Fat Joe To Release First Mixtape Of Career

[Turntable]

I've seen it now, I didn't notice it at first. One thing I can say about that: Calling K-Smith Gangst Rap is an insult to Ice Cube

[Silver Tiger]

LOL, I was NOT calling K-Smith a gangsta rapper, Turn. I was talking about Will hooking him up with 50 Cent.

Anyway, I'm over this conversation too. We like who we like, I guess...

[VIsqo]

Lol

[Turntable]

Will is much older now, I guess he just changed his mind about Gangster Rap. I remember him saying he likes G-Unit too.

[JumpinJack AJ]

That's FP being the team player for young/current rap. We know he usually takes that position rather than talk about how the popular face of Hip-Hop has nothing 2 do with Hip-Hop. He saves it for songs like "Party Starter" and "Lost + Found" and "I Wish I Made That" to vent. Another thing, he has met most of these popular rappers and they likely tell him how much they admire him (tho' they are often quick to keep that to themselves). They become casual acquaintances who FP knows are not murders, drug dealers, etc so he supports them because they are cool with each other. The 'Prince is never going to condone phony, unoriginal, gangsta rap. When he had Snoop jump on a song, it was a bouncy Jazzy Jeff produced, comical straight Hip-Hop record. There was no compromising and it was one of the many times Snoop has shown he's not strictly make the same kinda music he did when he came out.

[bigted]

well getting back to the discussion of the Fat Joe mixtape it'll be interesting to see if he goes at 50 again like he did on that "gay unit" mixtape, "300 Brolic" is another hard diss track, Fat Joe is just as versatile as Snoop is 'cause he does songs with all different kinds of artists, they prove that they're more than gangsta rappers, they're true artists that could make all kinds of music, "All Or Nothing" and "Rhythm and Gangsta" are both great records by those mcs...

[bigted]

this all goes back to a discussion that me and fuq had on facebook about the qualities that makes a dope mcand i mentioned how the great ones have the gift of doing a variety of tracks at a high level, real hip hop is special 'cause it's something that relates to everyone, that's why fat joe is real hip hop to me, he has a proven catalog of classics so hate him or love him he's gonna stay in the game...

btw i just love this verse he did on krs-one's "come to the temple" with smooth b, rampage, and rah goddess, these are the lyrics of a "found" mc that will talks about, don't get realer than this:
"airplanes flying, overseas people dying, we trying
not to escape but hit you with real the facts
that's why the government wants to kill rap
like me i represent the street life
always schooling shorties how to eat right
you better listen, this ain't coincidental
if you need more information i'll be teaching at the temple"

[Turntable]

I dont think Fat Joe is Gangsta Rap anway.. To me what he does is street rap, but whatever..

[VIsqo]

Yeah, Gangsta rap is really a think of the past nowadays. If you really look into it, most rappers are more into either pop or street rap instead of Gangsta.

[bigted]

i think will's more referring to the internet thugs who immitate the gangsta rappers style are wack, hate 'em or not rappers like 2Pac, Biggie, 50 Cent, and Fat Joe all lived the street lifestyle they talk about it in their songs but there's punks out there who immitate them who didn't live that lifestyle, LL calls them "laptop gangstas", it's all a matter of opinion of who we think got the most skills but they all represent hip hop since they tell stories in their songs to the best of their talents and their abilities, 50 Cent's just not as talented as 2Pac but he's still hip hop, it's like Chuck D said "Don't Believe The Hype" which I believe is the most relevant hip hop song of all time since all this bull**** we talk about is "hype", we tear down rappers whenever there's a "beef", "don't believe the hype" when it comes to hip hop 'cause i still "love h.e.r.", peace...

[bigted]

I'd like to share this terrordome I read by Chuck D which would go well with this hip hop debate we're having:

http://www.publicenemy.com/index.php?page=page3&item=158
The Anthology Of Rap

May 15, 2010

We are living in a period of growth for hip-hop culture, led this time not simply by artists but by students and scholars. The word-revolution in rhyme has been reflected in a slew of necessary critical perspectives that shed light on hip-hop’s history and development. Books and multimedia on hip-hop culture and rap music have entered a boom period—or should I say BOOM BAP period: a time in which the recorded history and the breakdown of interpretations may be more entertaining than a lot of the new music being made today.

The Anthology of Rap is a landmark text. What makes it so important is that the voices included within it are from the artists themselves, but they are presented in a way that gives the words context and meaning as part of a tradition. Anyone could put together a bunch of lyrics, but an anthology does something more: it provides the tools to make meaning of those lyrics in relation to one another, to think about rap both in terms of particular rhymes, but also in terms of an art form, a people, and a movement. Every great literature deserves a great anthology. Rap finally has its own.

