J.U.I.C.E. - The Man 2xLP

 

90s Tapes (2023, Reissue) 

Every Wednesday, in honor of Ed Lover Dance Day from Yo! MTV Raps, I take a break from rock and roll to write a little bit about hip hop. In the late 80s and early 90s hip hop ruled my musical life. During this often called 'Golden Era' I discovered so much incredible music. As I am slowly replacing the CDs I've had for twenty-five plus years with vinyl copies, I'm going to talk about some albums that had a really important impact on me during some very formative years.

This is another 90s Tapes release by an artist I had never heard of prior to this album going up for sale.  Doing some digging, I found out that J.U.I.C.E. was a force on the freestyle battle rap scene in the late 90s.  It's admittedly a scene I don't know very much about as I had kind of moved on from hip hop by that point and was pretty wrapped up in punk and indie rock by then.  Apparently J.U.I.C.E. crossed paths with Eminem as both were working their way up the battle rap circuit and during that battle, J.U.I.C.E. came out on top. 

Their careers took different paths from their, as I'm sure you have figured out.  And again, I never heard of J.U.I.C.E. until this 90s Tapes double LP came to light.  In 1998 J.U.I.C.E. put out a four song cassette EP called The Man.  This double LP takes the demo versions of the songs from that release and adds in a myriad of extra, unreleased tracks from the same era.  While hip hop in the late 90s typically doesn't resonate with me the same way the releases at the beginning of the decade do,  there's a lot to like about these songs.

The production is solid, but maybe not as strong as the early 90s beats that I usually gravitate towards.  The drums, bass lines and samples can be understated at times, but they are still good and have a lot in common with the more backpacker indie rap sounds of the early 2000s.  I can appreciate that style as well.  It's really the lyrics and delivery that makes this album stand out.  J.U.I.C.E. obviously a very gifted MC and he uses his freestyle skills to put together tracks that showcase those talents.  

He has a complicated flow, but not one that's outlandish just for the sake of it.  Some tracks have strong narratives while others have J.U.I.C.E. just throwing down battle rhymes.  It's a good mix and I think it would be difficult for anyone to not walk away impressed by his skills.  I feel like if he had come around five or six years earlier, he probably would have ended up among my very favorites if the production was a little more in line with the sounds of 1992 or 1993.  But that's just my personal bias on hip hop production.

J.U.I.C.E. - The Man:
https://90stapes.bandcamp.com/album/the-man

Skiploader - From Can Through String LP - White Vinyl

Tim/Kerr / Geffen (1996)

Skiploader is a band whose name I remember being kicked around in the 90s, but they weren't a band I had ever spent any time with.  In fact, I'm not even positive I ever heard a single song by them back then.  One of my buddies, Jason, had mentioned them to me a little ways back and it reminded me to give them another listen.  I did, and then I picked up a sealed cutout of their first full length, From Can Through String.  It was cheap and sealed, so that was a bonus.

My original expectations were that this would be the sort of slow twinkly emo that was in vogue in 1996.  Sad sack music lamenting all of the things wrong with the world.  The fact that it was on Geffen should have clued me in that it would need to be more exciting than that, and it is.  Skiploader's album is an energetic blast of catchy songs with big, crunchy guitar chords.  Is there an emotional undercurrent to the songs?  Absolutely, but it's done in a way that makes everything more dynamic and interesting than your by the numbers pop punk band of the era.

In fact, the band this album makes me think about the most as a comparison is actually Seaweed.  Both vocalists have the strained, but powerful delivery and the guitar riffage also has moments of similarity.  Now, don't get me wrong.  I'm not saying that Skiploader is quite as good as Seaweed was.  Seaweed had an intensity level that Skiploader can't match.  But Skiploader is carrying on a similar tradition and this record is way better than I would have figured based on everything I knew about them before actually listening to it.

Skiploader - From Can Through String:
https://skiploader.bandcamp.com/album/from-can-through-string

Unwound / Karate - Fantasma Split 7" - Red Vinyl

Numero (2023)

This 7" was originally available at the Primavera Sound Festival that took place in Barcelona.  Unwound and Karate both played on day three and were grouped as part of the third font size (out of four) on the poster.  As both of these songs are also available on albums by each band, I assume this was mainly released to be a take home trinket of the experience.  Lucky for record dorks like me, Numero put some extra copies up on their website, so I was able to keep my Unwound 7" collection up to date.

On the Unwound side we have "Look A Ghost," from their Leaves Turn Inside You album from 2001.  While the later era Unwound records are definitely not my favorite of their overall discography, this song does stand out as one of the best.  It's not quite as noisy as I usually want my Unwound songs to be, as they rely more on a clean (as in not distorted), but muddy guitar tone.  The playing is intricate though and it's not sleepy like some of the band's other later era songs. 

