Respect the Classics

There has been a wave of hip hop nostalgia sweeping social media. 

It started as early as we celebrated hip hop culture’s 50^th anniversary. 

In November 2013, people are remembering hearing A Tribe Called Quest’s Midnight Marauders  masterpiece as well as Snoop Doggy Dogg & Wu-Tang Clan’s 1993 debut albums.

The wave of hip hop nostalgia has not bypassed me.  I ride that wave quite often because the current climate of hip hop can be considered low tide. 

Discovering that the Respect the Classics series would reissue classic hip hop albums was easily one of the best pieces of news I could hear. 

As my playlists can attest, I’ve always reached for hip hop classics throughout the years. 

Respect the Classics give me more ideas and options where revisiting hip hop classics is concerned. 

I’ll also get a second chance at owning some of these masterpiece classics on vinyl because they hardly ever to never show up in crate digging excursions. 

If I had the means or came up with the idea myself, I would have started a movement similar to Respect the Classics myself.  Thankfully the wheels are already in motion. 

It goes without saying that The Haul of Records blog will always respect the classics by making time for them on DJ setlists, playlists and here in text. 

Thank you once again to Respect the Classics, Giant Step and hip hop for making this post possible.

Please make yourself familiar with the link below for more.

http://suitedelight.podomatic.com

Below is a playlist to bring you up to speed.  Click here to download.

The Suite Delight 2014-02-04 Playlist:

1.       Onyx - Throw Ya Gunz

2.       LL Cool J - Rock The Bells

3.       Ludacris - Southern Hospitality

4.       EPMD - Brothers From Brentwood, Long Island

5.       Anonymous Twist feat. Roc 'C' – Suckas Still Trying To Front

6.       Eternia & MoSS ft. Joell Ortiz - Its Funny

7.       DMX - Ruff Ryders' Anthem

8.       Big Daddy Kane - Get Down

9.       King Jus & Fresh Kils - Cold World

10.   Ghettosocks - I Invented Everything feat. Jabba the Cutt

11.   Relic - Loud Enuff Ft. Moka Only

12.   Hezekiah - Fired Up ft. Talib Kweli & Bahamadia

13.   Master Ace - Music Man (Mic Master Mix)

14.   Mos Def - Revelations

15.   Cee & Dr. MaD - Another Day ft. Notion & Nox

Public Enemy - It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back

I was grooving to Yo! Bum Rush The Show! when I was in high school. I remember rewinding You're Gonna Get Yours on my walkman on some family trip.

On a historic trip to New York in 1988, I saw a vision that would change my life forever.

As I walked up the stairs to get out of the subway, I saw a huge poster of Chuck D and Flavor Flav behind bars and the title of one of my most important albums of all time.

Public Enemy was the enemy of the public. Their Uzi weighed a ton and they had too much posse. What were they doing behind bars and why was Chuck D still so militant in that photo? I remember standing in a trance looking at that photo every time we would pass through the subway. They would have to call me away from it.



When we got back home, I got a vinyl copy of It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back from Dutchy's Record Cave. One day, I was playing the record on the family stereo and wanted to change sides. Unfortunately, the record slipped from my hands and before hitting the floor, it got scratched by one of the metallic knobs of the receiver. I will leave it up to you to determine which side got scratched. Whichever you choose, you understand the magnitude of what happened. I bought another copy while on a trip to Toronto, but don't remember what happened to it. I bought a CD copy a few years ago.



Never have I had so many opportunities to own a hip hop album. One day, while walking to my place, I noticed a bunch of vinyl and CDs in boxes on the sidewalk. I walked away with a Master Of Reality by Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin's second album, and you can guess which else.

I've got that one in plastic among my other records now.

For those unfamiliar with the classic album, Montreal's BBAM! Gallery will play Public Enemy's It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back from beginning to end on Friday, October 24 from 7:00pm to 10:00pm.  A dissertation and cultural perspective by presented by special guest host Darcy MacDonald. Beverages and snacks included in $15 admission price.