I first heard about The Anthology of Rap after meeting Dr. Adam Bradley at a symposium sponsored by the HipHop Archive at Harvard University. A few weeks later, I interviewed him on my Air America Network radio show, ON THE REAL, about his first book, Book of Rhymes: The Poetics of Hip Hop. I was fascinated by what I would call the emergent “artcademic” perspective he was describing. Here was someone who grew up with the music and had gone on to study it in a social context as well as “gettin down to it” on the level of language. He was spitting out a well-considered, highly analytical point of view to a mass audience that too often defines rap merely by what they hear on radio and see on television. Along with Dr. Andrew DuBois, Dr. Bradley has now brought us a book that just might break the commercial trance that’s had rap in a chokehold for the last several years. Rap now has a book that tells its lyrical history in its own words.

My own history in hip hop goes back decades. I started out in back in 1979 as a mobile DJ/MC under a crew called Spectrum City in Long Island, New York. Most of the shows we did were in less than ideal acoustic situations. Luckily my partner Hank Shocklee, who is now regarded as a sonic genius in the realm of recording, was just as astute about getting the best sound available out of the least amount of equipment. The challenge for many MCs was figuring out how to achieve vocal projection and clarity on inferior sound systems. I’ve always had a big voice, so my criteria was different because my vocal quality and power were audible. The content of my rhymes was heady because of what I knew. I'd been influenced by big voices like Melle Mel of Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five. I studied the rhymes and rhythms that worked and tried to incorporate my voice and subject matter in a similar manner. I had to be distinct in my own identity. That was a very important aspect to propel me beyond the pack.

Most MCs don't listen to enough other MCs. As artists we need to open our ears to as many styles as possible, even—and maybe especially—those that are not commercially successful. In sports you must study the competition. You’ve got to game-plan. You’ve got to school yourself not just about the defending champions, but about every team in the league. In these times, the individualization of the MC has often meant isolation—artists focus on a single model, a single sound. Some focus is a good thing, of course, but too much leads to a lot of rappers sounding the same, saying the same things, finding themselves adrift in a sea of similarity.

Having a range of lyrical influences and interests doesn’t compromise an MC’s art. It helps that art to thrive and come into its own. For instance, my lyrics on “Rebel Without a Pause” are uniquely mine, but even the first “Yes” I utter to begin the song was inspired by another record—in this case, Biz Markie’s “Nobody Beats the Biz,” a favorite of mine at the time. The overall rhyme style I deployed on “Rebel” was a deliberate mixture of how KRS-One was breaking his rhymes into phrases and of Rakim’s flow on “I Know You Got Soul.” Although the craft is difficult, the options are many and the limits are few. There are many styles to attend to and numerous ways to integrate them into your own art, transforming yourself and those styles along the way.

That’s where The Anthology of Rap comes in. It reminds us just how much variety truly exists in this thing we call rap. KRS-One raging against police brutality is far removed from Will Smith beefing about parents that just don’t understand or UGK explaining the intricacies of the street pharmaceutical trade, but all of them are united through rhyming to a beat. We learn more as rap artists and as a rap audience by coming to terms with all those things that rap has made.

Back in 2006 I did a collaboration with the great conscious rapper Paris. Paris singlehandedly created a Public Enemy album called Rebirth Of A Nation. At the time, people asked why an MC like me would relinquish the responsibility of writing my own lyrics. My reason was simple: I thoroughly respect the songwriter and happen to think there is a valuable difference between the vocalist and the writer. Rarely are people gifted in both or well trained and skilled enough to handle both at once. The unwavering belief that MCs should always and only spit their own rhymes is a handicap for rap. In my opinion, most writers shouldn't spit and most vocalists shouldn't write unless there is a unique combination of skill, knowledge, ability, and distinction. To have Paris write my lyrics as well as produce the music added a breath of freshness to my voice. I put my ego aside—a hard thing for a lot of rappers to do—and was rewarded with a new weapon in my lyrical arsenal, unavailable had I simply gone it alone.

In order for a lyric to last, it takes time and thought. Although top-of-the-head freestyles might be entertaining for the moment, they quickly expire. Even someone like Jay-Z, who claims never to write before rhyming, does his own form of composition. He has the older cat’s knowledge, wisdom, and understanding of the many facets of multi-dimensional life zones and the ability to exercise his quickness of wit and tongue. Few MCs have his particular combination of gifts. Lyricism is a study of a terrain before it’s sprayed upon like paint on a canvas. Most MCs would do better to think and have a conversation regarding what to rhyme about before they spit. While the spontaneity of the words to a beat might bring up-to-the-minute feelings to share, one cannot sleep on the power of the word—or in this case the arrangement and delivery of many words in rhythm.

