CRATE DIG: Legendary 90s Hip-Hop/R & B Producer "Buttnaked" Tim Dawg

Welcome to the newest regular feature here at True Genius Requires Insanity, the “Crate Dig.” As you may already be aware, we strongly feel as though it’s time to advocate a “back to basics” movement in music. We feel that instead of everyone being an innovator, that some of us need to be preserving the importance of original source material. To that end, the “Crate Dig” will feature members of the TGRIOnline.com staff, the “Hustlers of Culture,” digging through their mental crates to remember the songs that made them appreciate music. There will be some amazing, and yes, embarrassing choices here, but always the key impact is to remember when music was not something to be over studied, remixed, downloaded, forgotten and torn asunder. We’re remembering when music was simply a song you liked, and really couldn’t tell you more than a sentence or two why. Sit back, reminisce, and enjoy the building blocks of music appreciation.

http://www.youtube.com/v/DwApYLYEnmI?fs=1&hl=en_US

Horace Brown’s 1996 hit “Taste Your Love,” written by “Buttnaked” Tim Dawg

http://www.youtube.com/v/8GoXP8c5MCc?fs=1&hl=en_US

Christopher Williams’ “Every Little Thing You Do” (Tim Dawg Remix)

Song: (Too many to mention)
Year released: 1993-1998
Year “discovered” by me: 1993
Reason discovered: Obsessive listening to Friday and Saturday night live mixes by club DJs

Between the ages of 15 and 20, the most important person in hip hop and R & B in my world was producer “Buttnaked” Tim Dawg. One of the most key components to the early success of Sean “Puffy” Combs’ vision of meshing gang culture, fashion and music into a volatile and chart ready mix, Tim Patterson was the producer of note on nearly every 12″ remix of every major early hit of the Uptown Records/Bad Boy Entertainment era. Tim Dawg’s remixes in many ways were my Friday nights. I wasn’t a big partier in high school, and in college I didn’t party until junior year, so whether it was WPGC or WKYS or Flava 1580 in DC, or Providence College’s WDOM on Saturdays during freshman year or WBRU always on Sundays while I was in school, his remixes were a major part of my teenage years.

Even more amazing to me was in doing research for this piece learning that he was the songwriter behind one of my favorite songs of all time, Horace Brown’s 1996 regional hit single “Taste Your Love.” The Trackmasters remix of that song portended the future of Bad Boy, as it was politely grimy, sex driven lyrics over swinging uptempo R & B. To hear the track in 2010, and to realize that in 1996 the track was completely fresh and brand new as a concept really shows the development and diversity of R & B over time.

At a time, Christopher Williams ran neck and neck with Jodeci for being the most influential R & B performer in my life. I was definitely a socially maladjusted nerd, so in my mind dressing and acting like my R & B heroes was the best look for gaining acceptance. Jodeci was pretty much firmly entrenched until one night in ’93 a DJ dropped the Tim Dawg remix of “Every Little Thing You Do.” I wasn’t really a big fan of the original, as it lacked the gangland attitude, overt sexuality and sneer of my preferred brand of R & B. Tim Dawg gave that song teeth, made the dance floors ignite, and in many ways set the precedent for my teenage years.

From Mary J. Blige’s What’s the 411? remix album to working with the Notorious B.I.G., the Lost Boyz, Lil Kim and so many more, Tim Dawg is a true lost legend of hip hop music who should NEVER be forgotten.

http://www.youtube.com/v/s3XLikSF_CQ?fs=1&hl=en_US

THE DROP: The Notorious XX

The mash-up is dead. Long live the mash-up.

Most mash-ups face the same problem that Homer Simpson’s barbershop quartet faced: something that is witty at first, but is less interesting each time you hear it. Case in point: “Jay-Z and Radiohead, what a brilliant idea!” For a mash-up to be relevant, there needs to be a synergizing quality about the musicians – not just a quirky, ironic pairing of dissimilar artists.

San Francisco DJ Wait What’s “Notorious XX” mixtape reveals a pairing that benefits both Biggie Smalls and indie darlings the XX. Biggie’s laidback flow is a perfect complement to the chill, R&B-infused instrumentals provided by London three-piece. The vocal hooks by dual XX singers Romy Croft and Oliver Sim even work in the same context for Biggie’s songs, giving a fresh sound to well-worn classics.

