The 35th installment of I Used to Love H.E.R., a series in which artists/bloggers/writers discuss their most essential or favorite hip-hop albums and songs, comes from Dan Workman of Toronto-based indie-rock outfit Ten Kens. The band’s self-titled debut is out now on Fat Cat Records (home to SMS favorite Frightened Rabbit).

• Ten Kens | Your Kids Will Know
• Ten Kens | Refined

Beastie Boys
Check Your Head
(Capitol, 1992)

I’m going to ignore what I feel are obvious choices for best hip-hop record – Endtroducing, Chronic 2001, Nation Of Millions, Illmatic, etc – and go with what I’m sure will be a more controversial pick: The Beastie Boys, Check Your Head.

Is it real hip hop? Purists would surely say no. However, hip-hop is all about innovation in samples, beats, rhymes and flow, and to deny this record as one of the all time greats would be a shame. In direct contrast to their psychedelic sampling masterpiece Paul’s Boutique, it was the punk-infused nature of this record that seemed to ward off hip-hop enthusiasts and call upon a new nation of flannel-wearing grunge kids, kids who had for the most part otherwise been ignoring so-called hip-hop. It had somehow placed the unpolished sound appeal of the day firmly into the hip-hop arena, and this was no small task. It made it ok to put out a hip-hop record with less-than-stellar sound quality and production value.

The record flows with self-constructed samples and raw live beats. Yet all the necessary hip-hop elements are still firmly in place. The cuts are flawless and the rhymes are solid, albeit mostly non-sensical. There is something very pure and very true about this record, and I believe it belongs firmly in place with other hip-hop greats. That, and I just think it’s really cool.

• Beastie Boys | Jimmy James

The 34th installment of I Used to Love H.E.R., a series in which artists/bloggers/writers discuss their most essential or favorite hip-hop albums and songs, comes from writer Dan LeRoy, author of The Greatest Music Never Sold and the 33 1/3 book on the Beastie Boys classic Paul’s Boutique.

Dan offers thought-provoking insight on an album that, honestly, I had never heard, which is just another reason I get such a thrill from this series. Visit Dan at MySpace or on his Web site.

Dark Sun Riders feat. Brother J
Seeds of Evolution
(4th & Broadway/Island, 1996)

Two of my favorite hip hop albums are the Beastie Boys’ Paul’s Boutique and Seeds of Evolution, by Brother J’s post-X Clan group Dark Sun Riders. I wrote a 33 1/3 book about the first, and the second is the subject of this post. But it didn’t really strike me, until Kevin extended this very generous invitation to give Seeds some very belated praise, just how dissimilar the two records are.

Everyone knows, or should, that Paul’s Boutique was pretty much the last mainstream gasp for anything-goes sampling. The Beasties, Dust Brothers and Matt Dike stuffed every groove with as much familiar sonic flotsam and jetsam as possible, but changes in sampling law have made it unlikely any artist will ever be able to party like it’s 1989 again. Seeds, however, resides at the opposite pole. Except for the basslines (played, interestingly, by Quicksand’s Sergio Vega and producer/journalist Rich Tozzoli) and a handful of sound effects, it is boom-bap at its most uncluttered and primal. That’s high praise here, because the drums — mostly supplied by producers DJ M.A.T.E. and UltraMan — are simply huge throughout the disc. On songs like the single, “Time To Build” and “Rhythmous Flex,” UltraMan’s beats are so monstrous that other instruments are barely necessary.

Part of the pop-culture potpourri of Paul’s Boutique includes lyrical namechecks and nods clustered so densely that whole web sites are devoted to nothing but parsing Paul’s verses for obscure bits of cultural trivia. But Brother J’s refusal to play spot-the-reference gives the songs on Seeds a timeless quality. It’s set up like a sci-fi fable, with Brother J and his Dark Sun Riders on a quest for truth and light, in a messed-up, out-of-balance future world that seems not unlike our own. In fact, it might be the only hip-hop album I can recall where the interludes are actually necessary, something like the Broadway-style transitional songs such as “Sally Simpson” and “1921” in the Who’s Tommy.

Which brings us to the last big difference. Even people who, post-Licensed to Ill, believed the Beasties were assholes of the highest magnitude would have been hard-pressed not to chuckle at some of the juxtapositions and clever lines on Paul’s Boutique. It is simply a very funny record. Seeds, by contrast, is anything but. The few lighter moments occur mostly during interludes like “Day of the Gathering,” a splash-panel of an introduction to the whole valiant Dark Sun crew that couldn’t help but make any old Marvel or D.C. fan smile. And while Brother J’s lyrics resurrect some of the very serious topics (pro-black nationalist, anti-gay) that made X Clan a troubling proposition, it’s hard at least to argue with stuff like the haunting “Return to the River,” which describes seeing the “young and unschooled telling old man stories/teaching lessons never learned…no one seemed to care that the shadows were becoming one with the flesh.” Sound like any MCs and any hip-hop mainstreams you know, in 1996 or at present? Whatever he’s saying, Brother J’s forceful, yet refined delivery is a reminder that he’s one of the most unjustly unsung rappers around, something like the missing link between Rakim and one of today’s more eloquent mic practitioners.

