RA the Rugged Man

Friday, April 28 by Brian Pan

Back to the music...

I couldn't find too much information about RA the Rugged Man. His web page has been dead since 2005 it seems.

He's from Long Island and has been in the rap game for close to twenty years working with the likes of Notorious B.I.G. and Mobb Deep. He's been signed before but was dropped apparently because of his behavior. He hasn't put out an album until 2004 when he released Die, Rugged Man, Die through Nature Sounds.

Rugged is old school. Down and dirty, spray paint totin', subway ridin', cardboard breakin' with a boom box old school. The lyrics can get raunchy at times too, so it's not exactly work-friendly.

American Low Life (bootleg) - Grizzly

I saw him on DJ Battle TV where he was going off on whack MCs and the decline of New York hip hop since the days of the grandfathers that created it. I liked him immediately. :)

http://www.djbattle.net/tv.php?tvID=11

The episode is quite big (225MB) but if you download it, defititely check out the turntable routine in the middle by DJ Klever.

Here's another Klever routine on youtube:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=JZbnMDHvg9I

DJ Slow Kutz

Saturday, April 22 by Brian Pan

WaWaWaa

End of a scratch session last week. I think it's the album Slade Alive and the sound is the first strum of a guitar (start of a song). Which by the way is a pretty rockin album. They are a British band following in the giant footsteps of the Beatles. There's a little Beatles there but they are much more, what we think of nowadays as, straight Rock (less Pop sounding and experimental stuff).

In the middle where it sounds like wa-wa-wa.....that's because my crappy DM950 crossfader doesn't cut sharply enough and the sound is wavy instead of cut up. It's kind of a cool sound but on a better scratch mixer like Dan's DM1050 it sounds like cuts.

RockNRoll

From today. Slade Alive again. You can hear the area around "rock" already starting to burn out- it sounds hissy. That's after just 1 week, but then again, it's probably a 30 year-old vinyl record. You can also hear the record spinning back occasionally because another shortcoming of the crappy DM950 crossfader is that it doesn't always cut fully off.

Enjoy.

DJ Yodaslap

Saturday, April 15 by Anonymous


*wikki wikki* we're here to introduce y'all to a sound that ya never heard b'fo. DJ Yodaslap m-m-mixing the underground oldschool style, jiggaz.

yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaah, boyyy!

DJ Yodaslap - P Dubz

Music Theory

Friday, April 14 by Brian Pan

There was an interesting question posed on the SDF bboard about music theory. Here are some of the questions and my responses.
> I tried music theory, but all the books I buy just seem to tell you WHAT, rather than WHY.

The only WHY in music is because it sounds good. It may sound facetious but it really is true. There is not exactly "good reasons" for music theory other than it is a way to construct music that "sounds good". Other cultures etc. would not use the same theories, scales, or anything. Quarter steps aren't really used in western music but are used elsewhere.

> Why are the terms major and minor so important? As far as I can see, the major and minor are just modes of the same set of intervals.

Obsolutely. Again, they are just 2 building blocks for music. They have a different sound. Minor key "sounds sad" but of course doesn't have to be.

> Why are songs said to be in say, C rather than D Dorian?

No "good" reason but convention and that's what we expect to hear. For example, when composers use the leading tone (7th) to cause "tension" that resolves into more "stable" notes (dominant, tonic)- the only reason we hear tension and resolution is because that's what we expect. That's how the music we listen to operates.

The scales C, D Dorian, and A minor all contain the same notes. The only difference is how the notes are notated and used. Sort of like how E and Fb are the same note on the piano just used in different scales and circumstances.

So the answer is just learn it. Use it. Others have done the work of creating a structure for you. Eventually you may break it/break out of it if you like and if it sounds good!

My music theory isn't great and I neglected some ideas like consonance and dissonance but I think in a general sense I didn't screw that up too much. Turntablism is certainly an area of music that breaks traditional music theory. What are your thoughts? Any interesting musicians out there breaking norms and making good music?

The Pharcyde

Tuesday, April 4 by Anonymous

if you're into oldschool/oldschool style hiphop and have yet to check out The Pharcyde, then i strongly suggest doing so. they started out in the early 90's in south central and quickly became a favorite alternative hiphop act though their first album "Bizarre Ride II the Pharcyde" (1992) didn't really sell all that well.

if you ask me, The Pharcyde still sounds pretty fresh even today which is no easy feat. anyway, i've attached a couple of tracks off "Bizarre," one of which you may already be pretty familiar with as well as a crazy music video that was directed by Spike Jonze (Being John Malkovich, Adaptation).

The Pharcyde - Passing Me By

The Pharcyde - Otha Fish

Music Video: The Pharcyde - Drop