Devin the Dude (Official Video) – I’m Just Gettin’ Blowed (Assigned to The Shipment by Rick Gerard)

Posted on December 18, 2014 by admin

I mean who doesn’t love Devin the Dude?? He’s been referred to as “raps best kept secret” and “your favorite rapper’s favorite rapper”. For those hip hop fans who aren’t familiar with this man, you really need to remedy that and enjoy a nice session of Devin, perhaps accompanied by a joint of that good green ……or six.

This song in particular called, “I’m Just Gettin’ Blowed”, drives home my previous statement about a nice herbal session. I often wonder if there is ever a time that a joint or blunt isn’t burning and being smoked in his personal aura? Honestly I think the answer is NO. In the words of O.C. from a recent Apollo Brown track, “…when the joint gets down to the roach, I light anotha one.”, I think Devin lives by this code.

This video is pretty cool….just basically Devin flying around a little remote controlled drone helicopter camera on a beach and surrounding areas. You get some cool views and perspective….the song itself is a smoothed out jazzy kind of beat with some great saxophone work involved and some background piano. Another in a LONG line of tracks from this genius that can touch you so many ways.

For me personally, Devin the Dude signifies friendship and great memories. The four of us involved in this project and countless others of our close friends love this man and his music. So many days and weeks and even into years, some sort of music by (or involving) Devin would almost be theme music to the craziness that we would be involved in. It’s a guarantee that if you throw on a track by Devin in the vicinity of any of our good friends we will get hyped.

So my suggestion to everyone that happens to read this: GO LISTEN TO DEVIN THE DUDE RIGHT NOW!!!! Trust me you will not be sorry….and my apologies for this shipment taking longer that normal……I was just gettin’ blowed.

-THE SHIPMENT-

Black Milk – “Rhythm Roulette” (assigned to Ricky G. by The Shipment)

Posted on December 11, 2014 by admin

Music…. Passion….. Obsession…… Life. To me these four words are synonymous. I wasn’t born a musically gifted person. Nor was I gifted with the ability to craft something so beautiful, but through my upbringing, I developed this passion to seek out and enjoy music. To me, music is life and life without music is like watching a black and white movie. Yeah it’s still life, but it doesn’t have a soul (and all you movie buffs forgive me, I know they’re classics, but I’m trying to make a point). Music is just that…… SOUL.

Now I can all ready tell I’m going to be all over the place with this one. Not because i can”t articulate my feelings, but because music in it’s entirety gets me all jacked up. I actually told mi compadre who sent me this, ” I wish I hadn’t watched this video before bed, because all I wanna do now is “dig through the crates”. Nothing else in this world can give you this type of feeling… and I’m speaking from experience. Anybody who knows me, knows I’m a glutton for life. By it’s definition, that’s exactly what I am when it comes to this shit. A fuckin’ glutton.

So not knowing (due to my excitement) where to go with this, I guess I”ll kick a little bit of my musical history to you. I pretty much started out listening to what my parents listened to… or at least what I can remember. I recall listening to Patsy Cline, Travis Tritt, maybe some of the “BOSS”, Bruce Springstein for you fuckers who don’t know. Then my step dad came into the picture, and what I thought I knew about music was quickly replaced by what music was and is.

Through my stepfather I discovered the Pouges, 10,000 maniacs, Reverend Horton Heat, Stevie Ray Vaughn, Rancid, Nirvana, and countless other groups. Then I started getting into Blues and reggae with the likes of B.B. King, John Lee Hooker, Bob Marley and the Wailers, and Peter Tosh (thanks to my mother). Dead Kennedys, Operation Ivy, Suicide Machines, Black Flag, Mustard Plug were all due to my good friends. I mean the list could go on forever and it should. That’s the beauty of music. Just like learning anything there is never an end. Thank god for that.

So in trying to keep this within the format I’ll end it with this( and awkwardly so) Are you having a bad day?? Put on “Don’t Worry be Happy” by Bobby McFerrin or “Three Little Birds” by Bob Marley. If you’re ready to party, maybe put on some Push it by Salt N Peppa, (or for you Scotty, some “99 Red Balloons”). And for my hip hop heads (my true passion) I’ll give you my at-the-moment TOP 5: Anything off Nas’s Illmatic, “Ante Up” by M.O.P. “Beautiful Struggle” by Talib Kweli ( thank you Scotty), “Kick in the Door” by Biggie, and last, but not least, “Hellrazor” by Tupac Shakur. So Regardless of your taste, get in them damn crates, and loose yourself in the true gift to mankind…….. Music…..