Karate is a band I never listened to.  I'm not entirely sure why as they aren't a band that I can point to and say "I don't like them because ______."  I just never listened to them and I think I always thought of them as a slow, kind of boring band.  Now that I've heard their contribution to this 7", "There Are Ghosts" from the 1998 album The Bed is in the Ocean, I'm not sure my assumption was incorrect.  It's not a bad song, it is pleasant enough, but it has that slow, smooth jazz sort of indie rock vibe that never did anything for me.  Maybe they have other songs that are a bit more dynamic and exciting, but this one is kind of just there.

If you didn't go to the festival and already like either band, I'm not sure this is an essential release as you probably already have the song.  But for that segment of people that need to hunt down things like this, you can get it at a reasonable price from the fine folks at Numero.

The Concept of A.L.P.S. - The Classic Collection 3xLP

90s Tapes (2023, Reissue) 

Every Wednesday, in honor of Ed Lover Dance Day from Yo! MTV Raps, I take a break from rock and roll to write a little bit about hip hop. In the late 80s and early 90s hip hop ruled my musical life. During this often called 'Golden Era' I discovered so much incredible music. As I am slowly replacing the CDs I've had for twenty-five plus years with vinyl copies, I'm going to talk about some albums that had a really important impact on me during some very formative years.

I have something of a backlog of 90s Tapes releases, so you might see quite a few of them in the upcoming weeks.  This particular album and group I had never heard of prior to this reissue being made available for purchase a few months ago.  The Concept of A.L.P.S. (or as they are sometimes called, The Alps Cru) hailed from St Louis and in 1994 started releasing a string of independent 12" singles.  They had three singles in the mid 90s, but never put out a full length.

Then starting in 2008, they began releasing more singles and stayed relatively active putting something out every few years.  Again, they never put out a full length during this run either.  Enter 90s Tapes.  They have compiled everything from those 12"s from the 90s and most of the tracks from the later singles as well and put them all on one convenient triple LP (though one of the 3 LPs is the instrumental versions).  The label is based in Germany, so their on sale times are in the middle of the night for me.  I don't typically have a problem getting my hands on the albums of theirs that I want, but Alps sold out before I even woke up that morning.  I spent a little bit of time hunting, and I did have to pay collector prices, but I was finally able to track down a copy for myself.

And it was important that I did hunt this down.  It's a great album full of slower tempo, jazzy beats that still have a rugged feel to them.  I'm at a loss for an easy comparison point to another group, but certainly if you are into Tribe Called Quest or Gang Starr, you will be able to appreciate what the Alps Cru are offering, even though they don't really sound a ton like either of those groups.  Regardless, this is an album that my hip hop ear can enjoy, they are of their era enough that I'm interested, but left of center enough that they still sound like the sort of thing indie hip hop folks of today would enjoy.  Worth checking out, but be prepared to pay for the vinyl if you find it.

The Concept of A.L.P.S. - The Classic Collections:
https://90stapes.bandcamp.com/album/the-classic-collection

The Pretty Flowers - A Company Sleeve LP - Translucent Blue Vinyl (/250)

Double Helix (2023)

Of the records I've written about over the past five years or so, I'm not sure that any connected with a certain segment of my friends more than Why Trains Crash, the first album from The Pretty Flowers.  I wrote about it back in 2018 and most of the people whose taste in music most closely matches mine seemed to love it.  And not just love it, to further evangelize it to others.  Watching that happen for a record I loved so much was really quite wonderful.  My circle of music friends often agree on what bands are good, but there was something pretty special about the way every seemed to connect with The Pretty Flowers.

Fast forward to 2023 and five years have gone by.  That's a pretty long time since their last record and factor in that the five years that went by felt more like thirty and I wondered what would happen when A Company Sleeve finally came out.  Well, everyone I know loves it and that includes me in a big way.

Despite being fully aware that I do it, I often fall victim to the trope of trying to compare a band to other bands to try to help explain what they sound like.  There's only so many times you can write things like 'catchy' and have it really be a description of the music that you're listening to.  I still think that the bands that I most associate with The Pretty Flowers when trying to come up with a comparison point are The Weakerthans (for the storytelling component and hooks) and early Built To Spill (for the band's ability to weave in more complicated guitar attacks, but not overwhelm with unnecessary solo wanking).  

