Hero1

happy birthday! :2thumbs:

at first i was happy about u but now i am just starting to hate u man :rofl: If theres anyone you should hate its etherspinner! :rofl: :rofl:

Well they plan to record some new stuff this year..Will has also been to jeffs new studio..

just giving you a taste haha :wiggle:

i was looking forward to that robin thicke album as well.. hope it doesnt get shelved

Not really my kind of movie..but I'm sure it will be good.

http://www.jazzyjefffreshprince.com/audio/jazzysyd1.wmv

sure

Got abt 45 minutes in melbourne... got a few photos.. somethin 2 look forward to.. no..new sets! which was great.. a hip hop set and a very nice house set.. skills was great!! really got the crowd going

just saw 3 awesome jazzy jeff shows :gettinjiggywitit:

DJ "Jazzy" Jeff Townes isn't happy with the state of American hip-hop. Jazzy Jeff, a well-travelled hip-hop enthusiast. Jazzy Jeff, a well-travelled hip-hop enthusiast. AdvertisementAdvertisement Genre DJ/Dance, Hip Hop/RnB Location Tank Address 3 Bridge Lane, Sydney Date 22 July 2006 Tickets $30 Phone Bookings (02) 9251 9933 Online Bookings www.tankclub.com.au Preview Philadelphia DJ and producer "Jazzy" Jeff Townes isn't happy with the state of American hip-hop. He has more insight than most. In 1986, when hip-hop was still knocking on the mainstream's door, Townes hooked up with a young MC called Will Smith. DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince, as Smith then called himself, sold 10 million albums worldwide on the back of such pop-rap hit singles as Parents Just Don't Understand and Summertime. "Unfortunately, music - and especially hip-hop, something that started out very pure - has been taken over by corporations that have prostituted it," Townes says. "[Outside the US] it's going back to its early days. That's one of the reasons I think I travel as much as I do, because a lot of the places outside of the US have a much greater love and appreciation than the United States for music." Spending 200 days a year on tour, mostly outside the US, Townes gets many opportunities to hear the world's take on hip-hop. Unfortunately, the vast majority of Americans don't. "It's a shame," he says. "[Travelling] I try to grab as much music as I possibly can. I can walk into a record store and there's 5 million records, but when I turn on the radio I only hear 10. They're trying to tell me there's only 10 good records out of 5 million. "It's turned into a political thing. I always thought radio should play everything and let you decide what you like. Now radio only plays what people pay them to play or what sells the most soft drink. This is an art we're talking about and we're missing out." The well-travelled hip-hop enthusiast must know something about the Australian hip-hop scene. "Well, no, I don't. That's one of the exciting things - I have no idea about what I'm going to be hearing or seeing. That kind of catches you off-guard, because I'm not tainted. I like that. "Just travelling around, you find some incredible talent out there. It kind of reminds me how the United States was when hip-hop was just starting to break ground. I get that a lot from a lot of the places I travel [to]." Townes will be able to expose overseas audiences to Australian and New Zealand hip-hop if he gets a chance to go record shopping. "One of the things I pride myself on doing is not playing what's popular," he says. "I play what I like. I think that was the whole essence of a DJ back in the day: you trusted his musical tastes. I don't care where I get the music or how I get it, if it's something that moves me I'll play it. I'll play something from the UK in Africa, something from Africa in Australia and something from Australia in the United States." The American hip-hop audience is notoriously insular. Does he think they'll appreciate it? "Well, that's one of the reasons I don't play so much in the States." http://www.smh.com.au/news/gig-reviews/jaz...3166510518.html

