The 22nd 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 (read intro), comes from Mike Bell, one-half of electronic-pop duo the Lymbyc Systym. Bell and his brother Jared, based in Austin by way of Phoenix, released Love Your Abuser last year on Mush Records. A remix version of the album – featuring the Album Leaf, Daedelus, the One AM Radio and more – will be available March 1. Each disc will be numbered and feature handmade packaging. Check the group’s site for pre-order information on Feb. 1.

• Lymbyc Systym | Truth Skull

Madvillain
Madvillainy (Stones Throw, 2004)

Madlib and Doom’s masterpiece Madvillainy changed the way I think about hip-hop. Not only did it breathe fresh air into what I considered to be a stale genre, but inspired me to start producing hip-hop beats and collaborating with mc’s.

I absolutely adore Madlib’s production. I had read an interview with him in which he said he makes an album’s worth of material every day. Whether this is an exaggeration or not, this guy is way prolific and inspiring. His use of rag-tag funk and soul samples, coupled with strange vocal samples provides for a great experience when listening to records he’s produced.

Madlib’s also a self-taught multi-instrumentalist, and a pretty skilled one at that. He always adds his own touches to his loops, be it a bassline, rhodes part or chopped drum groove.
In my mind, Madvilliany is Madlib’s best work. It captures the essence of everything I mentioned above. I have a feeling he was so inspired to work with an mc as talented as Doom that he chose his freshest unused beats to use on the record. When listening to Madvilliany I hear the friendship between Madlib and Doom, a level of excellence that could only come from a unique collaboration between friends. I love looking at photos from the sessions on stonesthrow.com … pictures of Madlib and Doom laughing, recording and taking bong hits on the roof. I see great times, just as i hear when bumping this record.

Often times I’ll listen to a record and say “hey, i could do that”, and i definitely had one of these moments when listening to Madvilliany. I was so inspired to try my hand at taking samples from old records and adding my own touches with rhodes, bass guitar, synth and drums. Since then I’ve amassed a library of hours of beats and snippets, which will eventually be whittled down into a hip-hop record with my lyrically gifted good friend and desert dweller, Future Lord aka Michael Busse from Chronic Future and Back Ted N-Ted.

One last thing I love about Madvillainy and Madlib in general is how the craftsmanship is taken quite seriously, while the mood and vibe can become quite silly and light hearted, a far cry from the shoot-’em-up, booty- and money-driven sounds of most commercial hip-hop. There are hilarious chopped dialoges from Fantastic 4 cartoons placed as interludes throughout. On Shadows of Tomorrow Madlib’s high-pitched alter ego Quasimoto chimes in to give love to weed and Sun Ra and on America’s Most Blunted Madlib digs out some awesome sample of some goofy white boy talking about making music while high … it’s just so freakin laughable, yet so innovative and so well produced.

• Madvillain | Money Folder
• Madvillain | Shadows of Tomorrow

The 21st 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 (read intro), comes from Eso Tre, one-half of Los Angeles-based hip-hop duo Substance Abuse, whose 2006 record Overproof features MF Doom and Kool Keith, among others.

Brand Nubian
In God We Trust (Elektra, 1993)

I remember writing an essay for my 10th grade English class comparing a poem written by Countee Cullen to a track off of Brand Nubian’s In God We Trust called It Ain’t No Mystery, a song criticizing the abuses of religion and people’s reluctance to sway from conventional modes of spirituality. Nothing can erase the memory of my forty-something teacher reciting Sadat X’s lyrics in front of a bunch of honors students, and then asking them if any of them had heard of Brand Nubian. None of them had.

Of course, my friends and I knew this group all too well. I remember sitting through Yo! MTV Raps in eager anticipation of seeing what would become my favorite video of all time, Punks Jump Up to Get Beat Down. The simplicity of this video was it’s power: three guys who embodied that quintessential early 90’s New York hip hop, kicking rhymes in the subway and occasionally administering a beat down to anyone who might question whether or not “the Nubian reign had fallen”. As the forthcoming album would prove, it definitely had not.

Part of what makes this album so great and timeless was that sense that these guys had something to prove. With the man who had for a long time been considered their front man conspicuously absent from the equation, Lord Jamar and Sadat X were put in the daunting position of proving both that they could evolve musically as a group and that their charisma as a duo was legitimate. And as dope of an album as One for All was, Brand Nubian’s sophomore effort made it seem as if their classic first album almost obscured the undeniable chemistry between these two emcees.

With solid production provided by the group from beginning to end (with exception of Diamond D’s contribution with Punks Jump Up…), In God We Trust stands with so many other great works of this period that strove to present a unifying vibe and theme, even if at times the leitmotiv seemed to be challenging image of the group that One for All had established. What we hear in the second effort is that the ideology is much the same, but the means of effectuating it is now much more militant, as evidenced by hard hitting cuts like Pass the Gat and Black and Blue. Both rappers sound more polished the second time around, and display an intensity that I have yet to see rivaled by another group.

• Brand Nubian | Pass the Gat
• Brand Nubian | Punks Jump Up to Get Beat Down