-Ricky G-

Triumph – Wu-Tang Clan (assigned to Matt Ramah by The Shipment)

Posted on October 31, 2014 by admin

In music, convention tends to rule the airwaves. Certain rules apply in order to make a radio-worthy track. We recently went through the brutal age of the ring-tone, where having a catchy hook was the driving force behind platinum selling singles. It forced the artists to adapt to new styles because without change, a career could come crashing down. Who else would we look to when looking to challenge the conventional? The almighty Wu of course!

Who better to give a giant middle finger to the radio execs than a group that has spit in the face of the musical norms for their entire career. This supergroup has never sought acceptance for anything other than what they could say was entirely crafted by their musical desire, not by what others told them would work. These lyrical geniuses have even been proven to have a larger vocabulary than Shakespeare.

In a review of Shakespeare’s first 35,000 words written, he wrote 5,170 unique words. When compared with 85 hip-hop artists first 35,000 lyrics (The equivalent of 5 studio records), Aesop Rock, Kool Keith and the GZA set the bar much higher level than Mr. Hamlet himself. In the top 20 for hip-hop artists, Wu Tang as a group was 7th in unique words written. Broken down further, GZA is at #2, Ghostface Killah is at #9 and Raekwon and Method Man are at 19 and 20 respectively.

What better way to showcase this verbal depth and originality than to create a 6 minute assault on the senses entitled Triumph. Featured on the 1997 record Wu-Tang Forever, eight of the nine members ferociously claimed all of New York City as theirs and theirs only. No chorus needed, they just spit bars on bars. As they swarmed through the city on an unstoppable rampage, there wasn’t any time for some catchy hook, only time for utter lyrical domination.

When presented to the radio/video execs, RZA was told there was no way this would work and that it had to be edited. There was no hesitation in telling them to fuck off, take it or leave it, this project would be untouched or would be shelved for good. Wisely, the project was moved forward and even wound up having Brett Ratner direct the video (Director of Rush Hour). What came next was 6 minutes of visual madness and eargasmic genius. Enjoy as they do what they do best. They give it to ya raw with no trivia, like cocaine straight from Bolivia.

-Matt R-

Duke Dumont – Won’t Look Back (THE ASSIGNMENT)

Posted on October 29, 2014 by admin

My god…..the song “don’t look back” by the DJ Duke Dumont is another one of your typical club dance jams. Believe it or not it was #1 on the billboard dance charts along with another dance track of his earlier this year as well. So clearly he’s loved by the dance music community. With uncredited vocals by Yolanda Quartey, she is clearly very soulful and lends a bit of old school to the sound.

Now for the video….this shit is pretty wild. The video opens with 3 people in an old ass Van donning rubber masks in the likeness of the British royal family, with the Queen giving a nice parade wave as they drive by in slow motion. They pull up and and begin and armed robbery of a jewelry store and this is when it gets crazy.

Upon first watching, it looked like they were robbing the store with giant microphones and I was thinking it was gonna be something along the lines of media invasion of our lives or whatever. Boy was I wrong, about ten seconds later you see that the weapons are actually fucking pogo sticks as they start to hop away. Whoever did the pogo stunts for this video are amazing, some of the shit they pull off on those this is pretty badass.

As usual a stupid flatfoot copper wants to pursue and apprehend the pogo criminals. The piglet has a resemblance to Scott Bakula it seems and rides his Segway and uses interesting measures to get the first two royal family members. My favorite moments are definitely the pogo front flip over a car when they first see the cop, and the cop stealing an RC car from a little kid to sabotage the second royal family member. But once again the queen gets away and seemingly pogos off a skyscraper at the end with a “to be continued” message as it ends.

Overall a pretty funny and interesting video served up for me this week. This song was genred as UK garage, tech house, and deep house (whatever the fuck that means) so not exactly up my alley. But the soulful sound of the vocalist really took me back, and made it much more bearable. I think I might go get a pogo stick and try some freestyle moves……….or maybe not.