On Australian shores for an appearance at the first ever Australian Urban Music Awards, as well as his own shows across the country, Jazzy Jeff is a true pioneer of the hip hop scene. Hailing from Philadelphia in the USA, he broke through with Hollywood megastar Will Smith as ‘Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince’, attaining a level of commercial success most artists can only dream of. ITM finds out his opinion on the current state of hip-hop, and where he hopes to see it go in the future. Firstly I’d like to say an emphatic hello to the one and only Jeff Townes! I’ve been a fan of your’s since I can remember. What have you been up to recently? Well… touring the world in which I love, but I’ve been in the studio working on my second studio record “The Return of The Magnificent” due out in January. Are you looking forward to the Australian Urban Music Awards? Yes I am… I love gettin new music from around the world, so now I have a front row seat. It’s an honor. What were your musical influences growing up? The sound of Phila definitely… but any old soul and funk. You recently did a compilation for the Defected series, which allowed listeners for the first time to truly appreciate the diverse range of tastes from the one of the staunchest of hip hop pioneers. Could you tell us more about that? How do you feel about hip hop incorporating sounds form all other genres, as opposed to keeping it ‘fundamental’ all the time? Well I came up in a time when DJs played everything, so it felt good to do the Defected album… That’s what I love to play! Hip hop is not a music style, it’s a lyrical form over any kind of music you want, so I love to see the boundaries pushed to the wall. What are your thoughts on the glorification of hip hop by the mass media into something of a commodity franchise? Do you see any curbing of this in the foreseeable future? That’s what I hate, not the fact that it’s out to the mass media… just that they’re the ones who dictate what we hear. We’re brainwashed because out of all of the great hip hop that’s out, they only play 10 songs. My problem is what they don’t play. What is your advice to artists who sometimes get frustrated with the state of hip hop today, with the apparent difficulty of not compromising quality for sales? I think what you need to do first is find out what direction the artist want to go. Nowadays some artists want the money, so they will do whatever it takes, which is cool if that’s what you want. If the musical integrity is what’s important then you can’t worry about the commercial side of things – just follow your heart… that is how music was made 20 years ago. Tell us about your long standing relationship with Will Smith while he was known as the Fresh Prince. Do you still keep contact? How did it impact on you as an artist today? Do you still call him Prince, or is it Will now? We talk all the time. We’re going back into the studio this year, this is our 20th anniversary of our first album. It’s hard to see where the impact is on me because it’s always been ‘Jazzy Jeff & the Fresh Prince’. I never called him Prince, and he never calls me Jazz! How much of your time now is still spent behind the decks in relation to production work and artist development? I spend about 75% of the time on the road… I’m tryin’ to get it to 50% for both, because I love them the same. Do you ever get the feeling that the acceptance of the DJ as an essential and integral element of music creation is sometimes overlooked by audiences today? Are DJs really getting the respect and credit they deserve from all parties concerned? The funny thing is, now the DJ is bigger that it’s ever been… but it has very little to do with hip hop… every rock group in the world has a DJ, but very few new hip hop act even have one, which is a shame. The DJ is one of the four cornerstones of hip hop. How does living in Philly impact the musical aspect of your life? Apart from the abundance of raw talent seemingly being generated by Philly, the ‘City of Brotherly Love’, as a listener I get the impression that there really is a community vibe about Philly that endeared the likes of J Live to move down there. Is this an accurate rendering? Well… it’s not really like that, there’s unity there, but I feel that every major city has a huge amount of talent, it jusy needs the chance to be shown, and that’s what happened in Philly. I’ve always been there, just like The Roots, but it was the Jill Scott record that opened the worlds eyes to Philly again. Once we had the spotlight the confidence of the city grew into what we have today. That can happen in any city with the chance, nothing against Philly! Can you tell us more about your production company ‘A Touch of Jazz’? who are the current artists on the ATOJ portfolio? I took a little break from ATOJ because that takes a lot of time. I have a poet Black Ice who’s album will be coming out on Koch Records in September…. but I will be in the studio doing a ton of new ATOJ projects real soon, so it’s definitely [a case of] take it as it comes. Do your children listen to the music that you put out? My kids know everything from Etta James, to A Tribe Called Quest, to wack rapper #1. I just want them to have their own music, but know your musical past. Have you ever thought about doing anymore cameo acting stints in the future? Have you done any since your frequent visits on the set of “The Fresh Prince of Bel Air”? No acting, unless Will pulls me into a movie… I may do it then, haha! Are there any artists our there that you are really wanting to do a collab with? Sting, KRS One, Bonnie Raitt… Another sad moment in hip hop was the untimely death of multi talented producer J Dilla (R.I.P) earlier this year. Did you ever have the privilege to work with Dilla or his collective Slum Village? He was a very close friend of mine… I did scratches on Fantasic Vol 2 and he did ‘R U Ready’ on the Magnificent EP. He was the John Coltrane of hip hop. He was a genius that the world will miss. Are you looking forward to your trip to Oz? how do you like it down here? I love it there! There are a ton of incredible DJs, MCs and artists of all kinds. The crowd seems a lot more receptive to all kinds of music… and the awards are just validation how much the scene has and is growing. Do you feel that artists, being the perceived role models in society, have a certain responsibility to incorporate an element of socially conscious views in their work at times? I think it’s up to the artist… some just wanna make music and not be role models. Sometimes just because you do music well does not mean you have a good opinion on other things. Finally, what direction do you feel hip hop is taking in the next 10-15 years? I don’t know where hip hop is going… but I can’t wait till we take control over it again. Jazzy Jeff appears at the Urban Music Awards in Sydney on Friday July 21st. He’ll also play an exclusive house set at Tank nightclub in Sydney on Saturday July 22nd. http://www.inthemix.com.au/features/27748/..._of_Jazzy_class

