GRORTNETA*: “Crosstown Beef”++
(*Good Records On Rawkus That Nobody Ever Talks About)
Medina Green f/ Mos Def – “Crosstown Beef”
Medina Green f/ Mos Def – “Fa La Lashe“
from Crosstown Beef 12″ (Rawkus, 1998)
Mos Def, Pharoahe Monch, Talib Kweli, Rah Digga & A-Butta – “Talkin To You“
from CIA 12″ (Rawkus, 1998)
So this is shaping up to be a quarterly series. Because I’m a busy man – I have a formspring to tend, after all.
Unlike the first installment, the second Soundbombing was an actual, orchestrated compilation project and not just a collection of the quirky Rawkus one offs that preceded its release. Medina Green’s “Crosstown Beef” is the one exception and because of that the actual 12″ has been sort of erased from existence despite being in NYC dollar bins everywhere. Which is unfortunate because it features a nice B-side. As it turns out Mos Def’s brother and weed carriers have a better ear for beats than he does. And they don’t come with any of that self serious baggage that has weighed down Mos’ entire career (basically). Even this record that they dropped a few days ago has a similarly airy vibe despite serious as cancer subject matter. Posdnuos produced “Crosstown” and it’s somehow doper than any of the self produced De La shit from the same era. It is also great that the cover was shot in a meat locker. (||) Literal interpretations of “beef” will never cease to be entertaining. “If you ain’t got you better get / and if you ain’t hot you better get lit.”
Next up is another mostly forgotten b-side to Rawkus compilation filler: “Talking To You” was the flip to that Lyricist Lounge KRS / Zach De La Rocha / Last Emperor* song where they indict the government for selling crack. Mos gets top billing on here, even though he only sings the hook. Instead Pharoahe just owns the entire song by simply levitating through meditation. Oh and shooting em down like white students in Oregon. Digga comes off as well.** I wish she would have kept true to her “white label to death” threat. A nice double LP bootleg of Everything Is A Story would be appreciated. Kweli is close to tolerable and A-Butta is a guy.
Nice clean Medina rip via HQ Hip Hop and Hurricane Fenn provided the assist on “Talking To You.” Here is a very grainy youtube of the “Crosstown Beef” video. I think I ripped this from REAL VIDEO. It was that or this.
And here is that Zach Kris La Emperor thing, for no reason:
* Anyone remember when Last Emperor had a Jay Elect type buzz going? Dude even signed to Aftermath! On the strength a record where he ponders the outcome of an imaginary rap battle between Jeru The Damaja and Beast from the X-Men. The late 90s were a crazy time, kids. The front page of his website now boasts a ten year old quote from Mos Def suggesting that someone, somewhere might mistake the him for the greatest emcee of all time.
** Which reminds me, I need to dig out the Monch remix of Digga’s “Tight.” That one is nowhere on these internets.
January 12th, 2010 at 4:33 am
Last Emperor is definitely one of the more enjoyable super scientifical nerdy rappers…. or maybe that’s just my nostalgia talking? Or my regional bias? Good post.
-e
January 12th, 2010 at 7:33 am
i def remember last emperor getting crazy buzz. never got into him too tough.
January 12th, 2010 at 8:10 am
“Echo Leader” was pretty great, but I think I thought Secret Wars was kinda corny even back then.
And I still maintain BMS “Mucho Stereo” is the GREATEST record on Rawkus noone ever talks about.
January 12th, 2010 at 9:12 am
Soundbombing II is in the running for best hip-hop compilation ever. Impeccably mixed, and ALL the tunes are fire. Maybe the best thing Rawkus ever released, for real.
January 12th, 2010 at 9:54 am
“Last Emperor is definitely one of the more enjoyable super scientifical nerdy rappers…. or maybe that’s just my nostalgia talking? Or my regional bias?”
One or the other… dude was complete corn
January 12th, 2010 at 11:51 am
Wait, so how is crosstown beef like crosstown traffic? Just because brothers be on some real shit? That hook always confused the hell out of me.
January 12th, 2010 at 12:11 pm
yeah, that old medina green, bms, co-flow, kweli on rawkus before the label went soft was memorable… and im w/ test… sometimes mos’ rhymes just dont make any fucking sense
January 12th, 2010 at 1:06 pm
LOL..WOW…THE FUNNY THING IS IN THAT ERA PEOPLE LAUGHED AT RAWKUS FOR BEING COMMERCIALLIZED “UNDERGROUND”….