Some tracks work better than others: “Juicy-r” and “Basic hypnosis” are natural fits. However, songs that feature other Bad Boy stars don’t fare as well: neither Puffy or Ma$e have a cadence or style that match the beats. And I wished that “Suicidal Fantasy” worked better, because the same brooding tone dominates both the lyrics and music. Still, there are enough winning combinations over the 11 tracks to make this a worthwhile listen.

http://player.soundcloud.com/player.swf?url=http%3A%2F%2Fsoundcloud.com%2Fwait-what%2Fsets%2Fthe-notorious-xx

HIP HOP REMIX WEEK Countdown: #4 Notorious B.I.G.

Biggie Smalls doesn’t speak in words, he speaks in lifestyles. Easily one of the most quotable lyricists of any generation, it goes without saying that when it comes to spitting sixteen bars over someone else’s track, or having his own material re-imagined that the Notorious B.I.G. would be a standout performer. Much like Lil Wayne at #5, the ability of Biggie is borne as most things are in hip hop, from the hustle. In the year 1992, Biggie went from being the greatest “Unsigned Hype” performer in the history of The Source to being the hottest young emcee in the game. Getting to be one of the greatest artists in the history of the hip hop remix starts before his debut Ready to Die dropped, as in always using his remixes to keep his name hot in the streets, Biggie perpetually stayed ahead of the game.

http://www.youtube.com/v/-u5m_LfiXzM&hl=en_US&fs=1&

For me it was not with his performance on “Party and Bullshit” in 1992 that made him an instantaneous celebrity, but rather his performance on the remix of Supercat’s reggae hit of 1992 “Dolly My Baby” featuring Mary J. Blige. It’s everything a hip hop remix should be. “Dolly My Baby” was gigantic in the clubs, and was one of the leading dancehall party crushers of the moment. Take that, and add the potent rhymes of Biggie amongst a crew of also-rans, and a really ridiculous sounding Puff Daddy, and the track has new legs and new life. Plus, Biggie starts off his rhyme with, “I love it when you call me big poppa/I only smoke blunts if they rolled proper.” Again, lifestyles, not words.

http://www.youtube.com/v/V8pG1mG7BeI&hl=en_US&fs=1&

Puffy wouldn’t let ’92 end without Biggie and Mary J. Blige joining forces again as the king and queen of the grimy streets, as Biggie’s verse on Mary’s “Real Love” remix and keeping Bad Boy Records synergy high by getting in on remix to Craig Mack’s street anthem “Flava in Ya Ear” alongside LL Cool J, Busta Rhymes, continued to keep his buzz high heading into the album with easily the most noteworthy hip hop remix of all time, Ready to Die.

http://www.pp2g.tv/pa3F7Y3E_.aspx

The key to Biggie’s most successful remixes and most of Puffy’s work in general is an adherence to keeping the samples straight out of the heart of the African-American community, but also ear friendly and mainstream accessible. Debarge’s “Stay With Me” allows Biggie saying he’s “fat, black and ugly as ever” while dropping some of the dopest flows of the decade to sound like a romantic enticement rather than complete revulsion. My mother once told me that it’s not how big it is, but what you do with it that matters, and Biggie shows and proves like a true champion here inventing himself as the most unlikely loverman of the hip hop generation.

http://www.youtube.com/v/7w8Vu9SENok&hl=en_US&fs=1&

Biggie’s R & B loverman mastery continues as on 112’s “Only You,” he casts a spell of the perfect laid back playa lifestyle as in many ways, 112’s magnificent ballad is nearly undone by Biggie’s lyrical genius as it is a case of the horse driving the cart or the cart driving the horse.

Biggie, much like Lil Wayne was such a lyrical dynamo that it felt like even on posse cuts or guest appearances that the tracks were indeed his, so much to the degree that you’d want to believe that his verses on Total’s “Can’t You See,” Puffy’s “All About the Benjamins,” Junior MAFIA’s “Get Money” and “Player’s Anthem” were all remixes and not the original release. Not the case by a long shot. Biggie was such a dominant hip hop personality and lyrical genius that in his inclusion on a track it made the track a far larger than life experience than in many cases those songs already were.

Puffy may have invented the remix, but an artist is only as good as his paints.

HARD JAMS: Notorious B.I.G. and Eminem – Dead Wrong (RMX) (1999)

If you’ve been a fan of TGRIOnline.com as of late, you’ve noticed our preoccupation with having a particular dislike of the beta male, emotionally expressive movement in popular music. It’s not that we so much hate with passion the Kid Cudis and Pitchfork favored alternative indy bands of the world, we just would prefer to not see popular music taken over and inundated with their sound. As we’ve stated in “Alpha Male Music Week” and our “HARD 10!” countdown, we’re just attempting to represent a balance in music. WIth that being said, we’ll periodically feature some “harder edged” material to shake you out of your doldrums and give you a no crying wanted, swift kick in your musical ass. Do enjoy! 