-The Shipment-

L.T.D. – LOVE BALLAD WITH 8-COUNT ENDING(SLOWJAM MUSIC VIDEO)REARRANGED(1977) (WEEK 1 of THE ASSIGNMENT)

Posted on October 23, 2014 by admin

I started this assignment shit and this is the motherfuckin’ thanks I get?? When a YouTube title is this long – L.T.D. – LOVE BALLAD WITH 8-COUNT ENDING (SLOWJAM MUSIC VIDEO)REARRANGED(1977) – you know you’re in for some shit. That all caps really screams at you, doesn’t it?? Now I’m not trying to hate on L.T.D., Love Ballad or Soul Train, so bare with me here.

Soul Train is an amazing part of television history. Live performances or lip-synched, rather. People dancing their asses off, holding nothing back while they sweat out their problems. Bell-bottom pants, crushed velvet, velour, polyester and the platform boots (note that I said boots) are fucking awesome. Who couldn’t love all of that anyway?? Plus, women with afros always heat things up for me. Mmmhmmm.

Now L.T.D.’s Love Ballad might be on the most passionate love songs of all time. Their namesake actually stands for Love, Tenderness and Devotion – which only solidifies the romantic passion they deliver. These guys had originally played in the band that accompanied Sam & Dave back in the 1960′s, infamous for their hit Hold on, I’m Comin’. Pretty much these guys were born to make great music.

Here’s where things take a turn downhill for me. The fucking 8-COUNT ENDING?? What? Why?? I mean…shit. Re-playing that clip over and over again 8-times was grueling. Even though it’s the same clip, it seemed like the people dancing in the crowd were even irritated by it. YouTube user kevante1 must have needed some extra time to seal the deal with his woman. If he showed her the video though and didn’t just let it play in the background, I bet she left by the fifth count.

The song is magical and has probably pulled more box than most tunes out there. The video started out awesome, but then just kind of fizzled out with that 8-COUNT nonsense. Hopefully that wasn’t a premonition into kevante1‘s special night. However after watching this video fourteen times, I’m definitely convinced he made it with the best intentions (and a lot of haste). Cheers to you kevante1, I hope you get what you deserve in this life.

Scotty2Hotty

p.s. Keep your eyes peeled for The Shipment’s next assignment…fucker.

Type of Way by Rich Homie Quan (THE ASSIGNMENT – week 1)

Posted on October 17, 2014 by admin

The song “type of way” by rich homie quan was suggested for me by a good friend for me to write a little about. He knows the significance of this song to a person they bleeds MSU green like myself. This song was adopted by the MSU football team for last season for whatever reason, and when I first heard it I thought it was crap.

This is the type of song I may have liked when I was younger but not so much anymore. I didn’t pay much attention to this song throughout the MSU football season, not really thinking too much of it. Meanwhile MSU wins the big ten and gets a spot in the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California which is pretty close to where I currently live. So I make the trip out there with some friends and my view on this song drastically changes.

This song was bumped frequently after driving into LA once I mentioned i hadn’t heard it too many times. This trip was one for the ages with a couple fellow MSU fans that have relocated to Arizona as well. We stayed in a guest house of one of my friends family members out there in Venice and went out and enjoyed the area bumping that song quite often. Then it was game day and that song was being played all over the tailgate area and I was seeing people who I hadn’t seen in years. The game that followed was epic and the victory was marked with the MSU coach quoting the song name and Quan being on the sideline during the game.

This song has little bits of brilliance in some of the wordplay, but overall it really lacks substance in my opinion. He yells out on a couple occasions that “I write too” implying he writes all of his own rhymes which is a good thing at least, but not necessarily something to be proud of. Although there are a few gems in there mostly in the second verse, “she got a Georgia peach on her rear end like a license plate….no rookie, Girl Scout cookie got me high today.” Great reference to a super premium strain of marijuana and a fine ass on a woman, can’t complain about that, “I set it off like Queen Latifah cuz I’m living single…” Impressive double reference to a movie and TV show starring the famous Queen of hip hop. The video reminds me of any and all previous cash money records videos, mainly BG for the rapping outside of the project buildings shirtless and various car and crew shots.

In the end “Type of Way” by Rich a Homie Quan leaves a lot to be desired in my opinion, but certainly holds a special place in my heart. One thing that still kinda bugs me is, who exactly is Rich Homie Quan? “Just because my homie’s Rich you feel some type of way” is a line that gets repeated. So is he Rich homie Quan? or does he have a rich homie named Quan? Seemingly the answer lies somewhere in the middle, nevertheless this song does indeed makes me feel some type of way, so apparently he’s done his job.

Until the next time,