Since New Year an awful lot of 'Best Of 2009' lists have been unveiled, and I've been browsing a few to see whether I missed anything good. Turns out I did!
Blitz The Ambassador's Stereotype is djbooth.net's 'Best Hip Hop Album (Unsigned/Independent) of 2009', and it's fantastic. Jazzy beats and amazing instrumentation make this album a joy to listen to and frankly I wish all new hip hop would sound as good as this. Horns come courtesy of Hypnotic Brass Ensemble (coming to the UK soon!), who agreed to play in return for some graphic design work from Blitz (who designed the cover himself). Good deal.
Also recommended to me by djbooth was J. Cole, the first signing to Jay-Z's label Roc Nation. I'm not really a fan of Hov's latest material so wasn't holding much hope for this one, but I was really surprised! J. Cole has shot straight to the top of my last.fm and I just can't get enough. Cole's lyrics combined with the beats on his latest free mixtape, The Warm Up (available on his myspace) have such an optimistic feel to them that I can't stop listening. He is really refreshing to listen to. Check out grown simba:
Clearly I have been out of the loop to be able to miss the first signing to Roc Nation but oh well! After listening to Stereotype a few times I really started to appreciate the production and started to look into it. The producer who worked on the album is Optiks (hear his 12 minute 'The Beat Tape' here) he has done some nice work, particularly on Stereotype. Optiks hails from Orlando, Florida and after listening to this mixtape I feel pretty confident in saying that O-Zone is where it's at.
Oh if you liked that then this is good to:
Oh if you liked that then this is good to:
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