The Roots - Rising Up (feat. Wale & Chrisette Michele) (Video)
It’s been a long time since I’ve exclaimed “that’s my JAM” but after hearing this record I did not walk, I ran to get my hands on The Roots latest masterpiece Rising Down. Seriously I’ve had this joint on repeat and I never do [...]

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A few months ago I caught some buzz on Santogold as someone to check out. At the time, her record wasn’t out, and I simply forgot about it. This week I found a slip of paper (amongst many) on my desk that said simply ‘Santogold.’ Coincidentally, her album dropped in the [...]

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It’s been awhile since a tune I heard on the radio made me sit up and pay attention but that’s exactly what happened the first time I heard “Handlebars” by the Hip-Hop collective Flobots. Socially conscious and politically charged and completely live this is the visceral type of Hip-Hop that keeps me believing despite the [...]

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Yes you can! The annual Rock the Bells tour line up has been announced and it is, for my dollar, the most jam-packed bill of any tour crossing North America this year. Headlining the trek is the reunited members of A Tribe Called Quest, Nas, Mos Def, De La Soul, 1/3 of the Wu-Tang Clan [...]

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It’s time to spread the good word of Bacon Shoe. Out of Kansas City, Missouri, this humorous hip-hop trio is made up of: Lethal-D - the MC whose favorite subjects are disease and sex. ‘Toine - the hypeman of the group who is known to refer to himself as “Cocktopus” (for reasons I’ll let you [...]

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Ohmega Watts is a hip-hop producer / MC from Brooklyn. Nestled within his impressive most recent release, Watts Happening, is this funky, old-school, afrobeat-licious instrumental groove called “The Platypus Strut”.
Everyone should have a personal theme song or two to play in their head (or iPod) while they’re walking down the street. For me, [...]

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Internet buzz can take you a long way, maybe even to a 60 second clip during the Super Bowl. That buzz is reaching a fever pitch for the New York based Indian influenced Hip-Hop act Nivla Feat. P.Oberoi. The crew is one of three finalists for the chance to win a record deal with [...]

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The # 1 song in the country, folks, is “Low” by Flo Rida.
It’s your basic club hit of the month. The same machismo / underlying misogyny, the same “baby girl” references, the same drum machine programming. Same same same. But it’s blowin’ up.
What grabbed my attention and sounded the alarm on the easily annoyed side [...]

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Okay, so here’s the deal. This is not quite a “giveaway”; dear friends of Ickmusic you are going to have to work for this one. There are 52 faces on that record cover and whoever can name the most faces by November 9th wins a shiny new copy of DJ Axel’s mash-up masterpiece Breakin’ The [...]

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A mainstay on my iPod for the last several weeks has been Ahead of the Curve, a mix-tape by Lateef and DJ Z-Trip. I’m not too well versed in the current underground hip-hop / mix-tape scene, but let me tell you, this stuff is right up my alley. It’s probably due to the old [...]

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