The Suite Delight new time slot is Tuesday morning 2-3am EST on www.ckut.ca & 90.3 FM.

If you haven't already, please make yourself familiar with the link below for more of your favorite show and mine.

Click here to download podcasts.

The Suite Delight - 2014-08-12 by Dj Solespin on Mixcloud

The Suite Delight - 2014-01-14 by Dj Solespin on Mixcloud

Public Enemy - Fear Of A Black Planet

I’m not a psychic but my prediction of what the Fear Of A Black Planet album cover was going to look like was pretty much dead on.

In my mind, the black planet with the Public Enemy logo was Earth and not eclipsing it. 

I had not seen, heard or thought about the album until the summer of 2012.

The Montreal boulevard on the Main has huge sidewalk sales every spring and fall and I sometimes rummage through to see what CDs I can find. I found Fear Of A Black Planet with a mangled booklet. The only thing that mattered to me was that the CD wasn’t mangled. Funny enough, I’m at a stage that I’m picking up doubles of CDs I already own. It is either on purpose, by mistake or laziness to avoid rummaging through my music to get to the particular CDs.

I bought the Fear of A Black Planet CD and listened to it in its entirety for the first time since I owned the vinyl. It was a Sunday morning heading into the afternoon and I popped the CD into the player and sat down in my most comfortable chair.

As mentioned numerous times on this blog, Public Enemy’s 1988 album is easily one of the three most important hip hop albums of my life.



If It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back didn’t do it for me, Fear Of A Black Planet was surely the next in line.

For whatever it’s worth, The Bomb Squad producers managed to take what they did on Nation to another level. Quite frankly, they live up to their name with the 1989 album.



The B-Side Wins Again is a song title and a statement of fact especially where Fear Of A Black Planet is concerned. The audio assault of Revolutionary Generation, Can’t Do Nuttin’ For Ya Man and Who Stole The Soul is almost too much. I mentioned earlier I was seated while listening to the album. The image of the seated Maxell man being blown away by the sounds from the stereo seems like not much of an exaggeration.



I remember Fight The Power closed off the album. By the time the song ended, I was again nostalgic as I am when revisiting classic hip hop. Hip hop albums the caliber of Public Enemy are not made anymore. Thank goodness their music was recorded. Thank goodness I was able to bear witness to those glory days.

 

Public Enemy are inductees into The Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame. It goes without saying, writing or typing that I hoped that would happen for them sooner than later.

Thank you to the Public Enemy crew for the music.

Def Jam Recordings Tribute

The first hip hop album I ever bought on my first solo trip to downtown Montreal was a Def Jam release. For them to be among my Twitter followers today is an honor I would never have dreamed.

While trying to prepare the playlist for the podcast below, I browsed online looking for some form of inspiration to hit me.

I stumbled across word of Def Jam Recordings label celebrating 30 years.  I naturally grabbed an hour's worth of Def Jam classics and presented some of them on my radio show.

Thank you and congratulations to Def Jam for defining hip hop music and culture for over 30 years.

Thank you for checking out Def Jam Recordings Tribute.

Visit the Mixcloud page to listen to them and more.

The Suite Delight - Def Jam Recordings Tribute by Dj Solespin on Mixcloud

The Suite Delight - 2014-10-21 Playlist:

1. Ghostface Killah - Daytona 500 featuring  Raekwon & Cappadonna
2. Nice & Smooth - The Sky's The Limit
3. Davy DMX - One For The Treble
4. EPMD - Give The People (Erick & Parrish Remix)
5. Slick Rick - It's A Boy (Remix)
6. Nikki D - Hang On Kid
7. Nas - Memory Lane 
8. Public Enemy - Can't Truss It
9. Jay-Z - Sunshine featuring Babyface & Foxy Brown 
10. Redman ‎– It's Like That (My Big Brother) featuring K-Solo
11. LL Cool J ‎– To Da Break Of Dawn
12. 3rd Bass - Product Of The Environment (Project Remix)
13. Method Man - The Riddler