That's Major!

DJ Beat links up with Christian Audigier (Ed Hardy founder) and the founders of LRG (Lifted Research Group) at the magic show in Las Vegas

Pollymore is back with TWO new episodes of the Fresh Files. These two eps have a throwback theme to them. In Ep. 5, Joe Politics breaks down the start of Pollymore and his first gig in the music industry the Almighy RSO. Ep. 6 fast forwards to see Joe in the studio with R&B singer NE-YO while he making some songs that you will be familiar with.

Episode 6 – Creating Hits with NE-YO

Episode 5 – Old School Edition

Episode 2

Episode 1

“Scallops? Whatever I’m rocking with these steak tips. You’re BUGGIN’”

Anyone who knows rapper/producer Crush One knows he hasn’t come to a healthy lifestyle just recently. He was always the one looking for an alternative to the trash we put in our bodies on the reg. So it wasn’t a big leap when he took that healthy lifestyle and started his natural juice company JuiceHugger. The lifestyle company focuses on trying to help us all stop being such slobs. And he must be doing a good job if he is getting my former boulder like self into motion. Take a look at his web series Cooking With Crush where he dispenses some great advice.

Boston Beats & Rhymes is a documentary from 2004 by Film Maker Scott Limanek that I remember hearing a lot about and seeing a few clips from, and I thought the movie never saw the light of day and was (like a lot of other great documentary’s) left only with a rough cut or two floating around in the producers inner circle; luckily, I was wrong. I stumbled onto this clip while I was doing some research for another piece and realized that the producer had uploaded the entire documentary on YouTube.

While there will always be issues with historical texts, historical texts regarding the arts is especially hard given the formation of art and the subjective views regarding what contributions to what art scene where more relevent than others, and which microcosm of the specific scene would be covered. This represents itself more often than not within the realm of music and hip-hop in particular as historical texts being usually biased towards one subset of a scene over another; within the context of this movie and the coverage of Boston hip-hop my initial curiousty with the film was to see how well it juggled what is dubbed in large part as the white, college, “back-packer” scene of Boston Hip-Hop that formed largely within the College and more relatively suburban areas of the Boston area, and that of the “street” scene which is code for nearly anything produced out of Dorchester, Mattapan, Jamaca Plain, Hyde Park, Roxbury, etc…  and I must give the producer a lot of credit for balancing these two scenes that are very often insulated from each other; especially when paying tribute to what was really the foundation of the hip-hop scene in Boston sans college transplants…

Sam Adams came out of nowhere with a #1 album and single on iTunes hip-hop charts, and while some blogs have made it a point to dispute the feasibility of such a relative unknown artist garnering such a coveted spot, that will always remain speculation and nothing will ever be agreed on, so for the sake of this editorial we’ll just give that “issue” a head nod and keep it moving. Even with this “controversy” surrounding him, somehow he has been dubbed “Hip-Hop’s Savior” by a number of admittedly very unhiphop outlets, which makes me wonder how they’d think they’d have the know how to actually dub someone the savior of anything they aren’t involved in, and at the very least, don’t listen to. I’m equally as surprised about how he has managed to get glowing write up’s from the same writer (“George P. Hasset”) of the Cambridge Chronicle who had previously thrown the more street emcee from the same part of Cambridge Millyz under the bus just months ago…

For those who haven’t been privy to the the buzz surrounding the artist or the artist himself refer to this…

My issue with this artist, and the release itself, was that it was not made by someone within the hip-hop community nor was it targeted towards fans of the hip-hop community; but rather it by passed both of those essential aspects of a “hip-hop” release but somehow managed to sold and promoted under the guise that it was, in fact, a hip-hop release. It all seems to me like yet another product and person(s) picking and choosing aspects of hip-hop culture to best suite the release without offering anything back to what they borrowed from.

Beyond my original issue with it, I took an issue with the fact that this release and the artist is touted as “Boston’s Boy”, neither the artist or the release originates from Boston. According to various editorials written about him since the original discrepancy regarding his sales, Sam Adams originally lived in Cambridge,MA for Elementary and then onto Wayland, MA for highschool and Trinity College respectively. None of the previously mentioned places are Boston, and as a resident of Cambridge, we’ve never identified ourselves AS people from Boston, nor do we “throw 3′s”

I felt and still feel like this release will ultimately have a negative affect on the efforts of other Cambridge and Boston hip-hop artists who are on the cusp of success, because a whole other business model will be structured around the eventual “Sam Adams” model for what the labels think “work” from a “Boston” artist; it may also be damaging in regards to the public perception of the city itself and the type of music that can be produced within it.

I feel like this could’ve all been avoided if Sam Adams stuck with what ThatsMajor affiliate MattyTrump dubbed the music in the most recent Globe Article…

Instead, he’s carved out a style of dance-friendly rap that Trump dubs “electronica hop.’’

Luckily we weren’t alone…

Over at RepDaBean veteran Boston artist Slaine had some choice words for Sam Adams that echo’d the sentiments of many of the ThatsMajor editors:

I think over the years you can see Im not a hater…but this dude is actually a threat to the foundation of real hip hop street music. Never paid a due….has no respect or knowledge of the culture….If this is hip hops new direction we are in trouble. And he is about to get backed by the biggest powers in the game. He seems like a nice kid….but on principle…I gotta cut his head off. Sorry Sammy. Bostons boy is about to get banned from Boston. Im Bostons Boy faggot. Go back to college and do some homework. And tell your alamo rent a car investor he can get his face kicked in too. Wrong time to fuck with me. Be very afraid. Im gonna show up at your shows and make everything hard for you pussy. Say somthing about it and watch the temperature get way too hot for you.

I’m sure he’s a cool kid, but, I have to stick by Slaine’s comment of “Never paid a due….has no respect or knowledge of the culture….If this is hip hops new direction we are in trouble”; as a white dude from Cambridge who’s involved in Hip-Hop who has a deep appreciation for the culture, I feel that I HAVE to say something for both my city and the culture that I’ve become a part of…

Our family over at Bostonianz617 sent this over.   Live Cormega performance in Boston from 3/13/10.

Big shouts to him for doing this, a lot of misinformation is floating around

I got a chance to sit with one of the G.O.A.T.’s of Hip Hop, Rakim during his latest tour stop in the Bean. Great convo and concert footage. The God drops jewels as always on everything from who he thinks is hot to why he still wants to drop albums in a stanky leg loving world. Shout out to Hek and the good people at 617Live TV. Good work my friend.

So I’m working on getting my on camera interview game up. To do so, I connected with the good people of 617 Live TV and got a chance to build with Statik Selektah and Hip Hop legend Bun B. At the listening party for Statik’s new album, 100 Proof: The Hangover, we talked about the work they’re doing together and how to make it in a digital age. Feel free to pass this on. Shout out to my 617 Live family.

Dre Robinson talks about his new song “Fade Away” featuring Mighty Mystic. Then he describes why he stepped off the scene for a little while and how the competitive spirit drives making great music. Then we talk about the true mark of being humble. Good stuff.