When it comes down to the words themselves, lyricism is vital to rap, and because rap fuels hip-hop, this means that lyricism is vital to hip-hop culture as a whole. A rapper that really wants to be heard must realize that a good vocabulary is necessary like a good ball-handler sports his dribble on a basketball court. Something should separate a professional rapper from a 6th grader. Lyricism does that. Even when a middle school kid learns a word and its meaning, social comprehension and context take time to master. Even when a term or a line is mastered, the challenge should be on how many more peaks a rapper can scale to become a good lyricist. We all should know that the power of a word has both incited and prevented war itself.

Good lyrics, of course, have been around far longer than rap. They’re the life-blood of song. They direct the music and the music defines the culture. This is true for rap even though some mistake the music as being all about the beat. People sometimes overate the beat, separating it from the song itself. I ask folks would they rather just listen to instrumentals? The general response is no. Listeners want to have vocals driving the beat, but—importantly--not stopping it or slowing it down. It takes a master to ride any wild beat or groove and to tame it. Rakim, KRS-One, André 3000, MC Lyte, Black Thought and Nas are just a few such masters featured in this anthology. They will make the music submit to their flows while filling those flows with words to move the crowd’s minds, bodies, and souls. So reading lyrics on the page gives us a chance to understand exactly what makes these lyrics work. What’s their meaning? What’s their substance? How do they do what they do?

Like the air we breathe, hip-hop seems to be everywhere. The culture and lifestyle that many thought would be a passing fad has, more than three decades later, grown to become a permanent part of world culture. Hip-hop artists have become some of today's heroes, replacing the comic book worship of decades past and joining athletes and movie stars as the people kids dream of becoming. Names like 50 Cent, P. Diddy, Russell Simmons, Jay-Z, Foxy Brown, Snoop Dogg, and Flavor Flav now ring as familiar as Elvis, Babe Ruth, Marilyn Monroe, and Charlie Chaplin. But keeping in step with straight-up rap, a rapper is not just a celebrity. There still lies a performance factor that must be included before we describe an MC as a lyrical beast.

While the general public knows many of the names, videos, and songs branded by the big companies, it's important to study rap’s history. The best place to start is the holy trinity, the founding fathers of hip-hop: Kool Herc, Grandmaster Flash, and Afrika Bambaataa. All are DJs that played the records that moved MCs and dancers to fashion their own art forms. The MC had to go to the rhythm of the DJ, thus creating the atmosphere with words on the beat to music. This background is crucial to the evolution of the MC. But the influence of these hip-hop pioneers often went beyond the realm of art. Bambaataa almost single-handedly quelled the New York City gang wars of the 1970s with his message of peace, unity, love, and having fun.

Hip-hop is simply a term for a form of artistic creativity spawned from New York City, more precisely the Bronx, in the early to mid 1970s. Amidst the urban decay in the areas where black and Hispanic people dwelled, economic, educational and environmental resources were depleted. Jobs and businesses dried up. Living conditions at times were almost indistinguishable from a developing country, all in the midst of the nation’s wealthiest city. Last but not least, art and sports programs in the schools were the first to be cut for the sake of lowering budgets; music classes teaching history and technique were all but lost.

From these ashes, like a phoenix, rose an art form. Through the love of technology and of records found in family collections or discarded on the street, the DJ emerged. Different from the ones heard on the radio, these DJs were innovating a style first popularized on the island of Jamaica. Two turntables kept the music continuous, with the occasional voice speaking or chanting on top of the records. This is the very humble beginning of rap music.

It is important to remember that the thing we call rap is not a music in itself. It only becomes music when two words are combined: rap and music. Rap is the vocal application placed on top of the music. On a vocal spectrum, it falls somewhere between talking and singing and is one of the few new alternatives for vocalizing to emerge in the last fifty years. It is important to realize that inventors and artists are side by side in the importance of music’s development. Let's remember that inventor Thomas A. Edison recorded the first rhyme with “Mary Had A Little Lamb” in 1877. He did this in New Jersey, the same state that produced the first commercial rap hit, the Sugarhill Gang’s “Rappers Delight,” more than a century later.

It's hard to separate the importance of history, science, language arts, and education when discussing music. Because of the social silencing of black people in America from slavery in the 1600s to civil rights in the 1960s, much sentiment, dialogue and soul is wrapped up in the cultural expression of black music. In eighteenth century New Orleans, slaves gathered on Sundays in Congo Square to socialize and play music. Within this captivity many dialects, customs, and styles combined with instrumentation, vocals, and rhythm to form a musical signal or code of preservation. These are the foundations of jazz and the blues.

Similarly, it is impossible to separate hip-hop and rap music from the legacy of creativity from the past. Look within the expression and words of black music and you'll get a timeline reflection of American history itself. The four creative elements of hip-hop—MCing (the art of vocalization); DJing (the musician-like manipulation of records); breakdancing (the body expression of the music); and graffiti (the drawn graphic expression of the culture)—have been intertwined in the community before and since slavery. However, just because these expressions formed in the black and Hispanic underclass doesn't mean that they are exclusive to those groups in perpetuity. Hip-hop is specific, but it’s universal too.