For a hip hop track to be hard in my book, the most essential necessity is the drum break from Al Green’s “I’m So Glad You’re Mine.” So, with that being said, I clearly have an affinity for the Notorious B.I.G. “I’ve Got a Story to Tell” from Life After Death is one of Biggie’s finest story jams, and that staccato drum loop sets it off perfectly.

For Biggie’s posthumous Born Again, Reverend Al and Willie Mitchell’s Hi Records production is called upon again, but this time for “Dead Wrong,” a masterpiece from Biggie’s side for his magnificence as a rapper, the track serving as a phenomenal memory of his lyrical mastery. But where does the track get HARD JAMS recognition from? Eminem. In 1999, Slim Shady wasn’t hip hop’s cautionary tale of lovelorn parenting and rehab. He was a multiple time Rap Olympics champion who between “Just Don’t Give A Fuck,” “Still Don’t Give a Fuck,” and “My Name Is” turned hip hop on it’s head and became not just a dope white rapper, but the BEST emcee in the game, as a rookie. His brand of hyper-aggressive shock hop recalled images of the type of nihilism that made Ozzy Osborne a megastar and notorious celebrity, and not until we learned how Curtis Jackson was shot nine times, did we ever have a backstory that the entirety of music could find frightening, odd and instantaneously legendary.

http://www.youtube.com/v/gwpFaU7FwtQ&hl=en_US&fs=1&color1=0xe1600f&color2=0xfebd01

Eminem and Biggie. The concept seemed mindblowing, and for me as an “Urban Beats” DJ and radio programmer at Providence College in 1999, when Eminem stepped to the microphone, he didn’t so much have a lot to prove as have a situation to completely define himself as a vastly different sort of brand name emcee, shoving open numerous doors at the same time in the industry, and he delivered this:

There’s seven different levels to Devil worshippin: horse’s heads,
Human sacrifices, cannibalism; candles and exorcism
Animals havin sex with ’em; camels mammals and rabbits
But I don’t get into that, I kick the habit – I just,
Beat you to death with weapons that eat through the flesh
And I never eat you unless the fuckin, meat looks fresh
I got a lion in my pocket, I’m lyin, I got a nine in my pocket
And baby I’m just, dyin to cock it
He’s ready for war, I’m ready for war
I got machetes and swords for any faggot that said he was raw
My uz’ as, heavy as yours, yeah you met me before
I just didn’t have as large an arsenal of weapons before
Marshall will step in the door, I lay your head on the floor
With your body spread on the bedspread, red on the wall
Red on the ceilin, red on the floor, get a new whore
Met on the second, wet on the third;
Then she’s dead on the fourth – I’m dead wrong

That’s hard.

ALPHA MALE MUSIC WEEK: BE_GULLY PRESENTS: CLASSICS 101 – HIP HOP AT ITS FINEST: Notorious B.I.G. – "Hypnotize"

Happy New Year, Happy Friday, and Happy Alpha Male Music Week.

There is only one personality I could possibly be writing about this week. While the list of alpha males in classic hip hop is extensive (far more extensive than a comparable list today, as Lenins Tomb pointed out earlier in the week), there is one rapper who is particularly larger than life… and just large, too. That’s Notorious B.I.G.

Everything about Biggie’s public persona was carefully tailored to define the ideal of a rap star. One of the best demonstrations of what the personality Notorious B.I.G. was is the song “Hypnotize,” (Life After Death, Bad Boy Records, 1997) a track which unapologetically conveys every principle of overt masculinity in the world of rap music.

http://www.youtube.com/v/NHRPAQC9nmE&hl=en_US&fs=1&

Rap music was born from the streets, from people who had nothing but the music. A lot of original rap music fundamentally concentrated on reclamations of power, whether simply the power to forget your problems and party or more concrete forms of power. By the mid-nineties, it was a giant industry and the music had come to emphasize the concept of money as power. In “Hypnotize,” Biggie talks about how, basically, money ain’t a thing. He’s got cars: “my car go one sixty, swiftly, wreck it buy a new one” and he “put hoes in NY into DKNY” while “Miami, DC prefer Versace.”

Another element intrinsic to rap is the power of the gangster. If you can build a criminal empire, to the point where the police can’t touch you, you’ve pretty much made it. In “Hypnotize,” Biggie has a brilliant, concise depiction of his power on this scale. “At my arraignment/note to the plaintiff/your daughter’s tied up in a Brooklyn basement/face it, not guilty, that’s how I stay filthy.”

