mixtape maestro (2.0)

One of the many reasons why Slick Rick’s 1988 debut The Great Adventures of Slick Rick is still hailed today as a classic hip hop must-have: “Hey Young World”, the eye-patched emcee’s self-produced PSA-like request for the younger generation to, among other things, respect Mommy and Daddy (“Have you forgotten who put you on this earth…?”) and stay off the pipe (“If you smoke crack/ Your kids’ll smoke crack tomorrow”).

Even if you chose to remain ig’nant and ignore Rick’s on-point sermon, you still couldn’t deny how incredibly captivating the record was at the time, the nursery rhyme melodics embedded in those dancey synths and Rick’s sing-song cadences adding a pop-smart whiff to the tune eons before hip hop would regularly employ such Top 40-baiting tactics (see: damn near every rapper currently enjoying mainstream success).

Over twenty years (and many sampled uses of “World”) later, Nas and DJ Green Lantern have opted to cover the track (in partnership with the newly launched Levi’s Pioneer Sessions), slightly modernizing the beat with a heavy East Coast boom-bap thump while the lyrics are given a potent Nasty Nas revising (“Slow your roll before your soul ejects from your body/ And you turn cold…”).

Stay tuned for future Pioneer Sessions over the next six weeks (including brand new covers/ recordings by the likes of The Kills, She & Him and John Legend & The Roots); grab both the original version and Nas’ take (alongside another great re-interpretation of the tune from Macy Gray’s 2001 album, The Id) below.

DL: Nas “Hey Young World (Slick Rick Cover)” (alt)

BONUS DL: Slick Rick “Hey Young World” (alt)

BONUS DL: Macy Gray featuring Slick Rick “Hey Young World (Part Two)” (alt)

It’s hard to disagree with the classy and polished R&B diva route Mary J Blige has ventured into the past decade of her career: she’s more beautiful than ever, her voice is stronger, her personal growth is inspiring. At the same time though, there’s only so many re-writes of “Be Without You” one can take.

Are we saying we yearn for Blige to revert back to the always-wronged girlfriend/ wife role she seemed glued to in the opening phases of her career? No, not necessarily. But we do miss the sheer glee that arose once her church-grown vocal gymnastics were paired with the sounds of urban music’s past via old R&B and rap samples. Let us not forget, she is the Queen of Hip Hop-Soul.

Apparently, iconic rapper/ producer Marley Marl shares that same sentiment, as he’s taken it upon himself to give Blige’s latest single “I Am” some of that What’s The 411? flavor for this old school house party-approved remix.

Stapling the song’s “Ain’t nobody gonna love you better than I am” theme to the beat of T Ski Valley’s 1981 hip hop classic “Catch The Beat” (itself, one of the billion or so tunes to reference Taana Gardner’s “Heartbeat”), while adding a lil’ golden age braggadocio mic flair (“Who’s the king of the nineties? (I am)/ Who’s the king of the grind, B? (I am)/ Since you slept on a legend, step behind me…”), Marl swiftly resuscitates a track we would have probably forgotten all about in a couple months time, while simultaneously giving the kids a lil’ taste of why we fell in love with MJB in the first place oh so long ago.

Can this throwback sound please be the overall theme for Mary’s next album?

DL: “I Am (Marley Marl Remix)” (alt)

Bonus DL: T Ski Valley “Catch The Beat” (alt)

Jack Splash has quietly made a name for himself over the past few years in his roles as singer, rapper, songwriter and producer.

Besides drawing raving acclaim for his contributions to Plantlife, a wildly entertaining, three-albums-deep funk outfit based out of L.A., he’s also hooked up some of the brightest talents in modern-day R&B (Alicia Keys, R. Kelly, John Legend, Raheem DeVaughn, Solange, Estelle, Jennifer Hudson, Jazmine Sullivan) with these amazingly lush sounds and classic-tinged romantic scripts steeped in the always-rewarding luster of yesteryear soul (credits include throwback-seasoned singles like Keys’ “Teenage Love Affair”, Legend’s “P.D.A.” and Solange’s “T.O.N.Y.”).

This year has the potential to be Jack’s true breakout year though, thanks to the premiere of his much-delayed solo debut, Technology And Love Might Save It All. But just in case you’re still not yet completely sold on why it should be a necessity for you to circle the May release date of the project (or, hell, are still scratching your head trying to figure out who dude is), we’ve gathered three previously unleashed cuts for your listening pleasure below. Promises you’ll be an instant fan after hearing them:

“I Could Have Loved You” featuring Missy Elliott & Jazmine Sullivan

-leaked to high praise last summer, this infectious four-on-the-floor delight finds the ladies and Splash in the midst of a flirtatious stand-off. “I could have loved you,” they tease in a buttery smoove R&B hook, but because they’re both already attached, they can only offer a naughty twirl on the dancefloor. With their mates nowhere in sight though, Jack isn’t fully convinced they’re telling the truth, inquiring in his best Prince voice, “If you gotta man at home/ Why you got them high heels on?”.

DL: “I Could Have Loved You” (alt)

“Ringtone” featuring R. Kelly & T-Pain

-here, Splash is once again on the prowl (“Baby I just wanna get with you/ In a most familiar way/ I don’t wanna cause a spectacle/ I just had to stop and say…”) and being flanked by a supporting cast of A-listers (T-Pain drops a rap verse, an Auto-Tuned Kellz provides the chorus); but the track’s most noteworthy element is it’s oddly meshed groove, a surprisingly effective combination of synth-R&B quirk and acoustic guitar sunniness

DL: “Ringtone” (alt)

“.38 Special” featuring Cee-Lo

-Splash’s latest leakage, from the forthcoming mixtape King of The Beats (due this week), re-teams him with The Heart Attack partner Cee-Lo, for an exquisite dishing of needly guitar funk, golden age mic braggadocio (“I ain’t talkin’ bout a gun/ My .38 special, I spit from my tongue…”) and the kind of soul-stirring Gnarls Barkley-ish hooks Cee handles so well.