Even without referencing these touchstones, it's impossible to not gush over how expertly this entire album has been crafted as a body of work.  The individual songs are all spectacular, but the way they flow from one to the other is a masterwork in sequencing and thought put into making this feel like an album and not just being a pile of twelve songs.  This is not a concept album, but the concept of these songs being an album was obviously something that was taken very seriously.

I can't say enough great things about this record.  It's hands down the best record I have heard all year so far and I'm not really sure anything else is even close.  If you are ever the sort of person to put stock into anything I write and didn't pick up on the first Pretty Flowers album, listen to me this time and make sure you grab A Company Sleeve.  A shoe in for album of the year if John Reis doesn't put out anything before January.

The Pretty Flowers - A Company Sleeve:
https://theprettyflowers.bandcamp.com/album/a-company-sleeve

Al' Tariq - God Connections 2xLP + 7"

90s Tapes (2023, Reissue) 

 Every Wednesday, in honor of Ed Lover Dance Day from Yo! MTV Raps, I take a break from rock and roll to write a little bit about hip hop. In the late 80s and early 90s hip hop ruled my musical life. During this often called 'Golden Era' I discovered so much incredible music. As I am slowly replacing the CDs I've had for twenty-five plus years with vinyl copies, I'm going to talk about some albums that had a really important impact on me during some very formative years.

Before he was Al' Tariq he was known as Kool Fash and was part of The Beatnuts.  While I wasn't really familiar with The Beatnuts as a group back in the 90s, I was aware of them via their production involvement with several groups that I did listen to at the time.  I discovered the first Beatnuts full length many years later and was definitely a fan.  After that album originally came out, Kool Fash left the group and changed his name to Al' Tariq.  

God Connections is Al' Tariq's debut album and it originally came out in 1996, which is way past my typical hip hop expiration date of 1994.  What I've learned over the years is that for the most part, I'm right - the vast, vast majority of rap that came out after 1994 is pretty terrible.  But I've also learned that a blanket statement like that just cannot apply to everyone.  I have found some post-94 jewels over the last few years, and God Connections is one of them.

It's not a a perfect record by any means and I do with that the production was a little more upbeat and dirtier, for a lack of a better word to describe it.  Things are pretty polished and you'll never mistake it for something that came out in that 88-94 golden era.  That said, it is still quite good.  The beats do still hit relatively hard and the bass, while smooth, still thumps.  Lyrically, Al' Tariq is great and he's the main reason the album's highs get as high as they do.  As good as he was on Beatnuts' records, he' elevated his game further and spins killer stories on each track.

God Connections may not be an essential record that everyone needs to own, but if you are like me and are hunting for records outside of your comfort zone that can really hang with golden era classics, you could certainly do worse than Al' Tariq's debut.  It's definitely worth checking out.

Al' Tariq - God Connections:
https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_kvdbmCnLbKgDsjJ3W4nloTYa_028c-36U

Lifer's Group - Living Proof LP

Intercord / Hollywood BASIC (1992)

Every Wednesday, in honor of Ed Lover Dance Day from Yo! MTV Raps, I take a break from rock and roll to write a little bit about hip hop. In the late 80s and early 90s hip hop ruled my musical life. During this often called 'Golden Era' I discovered so much incredible music. As I am slowly replacing the CDs I've had for twenty-five plus years with vinyl copies, I'm going to talk about some albums that had a really important impact on me during some very formative years.

While I never heard any music from Lifer's Group back when it was originally released in the early 90s, I was aware of their story.  Born out of the Rahway State Prison's program that was highlighted as part of the Scared Straight documentary, the group came about as another idea to reach out and share their message through music and try to dissuade young people from activities that could lead to imprisonment.

What I didn't know is that the record is pretty great.  It came out in 1992, which you could really make a case for being the highlight of the Golden Era (it's either that or '93, for sure).  The beats are pretty much what you'd hope to hear on a record that came out at this time.  It's hard hitting, with aggressive drum breaks and tons of low end.  While not anywhere near the perfection that EPMD was producing at the time, there is something about the sounds on Lifer's Group that does make me think of Erick and Parrish's production prowess.

Lyrically, there's a bunch of MCs an the album and all of them are pretty great.  To be honest, I don't really know who is who from song to song, but everyone steps up to the mic and does an excellent job.  Lyrically it's a mix of positive lyrics encouraging people to stay out of trouble and tracks that play out as cautionary tales of what can happen if you engage in some of the activities that led to the participants being in Rahway to begin with.

At the end of the day, it's just a really strong, entertaining listen.  The beats are always what opens the door for me, but in this case the lyrics are what keeps me coming back for more.

Lifer's Group - Living Proof:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJMfO1C3-yM&ab_