I think I’m beginning to turn into one of those hated hip-hop purists. Don’t get me wrong, you’re not about to catch me in an oversized rugby and Girbaud jeans mouthing hip-hop lyrics in a room full of dudes drunk off Mickey’s and loneliness anytime soon, but I’m finding myself less interested in flowery lyrics and overproduced beats every day. Read the rest of this entry »

Danny Brown is off his rocker and he’s definitely on point as a rapper. Already having solidified himself as possibly the wittiest, lewd pundit Detroit newjack, he’s upping his rating, striping the censorship and gotten nastier, more filthy and simply even better with his new free album, XXX. Read the rest of this entry »

Mell Music tapped House Shoes for The Official Daily Bread Mixtape, a 45 minute original mix is the jump off for Apollo Brown & Hassaan Mackey’s new album Daily Bread Read the rest of this entry »

Google provides far more specific information on Dennis Coffey than this space would allow for me. Do know that the guitarist was an instrumental, original member of the original Motown Funk Brothers backing band. And while my own personal knowledge of the man is limited, PE sampling Coffey’s hit “Scorpio” for their track “Night Of The Living Baseheads” warrants bringing his music up for discussion today. Read the rest of this entry »

Into vinyl much? Might I suggest picking up Los Angeles 4/10. Need convincing? Rotate these two layered, slap-heavy instrumental offerings from Shoes. These two burn better than that leftover doobie in your ashtray. And even if they don’t, they should accompany it rather well. Let the beats knock. Read the rest of this entry »

After having the one of those weeks where the crap rolled downhill and accumulated mass, I feel bushed. There’s not too many rap songs that will recharge me but I know the people need what they need. Therefore, I dug up one that I had saved to listen to anyways, this An Experiment In Instrumentation creation by orchestrated by none other than Shoes. Read the rest of this entry »

Of course there will be an unabridged recap full of storytelling, details and all the extras. But since we’ve been sporadic with the updates, I figure there’s a chance that many may be interested in what the heck we’ve been doing the past few days as well as thoughts going forward. If can’t wait for our take, check out Weiss’ “Bootlegging and Blog-Rap at the Nah Right and Smoking Section Showcase” writeup for the L.A. Times.

These are my ramblings.

– I’m going to go into intense physical training before SXSW 2011. Believe that. There’s no other way a body can withstand the insane amounts of walking, standing and complete sleep deprivation required. Read the rest of this entry »

Photo by Suzette Lee

“If you admire somebody you should go ahead and tell’em, People never get the flowers while they could still smell’em.” — Kanye

Hey, I really like the first few subjects chosen for our What’s On My iPod series and I hope our readers did as well. We’ve got one more already locked and loaded, two more set and full intentions of keeping things moving in the right direction. Honestly, I’m thankful that these have been so well received, both by those who’ve participated and by visitors. From my computer chair, the perspective was that readers read and listen to what we listen to daily. I wanted the chance to branch, show different music and also tap the minds of a few of the Freshest folks around. Yeah, the early picks have all been personal inspirations of mine, but we’re going to open things up as we move along. First, we just had to get the ball rolling because wen we started these, they began just like all other endeavors we’ve tried here.

Straight up on a lark. Read the rest of this entry »

– Fab may be grooming baby Los to be the successor to his throne, but he found Drake’s “Over” to be a worthy opponent for trending topic supremacy on Thursday when he finally got around to dropping the second installment in his No Competition series.

– LC watched the Winter Olympics… So we wouldn’t have to.  You can thank her, but it wasn’t much of a chore due to her suppressed figure skating aspirations.

– We picked the brains of House Shoes & Ben Baller for playlist suggestions & S. Cadet sat down for a quick pow wow with Ayah.

– Please welcome & familiarize yourself with XXL’s incoming Freshman Class of 2010 (if you haven’t done so already, lol).

– Save The Date: March18th, 2010.

– For The Free: Fornever listening party.

– In our thoughts & prayers: Guru

House Shoes is a diehard. A simultaneous gatekeeper and torchbearer for Detroit, the city’s music, the legacy of Dilla and the essence of Hip-Hop. When thinking of “real Hip-Hop,” this guy was one of the first people whose mind I wanted to probe to see what he listens to when he’s not in charge of selecting songs to rock a crowd.

Sidebar: Technically, Shoes doesn’t even own and iPod (he does occasionally add songs to his BlackBerry so he can listen while on the go). Not that it matters; Shoes lives and breathes music.

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MarvWon – “The Way It Goes”

Marv is like my lil brother. Y’all know how he goes in on the battle scene, but his best songs are introspective real life shit. I’m always telling him he needs to do more joints like this.

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Quelle – “Blue Mondays”

Quelle is a fucking monster. This joint is what sold me on him. “Sell coke to white folks…” Shit makes me wanna kick a puppy.

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Freeway – “When They Remember”

Stimulus Package is nutso. Made me go back to this joint i was playing the shit out of a couple years ago. May be my favorite Free joint. Soundtrack to some taking over the world type shit.

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Moe Dirdee – “You Don’t Belong In Detroit”

Moe is one of my hometown favorites as of late. This is some classic Detroit shit talk right here.

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Drake – “Successful/Say What’s Real”

Fuck y’all hippity-hop fucks who say Drake ain’t dope. He is. These are my favorite kind of joints he comes with. I listened to “Successful” for two and a half hours straight the first time I heard it. And skipped Wayne’s verse for the majority. Read the rest of this entry »

The big homie House Shoes sent this over the other day and I’ve been selfish in hogging this for myself; using it to put a bit of dirt back on my soul after having it sweetened by the plethora of rappers selling out for 15 seconds of fame on the R&B route. Read the rest of this entry »

House Shoes and The Find Mag get together to bless us all with a mix sure to warm the heart & spirit. Because that’s the type of guy Shoes is. Read the rest of this entry »

Pic By Kyla

Right now, LC is somewhere way far away from her lovely computer screen. Otherwise, she would be in the comments, letting go sideways, riding for Shoes. Shoes Houses 20/21 with with House Shoes, Samiyam and Andres from Classic Drug References on Soundwaves KPFK. Tracklistings & links after the jump. Read the rest of this entry »

By now you should be familiar with that chain-smoking titan from Detroit that calls himself DJ House Shoes. If you’re not, this would be a perfect time to get familiar with the man.

It’s very easy to sleep on this record, although it’s really not advisable. Especially if you’re a Dilla fan. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s quite obvious that this is the LC show today as we presume the boys are off beating their collective meats in one hell of a competitive circle jerk pause. Since I have the time & space, I wanted to go back & shine light on the producers showcased in the consecutive/series of Fave Five’s we posted this week.

This isn’t in lieu of a regular The Week That Was. This is just an insightful series of pieces that needed additional light shined on them…

Shawn Jackson’s Fave Five

Read: Why Shawn cries a lot on the inside; What Hip-Hop legend used to be known as Baby John; How Yellowman usurps Redman. Read the rest of this entry »