didnt you guys get that e-mail i sent? maybe u need to check ya spam folder..anyway they are supposed to be here in the next few days

jeff is gonna be tourin the UK in september

a few hours haha

Last year, Jazzy worked on his long time buddy Will Smith's fourth solo release Lost & Found. The album features production and scratches from Jazzy Jeff. Not too long ago, the pair were hanging in Jeff's studio and putting down some tracks together. There was nothing specific, Jazzy Jeff explains. "The best music is what you do without a purpose. The music that made us popular in the first place was done without a plan. Once you start throwing darts at a specific target, then you lose. It could be for a Fresh Prince reunion album, it could be a track for my solo album or for Will's album." Jazzy Jeff by Christie Eliezer At 41 years old, Jazzy Jeff Townes is as possessed and obsessed as he was when he was 24, when hip hop made him a millionaire. In his A Touch of Jazz studio in its new offices in Philadelphia�s Delaware Street, not a move is wasted. He�s �time skilling�, as Americans say. �Philly made me sound the way I do,� he says. �Know what happens to great comedians who leave their hometown which gave them their stack of great stories and one-liners? They stop being funny.� He�s currently working on his second solo album, The Return Of The Magnificent which he�s trying to get done by the end of August so it can be out for Christmas, In the next few weeks, he�ll be DJing in Beijing, Singapore and then will do three club dates while he�s in Australia to appear at the inaugural Urban Music Awards in Sydney. �I�m bringing my portable studio with me,� he enthuses. �If I find someone, I�ll get �em in my hotel room to get a track down.� Jazzy Jeff is a big fan of the Australian hip hop scene. �The last time I was here, it had a purity and enthusiasm that the American hip hop scene used to have. That�s back in the days when mixers would perform live. Now it�s about the commercialism and who makes the money. In Australia, it�s still regarded as an artform and very open.� Last year, Jazzy worked on his long time buddy Will Smith�s fourth solo release Lost & Found. The album features production and scratches from Jazzy Jeff. Not too long ago, the pair were hanging in Jeff�s studio and putting down some tracks together. �There was nothing specific,� Jazzy Jeff explains. �The best music is what you do without a purpose. The music that made us popular in the first place was done without a plan. Once you start throwing darts at a specific target, then you lose. It could be for a Fresh Prince reunion album, it could be a track for my solo album or for Will�s album.� Is he surprised that Will still has his feet on the ground? �Not at all, we�ve been friends for a long time. I know the person he is. We�re both blessed. You don�t take it for granted to be in the position that we are in. He wanted to be a movie star, I wanted to just do music. We�re lucky to have that level of success we dreamed about.� Much of their success with Middle America was that neither of them were confrontational or made their (white) audiences uncomfortable. Townes, born January 22, 1965, grew up in West Philadelphia in a musical household. The �hood was predominantly black, but in the Townes house, they played jazz, urban and white rock. At his DJ stints, he�ll switch from rap to Nirvana to old skool soul. �If it moves me, I�ll play it. Why put it in categories, you confuse people. If you go into a store looking for an Aerosmith record, look under �A� not �rock pop� or �glam metal� or whatever.