For all their differences, Paul’s Boutique and Seeds do share at least one unfortunate bit of history: both are great albums that major labels had no idea how to sell. The Paul’s Boutique chart debacle, and the Beasties’ comeback on Capitol, have now entered legend, but Seeds marked, as best I’m aware, the last time Brother J got a release on a major. That’s a loss for the larger hip-hop world; if you have followed the Clan’s recent exploits (as on 2006’s Return to Mecca) you know it isn’t like the guy suddenly forgot how to dominate a mic. But if you’ve never heard Seeds of Evolution, you should find a copy at once and hear him at his creative peak. Or better yet, listen to it back to back with the Beasties; it makes a nice rebuttal to anyone who claims there’s only one kind of “real” hip-hop.

• Dark Sun Riders | Time to Build
• Dark Sun Riders | Rhythmous Flex

The 33rd installment of I Used to Love H.E.R., a series in which artists/bloggers/writers discuss their most essential or favorite hip-hop albums and songs, comes from Illa J, younger brother of the late J Dilla (R.I.P.). Delicious Vinyl will release Illa’s debut album, Yancey Boys, which features Illa J rhyming/singing over previously unused J Dilla tracks. It’s due for a November release. Check the first single below.

• Illa J | We Here

My favorite hip hop album is Ruff Draft by my brother, J Dilla. It’s classic! I love this album because it’s so raw … he took it back to straight loops. The intro pretty much sums up the album, “You wanna bounce in your whip with dat real live shit? Sound like it’s straight from the mufuckin’ cassette.” Even though he used loops throughout the album, Dilla didn’t loop beats the same way an average producer would. What’s crazy is that a lot of the joints off the album were flipped using the same record. I love to hear it in the system in the car … it bumps real hard, as Dilla declares in the intro. It puts me in a trance. As with any Dilla beat, the drums are out cold. Ruff Draft is important to me because it has inspired me lyrically as a songwriter and an MC. It helped me to think out of the box from an MC standpoint as well as from a producer’s perspective. I love the overall concept of the album, which is getting on your grind and doing whatever it takes to make it. Whenever I listen to it, it keeps me focused and on track with the ultimate goal of achieving my dreams and making them become reality.

• J Dilla | Make’em NV

The 32nd installment of I Used to Love H.E.R., a series in which artists/bloggers/writers discuss their most essential or favorite hip-hop albums and songs, comes from Marc Bianchi, the man behind Her Space Holiday, whose full-length XOXO, Panda and the New Kid Revival comes out Oct. 7 on Mush Records.

Be sure to hit the Mush Records YouTube page for a series of short films Bianchi is releasing as a preview to the record (which is really great, by the way).

• Her Space Holiday | The Boys and Girls

De La Soul
De La Soul Is Dead (Tommy Boy, 1991)

there are three records in my collection that have reshaped the way i think about music, and creativity in general. i suppose it is irrelevant to mention what two out of the three are in this half baked little rant. however, the one i will talk about is De La Soul’s masterpiece “De La Soul
is Dead.”

in my opinion, this album goes far beyond its weighty banner of being hailed as a “hip hop classic.” it’s simply a classic work of art no matter what genre you apply it to you. “de la soul is dead” is a sonic collage of the light and the dark. humor mixed with horror. the political and the playful. the sublime and the shocking. all the ingredients of the human experience mixed into one rich, vibrant concoction. it’s the subtleties in this album that keeps it timeless and enduring. no matter how many times i let the needle dig into this record, I always find something new to appreciate and learn from. Choruses, that initially introduced themselves as catchy sing alongs, eventually mutate into gritty and insightful social statements. skits, that at first listen are light hearted, and child like, twist into biting and aggressive commentaries. all of it wrapped up into a familiarly sweet spoon full of sugar that helps get the medicine down. like a small kid with quick fists, it’s far tougher than it appears. to me, prince paul is more like a master painter than a super producer. dipping his brush into every
color known to man, while at the same time, keeping all of it from running into a soupy grey mess. focused and incredibly loose all in the same breath. “de la soul is dead” is a testament to originality and limitless expression.

maybe i am reading into it too deeply? or being overly sentimental? i’ve been told that i do that sometimes. So if none of the above appeals to you, let me also just include that “the beats are slamming.”

• De La Soul | Ring Ring Ring (Ha Ha Hey)

BONUS:

• De La Soul | Ring Ring Ring (Ha Ha Hey) (US Mix)