Hip-hop is a cultural language used best to unite the human family all around the world. Many international rap artists can rhyme in multiple languages and still move crowds with meaning. The world beyond the United States has excelled in hip-hop’s fundamentals, perhaps more even than in the country of the culture’s invention. To peep rap’s global explosion one need not even search very far. Starting just north of the U.S. border, Canadian hip-hop has featured rappers who are infusing different language and dialect flows into their work, from immigrant artists like K’naan rhyming about the “ghosts in my old home” to French flowing cats from Quebec.

Few know that France for many years has been the second largest hip-hop nation, measured not just by high sales numbers, but also by its political philosophy. Hip-hop has been alive and present since the mid-1980s in Japan and other Asian countries. Australia has been a hotbed in welcoming world rap acts, and it has also created its own vibrant scene, with the reminder of its government's takeover of indigenous people reflected in many rappers’ flows and rhymes. As a rhythm of the people, the continents of Africa and South America (especially Ghana, Senegal, and South Africa, Brazil, Surinam, and Argentina) have long mixed traditional homage into the new beats and rhymes of this millennium. Hip-hop and rap has been used to help Brazilian kids learn English when school systems failed to bridge the difficult language gap of Portuguese and patois to American English. It has entertained and enlightened youth, and has engaged political discussion in society, continuing the tradition of the African griots and folk singers.

For decades, hip-hop has been bought, sold, followed, loved, hated, praised, and blamed. History has shown that other cultural U.S. music forms have been just as misunderstood and held up to public scrutiny. The history of the people who originated the art form can be found in the music itself. The timeline of recorded rap music spans more than a quarter century, and that is history in itself. With all this said it might sound like a broken record but the re-introduction must come with the clear definition of what it is. A rapper’s style is not to itself. It comes from somewhere. All of these lyrics evolve as the griot-like timeline with the words finally manifesting themselves into a solid testament of the craft. In the words of the Public Enemy song “Bring the Noise,” here we go again. . .

[bigted]

The mixtape's dropping on Halloween for anyone that cares:

-Fat Joe is prepping to drop his new mixtape, the sequel to 2010’s critically acclaimed album, The Darkside, Vol. One, for free this Halloween, (October 31). On the eve of its release, the Bronx-bred rap vet spoke to XXLMag.com about who he worked with on The Darkside, Vol. 2, the death of gangsta rap and why he decided to put it out as a tape as opposed to a proper studio album.

As far as Joe is concerned, he’s trying to go a radio friendly route with his next album, but when it comes to his new mixtape, he wanted to make it strictly for the streets.

“Darkside One was an album and it got great reviews and it’s what I like to do in hip-hop music; the hardcore ****,” Joey Crack explained. “But, you know in a mainstream world talkin’ about killin’ niggas and hustlin’ and all that, niggas, they scared to play that on the radio. So I said, you know what, we gon’ keep the Darkside brand, we gon’ keep feeding the fans, because niggas who love Fat Joe they want that hard ****.”

The Terror Squad leader feels that his brand of aggressive music is missing in the current rap climate.

“I been noticing since I been thinking about this Darkside mixtape, I’m like, Yo I feel like gansgta rap is extinct right now,” he said. “It used to be the backpack rappers were always like, ‘Yo we don’t get our just due.’ Now its like them niggas get all the just due. And the gangsta rap niggas they ain’t even getting heard like that. I felt a need to just touch the streets with that Darkside.”

D Two features Joe’s fellow East Coast gangsta rap peers, Raekwon, Jadakiss and French Montana, who appears on the project’s intro, “Welcome to the Darkside.” While FJ has some recognizable features, on the production side, he decided to try out a crop of newcomers, like Mark Henry, who produced 80 percent of the tape.

Meanwhile, 99 percent of the tape is all new material, except for the track, “Pushing Keys,” which he dropped earlier this year.

“All new records,” he said. “One record that I feel like I had put out a while ago. To me it’s like an incredible record. It’s called Pushing Keys and not many people heard it. And I’m leaving that on the mixtape ’cause its just like, it’s too dope.”

“Other than that it’s all new material,” he added. “I ain’t gonna lie to you, I believe in quality over quantity so I went into Darkside Two like it’s an album. To me it ain’t just a mixtape. Maybe I’m crazy but I feel like I reached the status of where I can’t put out bull****. I gotta try my best all the time.” —Jesse Gissen

[VIsqo]

Im gonna check it out.

[bigted]

Damn this is ill!

http://www.livemixtapes.com/mixtapes/15153/fat_joe_the_darkside_2.html

[VIsqo]

It is, Ive listen to it like 4 times already