January 12th, 2010 at 1:50 pm
This is 100% my favourite Rawkus record. I heard Maseo playing it off his instant replay machine at some instore for the ‘Stakes Is High’ album before a UK gig – and asked what it was and he said it was a new Mos Def thing. It was only when it surfaced that I remembered that shit.
January 12th, 2010 at 2:29 pm
@Test Wow, I never noticed that. Hmmm.
January 12th, 2010 at 3:20 pm
Crosstown Beef, Fortified Live, If You Can Huh You Can Hear, and Respiration >>>>>>>>>.the rest of Mos Def’s career.
January 12th, 2010 at 4:09 pm
“cia I’ll see you soon, when I flip the script like Pacino in Dog Day Afternoon”
Few remember now a decade later how a well-intentioned Zach De La Rocha held the CIA hostage in an ill-fated bid to pay for his lover’s sex change operation.
“but all three to drop the science to form the most powerful alliance since nato(nato nato nato)”
lol
“in the new millenium, they’ll be no central intelligence”
rotflyicmts (Rolling On The Floor Laughing Yet Inwardly Crying Myself To Sleep)
In hindsight, perhaps we hate conscious rap because conscious rappers had to so laughably overstate their political power, if only to affect the swagger which came naturally to other kinds of hiphop. Or perhaps the post-soviet naivetee which seemed to lead them to believe the revolution and it’s subsequent utopia were imminent if only the right records got airplay.
I always thought Mos Def had Jimi Hendrix’s Crosstown Traffic in mind.
January 12th, 2010 at 4:10 pm
typo “in the new…. [there]‘ll be no central intelligence”
but, yeah, ROTFLYICMTS
January 12th, 2010 at 5:56 pm
I was thinking the other day that the fact that Last Emperor got signed to Aftermath (even if he was shelved like everybody else) is totally unimaginable today. I guess Dre had had mega success with Eminem and was willing to gamble on some open mic vets. Things sure have changed.
Also, the trajectory of Rah Diggas career is like the saddest shit ever, Even if she did see some loot at some point I couldn’t believe how she went from all her Outz shit to the Party & Bullshit bullshit.
January 12th, 2010 at 6:06 pm
I like how D****L “Mr Complex” Faux Rillz shows up every now and again strictly to criticize the tastes of decade old versions of ourselves.
-e
January 12th, 2010 at 6:26 pm
i haven’t heard “talkin’ to you” since it was used in that 411vm in ‘99.
good monch verse.
January 12th, 2010 at 8:42 pm
Great post. I loved Tash & Dilated’s “Soundbombing”… that joint was my morning routine for months and months and months.
Rawkus, R.I.P.
January 12th, 2010 at 9:59 pm
Which reminds me, I need to dig out the Monch remix of Digga’s “Tight.” That one is nowhere on these internets.
^
Uploaded the Imperial/Tight VLS a few months ago for that very reason. Monch devours it and Lord Have Mercy entertains merely by existing. Bizarro Chali 2na. Always wished Thee Ungodly Hour would pop up on the interwebs somewhere, but I doubt a complete copy even exists.
Here’s the link for tight: http://www.mediafire.com/?mogyzlmhzzz
January 13th, 2010 at 2:20 am
iirc,
monchlast emperor and em were signed to afetrmath around the same time. i don’t think em’s success had anything to do with his signing, in fact it probably was part of the reason his project ended up being squashed.January 13th, 2010 at 5:13 am
> iirc, monch and em were signed to afetrmath around the same time.
I don´t think that´s correct, as far as I can remember. at least not in monche´s case.
January 13th, 2010 at 5:17 am
in fact, wasn´t monche signed (or suppossed to sign) to Shady/Aftermath, through Em not Dre?
January 13th, 2010 at 7:45 am
whoops sorry i meant last emp and em, not monch and em. too drunk for blog comments.
monch never signed to aftermath, though yeah there were rumors.
January 13th, 2010 at 1:05 pm
“I like how D****L “Mr Complex” Faux Rillz shows up every now and again strictly to criticize the tastes of decade old versions of ourselves.”
Sir, I am criticizing your admitted ongoing affection for Last Emperor
Also: “Visualize” >>>>>>> “Secret Wars” all day
January 13th, 2010 at 1:14 pm
tanners – thanks.
January 13th, 2010 at 3:29 pm
yeah i don’t think Eminem screwed Last Emperor… Last Emp and Aftermath screwed Last Emp. if you catch my Montreal Screwjob reference. if not, i’ll go back to being a wrestling nerd in my corner.
