Style Wars – Obama and McCain Graded on Musical Taste

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The wars of the future, there ladies and gentlemen, nurse will not be fought over oil, or territory, or, contrary to what you may have been told, water. The wars of the future will be fought over cool.

So – to the point. Earlier I received an email from imeem:

Dear dex digital:

Before you vote, check out imeem playlists of Barack Obama and John McCain’s top ten favorite songs: http://www.imeem.com/presidentialplaylists

Whoa. Both major presidential candidates had online playlists? You know I had to check this. And looking at the playlists, I realized how much these speak to the style wars of the future. Keep in mind, kids – the hypebeast electrobanger listeners will some day be running the country. What you see below is a rundown of each candidate’s playlist, with a running commentary, final grading, and suggestions on improvement.

So, because voting based on political stances is played out – here I present the official Mixtape Show guide to voting based on taste.

First – Barack Obama.

Ready Or Not – The Fugees. This is a very, very good start. A group that many adults (and younger kids, really) haven’t even heard of, but Obama doesn’t care. A brash opening move that will get respect from the hardcore. Respect.
What’s Going On – Marvin Gaye. I’ve actually always hated the hook to this song, but the rest of the song is classic. Political Black soul. A strong following move.
I’m On Fire – Bruce Springsteen. Off the Born In The U.S.A record, which methinks is an appeal to the “Obama – ain’t that like Osama? I bet he’s one-a them thar A-rab queer lesbasexual terrarists” crowd. Decent enough song. I didn’t have this one in my house growing up.
Gimme Shelter – The Rolling Stones. This either. I am, however, noticing a rather unsubtle selection of track titles here.

Read on for the rest of the lineup…
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Are you a Rapper? Get on Bandcamp.

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No, viagra here really. But let me explain myself first:

This is a post I’ve been meaning to write for some time. I held off partially because I didn’t want to come off as being some jaded, negative, know-it-all music blogger, because I am not – but also because I don’t like whining about problems without presenting a solution – and at the time, I didn’t have a good one. I do now. This post is aimed at all artists, managers, or labels – from basement operations on up – and is a result of spending the better part of six years screwing around with rappidy raps. What I say here is not a surefire way to get radio/podcast airtime, nor is it a guarantee of any other sort, but I think it’s safe to say that some of the things I will mention here, if you pay attention, will actually help you get your music out there in the digital world.

So, let’s get into it:

As I’ve mentioned before, I get a lot of music-related email. Some of it from majors, some from indies, some from solo artists just starting out, but all with a basic common goal – to get me to listen to their music and put it on the show. When I started out, it was fun – an email from Warner here, two days later an email from some dudes in Chicago, then a week later someone from LA wanting to get my opinion on her beats…fast forward a few months, and we’re talking dozens and dozens of mp3s per day.

And I want to give everything a fair shake (particularly the independent artists), so like a year ago I made a sort of rule to submitting material – 2-3 mp3s, attached to the email. No onesheets, no bios, etc. If I like it, I get back to you. If not, no.

Often, however, I’ll get emails that make the following mistakes. For those of you artists following along at home, see if you can figure out why each of the below are not good promo looks:

What Not To Do

Q1. “Hey yo fam check my myspace – (link to myspace.com/whatever). Check out songs 2 and 4″
Q2. “Here is a link to my latest mixtape that you can download (link to a zipped file on Rapidshare)”
Q3. An email that actually does have the mp3, but when I open it up, it’s called STOOEY_FINAL.mp3, and it’s not tagged properly with artist info or anything.

Okay, put away your pencils and papers and close your test booklets – answer time.
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MIXTAPE 112 – SOULTRONICA SIDEBAR: MOTHERSHIP DILLALEON

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MIXTAPE 112 – SOULTRONICA SIDEBAR: MOTHERSHIP DILLALEON

What’s good Earthlings – this is an official Mixtape Show Soultronica Sidebar Hijack by your favorite android – Brothertron. What we have here is what I promised you last week (Future Colour Time – we don’t run on your crazy Earth clocks, therapist dig? For us out here, tadalafil this is on time!) – a new (to you!) project by A.Leon Craft (he’s appeared on the Mixtape Show in as a member of Labratz), over J Dilla beats, courtesy of Sol Messiah.

And, of course, since we’re bringing you this tape from the future – you’re the first to get it. Dig it.

Here’s the tracklist for those of yall keeping score:

Project Title: Mothership Dillaleon
Track Selections (Continual Stream Mode):
introlude: Planet New Afrika Cultural Archives Audio Identification.
1. ALeon’s Craft
2. Lite Beam
3. Healing Process
4. Guitars In The Water
5. Concrete Complications
6. Maroons
7. Melanin
8. The Moon
9. Black Dolla
10. Mothership Dillaleon
Possibly more info on the dude also at myspace.com/aleoncraft.

Bonus: The original album artwork from the project:
Front:


Back:

Of course, if you are subscribed up to the podcast, all images are included in the mp3. You are subscribed, right? Not like it costs you any credits or anything.