Always smooth (“since days of underroos”), another mark of the rap alpha male is sex. Biggie tells it how it is: “Come through, have sex on rugs that’s Persian/come up to your job, hit you while you’re workin’.” And that’s not even considering the video.

The video for “Hypnotize” might be the most epic video from the entire decade. It’s a dramatic story of police heat, hoes, gambling, hoes, speedboats, and hoes in mermaid outfits in a fish tank. The setup for the video, with helicopters zooming in on Biggie’s party boat, is brilliant. When the beat drops, you know it before he says it; he’s “sicker than the average.” And that’s just a modest, classy way of saying it, really.

Everything about this track, from the video to the hook, is a display of alpha male dominance. “Sometimes your words just hypnotize me/and I just love your flashy ways/guess that’s why they broke and you so paid.” That is the summary of the pinnacle of a rapper, when women want him and men want to be him. It might be shallow, and it might not be the only thing worth rapping about, but Biggie was right when he said, “at last, a nigga rappin’ bout blunts and broads/tits and bras, menage-a-tois, sex in expensive cars.”

and if you don’t know, now you know…

Puff Daddy co-wrote and co-produced this track. This was back when he was awesome despite being named “Puff.”

Coogi is a clothing brand that makes the most awesome sweaters ever conceived.

SHIT I’M DIGGING THIS WEEK

aka avant garde and rather musical water cooler discussion.

1. DJ Quicksilva – Where The Do That At? and Unruly Records’ assault on mainstream radio

DJ Quicksilva – Where They Do That At – DMV Remix by Unruly Productions

DJ Quicksilva – Where They Do That At – Bmore Remix by Unruly Productions

2. Laidback Luke and Gina Turner are Nouveau Yorican

I’ve been preaching to everyone to prepare for the coming of the Freestyle reinvasion. Well, it’s finally here. LA by way of New York DJ Gina Turner is a club kid made great, and Laidback luke is easily one of the most respected DJs on the international underground. France’s Sound Pellegrino Records has them combined as the ultimate combination of the Hi NRG and breaks of freestyle with the jacking beats and minimalist funk of Chicago house to create a sound that can play in rooms great and small. Just recently, Discobelle dropped Gina’s mix which includes “Boriqua,” the debut Nouveau Yorican single which has been remixed by Harvard Bass, Douster and Sandro Silva. Do listen, and do enjoy.

3. Sidney Samson’s “Riverside.”

http://www.youtube.com/v/Pde2j70eiC8&hl=en_US&fs=1&color1=0xe1600f&color2=0xfebd01

This is easily one of my favorite electro jams of the year. Dutch rappers Wizard Sleeve kill it, but, I really tend to think that this one can have a MUCH larger life in America, unedited, as, well, an emcee equipped to get it in at 120 BPMs, with a hook that’s as hard as “Riverside Motherfucker!” gets onto this, this could be a problem for the mainstream bottle service club community. Burns dropped this at peak time as he opened for Deadmau5 last week at DC’s 9:30 Club, and it slayed in a room filled with progressive guys and girls and oddball kids in mouse heads. It’s hooky, is a fantastic track, and really doesn’t require much as you can take the entire track, no sample, and make a hit. Here’s hoping the US catches onto this VERY trendsetting dance hit.

4. Super Cat, Biggie Smalls and Puff Daddy v. Major Lazer and how iconography can spark an entire musical movement.

http://www.youtube.com/v/uzH4tprczp8&hl=en_US&fs=1&color1=0xe1600f&color2=0xfebd01

I’m of the belief that Super Cat’s “Dolly My Baby” video is one of the most iconic moments in hip hop. It’s the celluloid debut of Biggie and Puffy, and when those machine gum blasts hit the track, it signals the iconic image shaping of Bad Boy Records as the new defining concept of what hip hop needed to evolve into. Super Cat, just by breathing on a track that is this legendary, scalding and hot like fire cements his legacy as well as a lyrical toasting giant.

http://www.youtube.com/v/nWCdG0RacIk&hl=en_US&fs=1&color1=0xe1600f&color2=0xfebd01

I really haven’t seen anything so iconic and visually impressive since in dancehall music trending mainstream until Major Lazer. Whenever the Major enters a Major Lazer video, it’s literally the same heroic feeling, but under a totally different guise. In any regard, having dancehall music back as a commercially viable vehicle is truly one of the highlight stories of 2009.