January 13th, 2010 at 3:43 pm
I know y’all prolly already know- I didn’t:
http://petroleumempire.bandcamp.com/track/un-conscious
January 13th, 2010 at 4:38 pm
I liked “Talking To You”. I think I traded my 12″ a year or two ago but that Monch verse made it a close call. I can’t count the Rawkus 12″s I have kept on one hand and inexplicably that includes L-Fudge…
January 14th, 2010 at 1:19 am
Very nostalgic post; I have a very specific memory of the first time that I heard these tracks in the 1998-2000 Rawkus NYC era (if you can call it that). Soundbombing was a compilation with the feel of a mixtape, in the old sense of mixtape. This was also around the time that Babu and the rest of the Beat Junkies were getting mad play in the NY back pack scene. Babu has some serious beat matching skills.
Last Emp reminds me of high school, too. I wore out a cassette with Secret Wars and the rest of the B-sides on that 12″ that some DJ friend of mine in Brooklyn had made for me. Though my tastes in rap have changed since then and I’m no longer as impressed by similes and wordplay, “Monumental” was a good track: “In the mind is where each man must build his holy temple/ now that’s the true meaning of monumental.” Eh, at least it was pretty reflective of that era of east coast rapps.
January 14th, 2010 at 1:20 am
Oh yeah, I also didn’t appreciate the Bob Marley interpolation in Talkin to You when I fist heard it. You’re right, Pharoahe murders it.
January 14th, 2010 at 3:43 am
>I know y’all prolly already know- I didn’t:
>http://petroleumempire.bandcamp.com/track/un-conscious
I still find it hard to get around the fact that this was the same dude who did “Blue Cheese” … In the same way UMCs second album, when they switched to some sort of pseudo-Wu Tang style seemed incredibly forced at the time. He does bring a lot of energy to his new stuff though.
January 14th, 2010 at 8:48 am
Fuck the hate – i will always profess that i was a backpacker and was bumping Rawkus back in the day…i can’t think of a label that put out so much good music in such a short amount of time…it’s sad it went away, we definitely need something like that today
Soundboming II was one of the first rap albums i bought – i bought it immediately after i saw the high & mighty joint, w/ mos and skillz – b-boy document. almost every track is a standout and i still play it till this day, could not have asked for a better first purchase
January 14th, 2010 at 8:52 am
last emperor is one saddest casualties to the label/ music business black hole
January 14th, 2010 at 2:23 pm
lets take a moment to reflect on a couple really good, non-nerdy Last Emp songs:
Hustler’s Theme (from the Beatminerz album)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ef5nKpdBPjQ
One Life (Too Poetic’s “im dying” song)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gXWkksacWWI
January 18th, 2010 at 2:10 pm
LOL @ Khal with the Montreal Screwjob reference… I caught it.
“Crosstown Beef” is one of those songs I mention to people who only wanna talk about “Ms. Fat Booty” and whatnot.
I’m really lookin’ for a good version of “Fortified Live”- Kweli was still grating to listen to, but Mos and Mr. Man bodied that shit, and that beat was nutso.
-D!
January 18th, 2010 at 2:21 pm
@ DANJ!: http://www.cocaineblunts.com/blunts/?p=3608
January 18th, 2010 at 6:35 pm
“Last Emperor is definitely one of the more enjoyable super scientifical nerdy rappers…. or maybe that’s just my nostalgia talking? Or my regional bias?”
One or the other… dude was complete corn
^^
dude rapped about comic book super heroes haha
January 19th, 2010 at 4:18 am
“dude rapped about comic book super heroes haha”
WTF kind of argument is that? I could easily name 30 classic rap tunes that are about, or namechecks, comic book super heroes.
But Secret Wars was still completely cornball though.
January 20th, 2010 at 5:05 pm
Fuck this east coast shit!
January 20th, 2010 at 5:07 pm
After Secret Wars, I only remember that song with Poetic or Frukwan from Gravediggaz. One life. There are two versions, one is remixed to be more radio-friendly I think.
January 20th, 2010 at 5:08 pm
Lord Have Mercy, there’s someone that deserves a post to himself!
January 20th, 2010 at 10:33 pm
dude rapped about comic book super heroes haha
did you listen to the monch verse? “X-man, white man, got plans to feed the planet”
Lord Have Mercy really does deserve his own post
February 28th, 2010 at 4:50 pm
[...] Medina Green (ft. Mos Def) – Fa La Lashe Classic Rawkus, courtesy of Noz. “If you ain’t got you better [...]
March 24th, 2010 at 10:38 pm
“Develop close ties like Jerry Seinfeld and George Costanza.”