DL: “.38 Special” (alt)

Sample some of Splash’s other creations via the widget below; pick up his last mixtape, Heir To The Throne, here.

True, after loving Wale‘s previous two mixtape triumphs, 2007′s 100 Miles & Running and the Seinfeld-themed, year-later follow-up The Mixtape About Nothing, the comparably bland lyrical input on his official major label debut, “Chillin” (not to mention the questionable choice of Lady GaGa as hook feature), kind-of deserved the underwhelmed reaction it initially received.

But after a few listens, and a coming-to-terms with the idea that this was meant to be rapper’s introduction to the less Web-affixed masses, “Chillin’” didn’t seem so bad; plus, it was hard to deny the song’s oddly tantalizing hip-pop mixture of Wale’s “Top Billin”‘ swag-jack, GaGa’s shameless M.I.A-biting and Cool & Dre’s lively production (winner of best use of a Steam sample in a year that’s saw the already overly-familiar “Na Na Na Na” tune become even more ubiquitious).

Previously MM-hyped DJ/ remixer/ producer Skratch Bastid helps elevates “Chillin’”‘s level of appeal much further with a mega-sized-feeling revamp that cleverly interweaves nods to Wale’s D.C. birthplace (via it’s licking of Trouble Funk’s go-go classic “Let’s Get Small”) amongst other blink-and-you-miss-them snippets, ranging from “I Put A Spell On You” to “Paper Planes” to “Arab Money”, all inspired by select lines.

Look for Bastid’s new 110% mix CD to drop real soon, and try to catch him on his tour throughout Canada sometime this summer (see dates here). As for Wale, his long-awaited AllIDo/ Interscope debut, Attention: Deficit, is due sometime later this year.

Wale f/ Lady Gaga – Chillin’ (SKRATCH BASTID REMIX) from Skratch Bastid on Vimeo.

DL: “Chillin’ (Skratch Bastid Remix)” (alt)

For this upgrade to his late ’08-leaked Weezy-assist “Up In The Club”, Swizz Beatz trades in the obscure, mid-90′s Brit-pop sample reference of the original for the far more familiar old-school knock of “It Takes Two”, effectively transforming “Club” from a mild head-nodder to a surefire banger.

No alcohol in your system? No problem, as this track’s delirious combination of a Rob Base and DJ EZ Rock swipe, “Don’t stop! Get it, get it!” hype-man chants, Wayne’s Auto-Tuned trills and a sturdy Busta verse that starts with the classic line “I wanna rock right now…” could bring even the bone sober to drunken-like heights of giddy euphoria.

Swizz may not be…hell, anyone’s favorite emcee, but when it comes to rocking a party and rocking it right, you can’t argue that the man doesn’t know how to deliver the goods.

DL: “Up In Da Club (Remix)” (alt)

Remember The Fugees’ cover of Roberta Flack’s “Killing Me Softly”, and the mystifying hold it had over you with it’s odd blend of Lauryn Hill’s chocolate-y soul wail against that sparse “Bonita Applebaum” drum loop (itself a sampling of Little Feat’s “Fool Yourself”)? Well, the Mick Boogie team tap somewhere close to that spirit in their latest mash-up project, Adele: 1988, which fixes nine cuts from the Grammy golden girl’s acclaimed debut opus 19 to the familiar beat skeletons of hip hop’s late ’80′s heyday.

For the soaring heartache ballad “Melt My Heart To Stone”, one of those songs that many turned to in ’08 while whimpering into a half-swallowed vodka bottle late at night, Adele’s self-berating of being “the only one in love” floats o’er worming guitar and the light drum tickle of Al Green’s oft-referenced “I’m Glad You’re Mine” (borrowed on MC Lyte’s ’88 fave “Paper Thin” amongst so many other rap titles). Trading in some of the original’s depressing weight for a toe-tapping midtempo lilt (and including a brief mid-song verse from Little Brother’s Big Pooh), this Kickdrums Remix should have you falling in love with the “Chasing Pavements” songstress all over again.

DL: “Melt My Heart To Stone (Kickdrums Remix)” (alt)

Snatch up the nVMe remix of Maestro 19 favorite, “Right As Rain” (now backed by the classic instrumental to LL’s “Goin Back To Cali”!!!), below:

DL: “Right As Rain (nVMe Remix)” (alt)

Pick up the rest of Adele: 1988 via Press Play Fashion Forward.

Ruining an otherwise sick skeletal blending of “Top Billin’” and “I’m A Hustla”, 50 Cent goes three-for-three in horrid new single choices in his latest Curtis sneak peek leak “I Get Money”.

Where “Straight To The Bank” felt uninspired and “Amusement Park” was outright laziness, the release of “I Get Money” (a supposed “Bank” remix that celebrates how “stanky rich” the man is) makes you want to give up on him totally. It’s almost like that energy water venture he’s been stacking cash off and his attempts to win over Hollywood through acting has sucked away any interest he still had in music.

What’s worse is he wastes a crazy street beat any hungry emcee would die for to talk about how ridiculously massive his bank account is. It was evident 50 would lose his hold over the hip hop audience eventually, but who knew it would arrive this quickly and this dramatically awful?