choices
So what I do is for y’all, there ain’t too many voices left
I watch my back, and watch my step
And I might forgive, but I will not forget come on

[Hook]

Yo, living in turbulent times
The blind leading the blind
Some call it evolution, some say intelligent design
You say you want a revolution, you out of your mizind
Your sons’ destitute, and their pops all in the prison
My man’s back in the jam, he like the back of my hand
He just attracted to scam, he right back in the can
I never sleepwalking, you dig
You get your shuteye
I’m on the first thing in, I’m leaving on the red-eye
My brother back in rehab, just had another relapse
But fin himself, it’s been like he’s been fighting an energy
Half telling me nobody true when they pretend to be that
So closer than friends, that’s where I keep my enemy at
To many parties concerned, it’s time to live it and learn
Until we’re able to grow, forever bridges we burn
My thoughts free as a bird, that’s just about to emerge
And every action is heard, it speaks louder than words, yo

[Hook]

-vyrtue

www.twitter.com/vyrtue77 (TWITTER ME SON!)

D’angelo, Femi Kuti, Macy Gray, & The Soultronics (ft. Nile Rodgers & Roy Hargrove) - Water No Get Enemy

1. When you see that line up all you can really say is.  DAMN.

2. If you do not know who Fela Kuti is click this link now and expose yourself to a genius… the black president.

Fela Kuti is like the Nigerian James Brown and Bob Marley.  James due to his leading and commanding of such a funky ass band and Bob because of his political power in Nigeria.  I wanted to post one of his original tracks, but they are all long and exceed the 10mb limit that tumblr has for audio tracks.  However, this is one hell of a cover.  The song “Water No Get Enemy” first appeared on Fela’s album Expensive Shit.  The album title came from an incident where the police tried to arrest Fela by planting a joint on him.  Fela ate the joint and the police waited for him to crap it out.  The story says that Fela used another inmates excrement in order to get off from the chareges.  Water No Get Enemy is sung in yoruba and english.  Fela scholar Michael Veal suggested that Fela uses water as a metaphor for the natural flow of society, a flow that the ruling patriarchy in Nigeria ostensibly denied to most of its citizenry.

T’o ba fe lo we omi l’o ma’lo
If you wan to go wash, na water you go use

T’o ba fe se’be omi l’o ma’lo
If you wan cook soup, na water you go use

T’o ri ba n’gbona o omi l’ero re
If your head dey hot, na water go cool am

T’omo ba n’dagba omi l’o ma’lo
If your child dey grow, na water he go use

If water kill your child, na water you go use
T’omi ba p’omo e o omi na lo ma’lo

Ko s’ohun to’le se k’o ma lo’mi o
Nothing without water
Ko s’ohun to’le se k’o ma lo’mi o
Omi o l’ota o

[Chorus]
Water, him no get enemy!

Omi o l’ota o
If you fight am, unless you wan die
I say water no get enemy
If you fight am, unless you wan die
Omi o l’ota o
I dey talk of Black man power
I dey talk of Black power, I say
I say water no get enemy
If you fight am, unless you wan die
I say water no get enemy
I say water no get enemy
Omi o l’ota o
Omi o l’ota o

Check out the video from the recording session of this song

I am also dying to see the play about Fela’s life

Owusu & Hannibal - Blue Jay

This album defined the year 2007 for me.  I stumbled upon this group listening to Rewind 5 compilation where they did a dope cover of the Beach Boys - Caroline, No.  The cover is really spaced out and sensual similar to a lot of ambient music, but with excellent vocals over top.  Their creativity shined on this cover and I immediately began searching for their album “Living with…”

Basically they are two guys from Copenhagen, who bonded over a mutual love of Sly Stone (***psss the artist below).  The group put the album together in about a year working on it 50/50 in each others home studios and recording the vocals in Phillip Owusu’s grandmothers bathroom.

On to Blue Jay, I love how the track comes on with the almost drunken drums with the guitar being sucked in a straw.  Phillip Owusu has such a dope style of singing.  It’s like subtly soulful, he’s not oversinging or undersinging, but hitting it perfectly.  You can feel everything that he is saying.  The harmony on the chorus is beautiful.  Phillip Owusu makes me want to sing again, I just can’t get enough of his style.  This is merely a sample of how beautiful the whole album is.

Tune in later and I will post some tracks that Phillip Owusu has remixed and some tracks from Robin Hannibal’s other groups Boomclap Bachelors and Non+

THE CITY SEEMS AT PEACE TONIGHT
THE CITY SLEEPS I RUN THE LIGHTS
FROM THE EAST TO THE WEST SIDE
IT’S AN ALL NIGHT RIDE

A GARBAGE TRUCK HONKS THE HORN
GREAT MINDS COLLIDE A TREATY TORN
NO ALLEGIANCE SO SKINTIGHT
NOT THIS LATE AT NIGHT

I HEARD HOW SOON THE DAY COMES
BLUE JAY GOT ME ON THE RUN

I THINK ABOUT I THOUGHT IT THROUGH
I READ THE GREEKS LIKE CHINESE DO
FROM THE BOTTOM LOOKING UP
IT’S A DEATH DEFYING DROP

I BREAK THE GLASS I KEEP THE SCORE
TAG THE HALLS AND CORRIDORS
I WORK AT NIGHT I WORK THE NIGHT
I WORK THE LONG NIGHT

I HEARD HOW SOON THE DAY COMES
BLUE JAY GOT ME ON THE RUN