Dex (2008 version) will be back next week (Earth time, maybe) with a new rap episode – or in the meantime I guess you can holler at him in the “comments section” of this “website”. Brothertron out.

MIXTAPE 111 – HOW WAS YOUR SUMMER

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MIXTAPE 111 – HOW WAS YOUR SUMMER

So this, price I guess, would be the third official Summer Mixtape. For those of you who are in Southern California – it’s probably still summer for you – so feel free to grab the first edition – SUMMER MIXTAPE (2006), the second one – BACKPACKER/SUMMER IN LA (2007), and then put it together with this one, and get on your Dyno with the black mags and bang out, kiddo.

As I said – I had a major hard drive crash and lost hella data (and some music – do your backups, kids, for serious) which caused the 3-week delay, but here we go. Let’s get into it:

Tracklist

Intro – Thad Reid – Cruzin feat Akshan.

Stat Quo – Dear Summer (Part 2). The follow-up to Part 1, which I probably would have put out were it not for the hard drive crash-induced delay. I don’t think I necessarily cared that much about Stat Quo’s life and/or career before hearing this series, but I have to say, this is sort of an interesting series that dude has been putting out. It’s sort of like the rap version of Livejournal. Or maybe that’s Atmosphere. So maybe this is more like the rap version of Caroline’s older sister’s Xanga, because I used to read that all the time and be like damn she’s cool. You ever do that? Interweb stalking is bad, kids. myspace.com/statquo.

DJ Crazy Toones – It’s A Demo Teaser. This isn’t even a song, but I dig this cut. Some of the most ignorant statements on this episode are made by this man. I mean, I fully agree with the sentiment – too many people out there don’t understand how to put together a mixtape/cd/podcast, but come on, did we need that comment about Singapore? And why was the dude in Singapore? I mean, anybody can go to Singapore. I can go right now in probably like a few hours. Is there something special about Singapore that I don’t know? I mean, go to Tibet, fam, and I’ll be impressed. Maybe beat up a monk or something. Aside from that, this demo is just ridiculous. I really want to hear this mixtape now. myspace.com/djcrazytoones.

Birdman – Sun Come Up feat Rick Ross and T-Pain. Nobody really cares about what Rick Ross did before he was a rapper, because 90% of the rap game is lying, ladies and gentlemen. It’s an act. Yes, it has ramifications on what happens out here, and it’s okay to get sucked into the drama on some suspension of disbelief, but 騙されるな、dig? I gave a talk at a high school earlier today and some kids in the audience were absolutely blown away that rappers weren’t you know, actually shooting people in real life. Remind me to tell you about the first time I ever saw the Beef DVD (hint – it wasn’t in the US). That said, I like this cut, and it’s probably the most “traditional” summer rap cut I got on here.

Guilty Simpson – Michigan Nights. Okay, Guilty – “I’m like that cat you never liked but was scared to fight”. I’m actually thinking about this now and I can’t think of anyone I didn’t like to the point that I wanted to physically harm them but I was scared to actually give it a try. That said, I more or less quit fighting around age 12 or 13 (the age when people start bringing knives and guns to school fights). A lot of the time I wish rap songs were shorter – like on the 2 minute range – but this is one of those cuts where you’re glad you don’t have to be satisfied with a cut-up radio version. Cinematic. Dig it. myspace.com/guiltysimpson.

Replife – Do You Want To Pay A MF. Interlude status. The album is good, though. Stay tuned.myspace.com/danielgraykontarisreplife

Double F – I-5 Merge. I alluded to some superbly ignorant statements being made in this episode – and here they are. What is this dude even talking about? You’ve heard a cut off this tape before, actually. myspace.com/mystadub.

U-N-I – Yesterday. I think I was put up on these dudes last summer, and finally they make an appearance on the mixtape show. Kids set aside the A.D.I.D.A.S style swagger stuff for a minute and go somewhat serious for a minute. I like this cut. Shout-outs to Amanda for having the good sense to pick these kids up for Block Party. myspace.com/unimuzik.

Fatlip – What’s Up Fatlip? (Breakbot Remix). Breakbot is a new name to me, but whoever the cat is did a pretty good job with this remix. Fatlip somehow sounds more pathetic on this cut, and the vocal glitching is just enough to be noticeable but not over the top on some Funkstorung (not that I don’t like Funkstorung). Like you can’t listen to this and not really feel bad for this dude. And we all have days like this…right? Right? (I can’t find dude’s myspace.)

Guest Anouncement/広告alude – Jim Jones – Pop Champagne feat Ron Browz and Juelz Santana (instrumental): I’m not going to write about it here since I’m still a little upset about it, but the end of this episode got cut off by someone you’ll probably recognize…looks like next week’s episode I’ll be taking a break.

And before I forget, shout out to Mamiko again for handling the artwork on this joint because I still don’t have any image editing software yet.

So – how was your summer?