� At 10, Townes was practising spinning records in the family basement, and then spinning at parties. By the time he reached John Bartram High, he was already playing block parties. He instinctively knew which music got a party moving, and mastered scratching techniques, powering it with strong percussion. �Damn but he was fast,� says Schoolly D, an early rival. Says Jazz, �Every neighbourhood had its own djs, so there�d be this rivalry when the djs got together. It was a great place for kids to check out to see what other dj talent there was. You had to finish by midnight. But you had such a good time, that sometimes cops would come on down, and sometimes they�d close you down.� In 1985, Jazzy�s regular MC was ill so some wiseass called Will Smith came on the mic. The chemistry was instant, they shared the same humour. By the next summer, they�d released their first single Girls Ain�t Nothin But Trouble as DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince. It was the first hip-hop song to sample a TV show theme, I Dream of Jeannie and it soon began to chart. That year, Jazzy took out the championships of the DMC New Music Seminar while their TV series made their stars. The duo�s debut album Rock The House saw Jazzy Jeff�s invention, the �chirp scratch� to make it sound like a bird. The track A Touch of Jazz was one of the first times hip hop flirted with jazz, which they�d follow up on their third album And In This Corner on which the single The Groove featured a remix with Grover Washington Jr. In 1990 Jazzy Jeff set up A Touch of Jazz to develop new producers and djs as James Poyser and Vikter Duplaix. In 1998, Jazzy Jeff signed a solo deal with Columbia Records He recorded an album with artists such as Masta Ace, wack rapper #2 and De La Soul. Unfortunately, Sony shelved it, wanting something more commercial. It was the first time that wack rapper #2 was to be in the studio. �He was and is very talented, very sure of himself. He hasn�t changed, except he�s got more popular. I reached out to him, I thought he was the most incredible MC I�d ever heard.� While DJs go into showmanship (Cash Money for instance will scratch with his nose or a butt cheek), but Jazzy Jeff is just about the music. �My whole aspect is, if there�s 2000 people, only 600 can see me. I need to do something that will please all 2,000 not those near me. I love DJing, it keeps me sharp!� Catch DJ Jazzy Jeff along with Mad Skills tonight at Brown Alley. haha Christie Elizer wrote half of her article from my ****.. its kool tho its in the local street mag here in melbourne so I know I hand a hand in that :kool:

yeah im not really fans of these traxs either.. but that was quick!

nicely said by jada

yeah im goin up 2 sydney

http://www.pennlive.com/newslogs/musicrevi..._07.html#160747

most of them yeah.. It pays to contribute to the forum... other unreleased traxs from Willennium: track with common track with masta ace track with trina and tamara? other traxs from big willie style lean left lean right traxs ftom lost n found ->2 traxs with petey pablo other unreleased traxs ->3 tracks for the bad boys II soundtrack including a bbII theme track that kel spencer worked on.. I bet Kel could talk a lot about all this unreleased stuff he prob worked on a lot of it..

Will himself said he recorded 2 tracks with Warren G..this was abt 8 tracks into BWS.. i'll have more for this post later

Thanks good interview. I was kinda disappointed with the album.. theres still a few good fresh prince style storytelling comedy raps on there tho

the 2pac skit was hilarious.. the other stuff..just not really funny.. I think this material should have stayed unreleased..its Chapelles damn show..and this material clearly wern't to his liking

remember when i changed the filter on the board..so that when any1 posted the name eminem it came out with "that idiot" and then every1 got upset :3-laugh3: :3-laugh3: