SOULMAN WORLD OF BEATS VOL. 2 - DIG IT! (A BLAST FROM THE PAST)

After dropping two "now-level" Soulman mixes this week, it's only right that I step into the time machine and come back out with one of my early joints, the 1998 released Soulman World Of Beats Vol. 2 - Dig It! This is from back in the cassette days, the all analog no digital days, the just discovering the wonders of the internet days (you know, that magical era when you were up all night marveling at the fact that you could see SO much porn so easily in the privacy of your own home- man, the things these kids take for granted nowadays, they just don't know what it used to be like!). The Corel Draw graphics because I don't know about Photoshop yet days. Great memories, everything was still so fresh and new back then. I've gotten a few requests to drop some of the old mixes, so the giving person that I am will gladly oblige from time to time (just don't forget I still sell stuff on CD-Rs too if you really need some of the earlier Soulman joints... hit me up, I'll let you know what it is).
I merely dropped an excerpt of this mix in an earlier post, this time I'm blessin' y'all with the full monty (pause). Breaks, beats, loops, grooves, sample spotting... it's all there in that time honored Soulman style (and I WILL get back to some schitt like this again one day... I don't know when, but I will).

SOULMAN WORLD OF BEATS VOL. 2 - DIG IT! sidefirst
SOULMAN WORLD OF BEATS VOL. 2 - DIG IT! sidenext

SOULMAN - BEAUTIFUL 2

The good news is that it's been a productive day today... finished up and mixed this Beautiful 2 joint, did the photoshoot (thanks to Khalil Stroman Photography Inc. for the hook up), put together the cover art and here it is for your listening pleasure today, just as I promised yesterday. The not-as-good news is that it looks like I'm gonna miss the Freeway / Jake One show here in Philly at the Troc tonight (sorry I can't make it but thanks for putting me on the list anyway, hommie... I know y'all gonna rock it). Well, just as with the last Beautiful joint I did, I'm real happy about this one. Make sure to let me know if you dig this kind of schitt, 'cuz I'm itchin' to drop number three very soon if you want more.

BTW (and totally off topic), did anybody see that NBA all star dunk contest the other night? WEAK. Worst of all time. Dudes have no imagination whatsoever. If any of y'all NBA dunk dudes are listening, I'll give you one for next year (save this for your show stopper)- dribble the ball while you're standing at half court, about to make your dunk. Then suddenly just put the ball down. The crowd will start gasping like "wtf??? What's he doing? Is he quitting???" Then just start running towards the hoop without the ball. Everyone will think you've gone insane. What they don't know is that while the last guy was doing his li'l wack ass dunk, you were on the sidelines untying one of your kicks, loosening it up just enough that it won't fall off while you're running. As you leap into the air towards the hoop, you reach down and take off the loose sneaker while in midair then bring it up and WINDMILL DUNK THE SNEAKER. Hang from the rim for effect (and also to ease your one-barefooted landing). The fans are happy, the streets are happy, the sneaker companies are happy, and David Stern is doing something prematurely in his dress slacks he's so happy. You don't have to pay me for that one, NBA dunk dudes... just do it. Do SOMETHING. Anything. I got a million of 'em, hit me on the e-mail and I'll do y'all that solid (the sneaker dunk was free but any of my other ideas will be for a small fee, of course... y'all can afford it).

SOULMAN - BEAUTIFUL 2

EDIT: if you need this in MP3 form instead of the M4a or whatever that schitt is above, here it is again-

SOULMAN - BEAUTIFUL 2 (MP3)

SOULMAN - LOVERS AND FRIENDS

Although my PC is down, I refuse to let my computer woes stop THAT REAL SCHITT from marching forward... had to pull out the Macbook (which I rarely use due to the fact that I don't know jack about Macs) and get busy as best I can. I planned on dropping another one of my many belated mixes this Valentines weekend and here it is. Didn't have many of my usual tools to hook up the music and visuals, so I improvised. No Photoshop? I downloaded the GIMP schitt for Mac and did what I could do for the graphics (not much different than what I normally do- I'm no pro at any of this schitt, believe me). Had to do a LOT of schitt differently, but it got done.

This is just a collection of some sweet soul-ish stuff that I like and have been listening to for awhile now. Some I got from my vinyl collection, some I got from around the internets (like the Top Shelf "Let Them Keep On Talking" from Matthew Africa's blog... thanks, Matt!). I'd like to say this is perfect since this is Valentines Day, but some of the songs are more on some "I lost you and we're not together any more" steez rather than some "I love you and you love me and we'll be together FOREVER" schitt. There's plenty of that too, but I'm just giving y'all that disclaimer before you play this mix for your sweetie tonight and she gets depressed and leaves your ass. Regardless, it's a lot of great music so enjoy.

And also, BTW- Soulman BEAUTIFUL PT. 2 tomorrow.

SOULMAN - LOVERS AND FRIENDS

EDIT: if you need this in MP3 form instead of the M4a or whatever that schitt is above, here it is again-

SOULMAN - LOVERS AND FRIENDS (MP3)

DOIN' HIP HOP A FAVOR: FREEWAY & JAKE ONE OMG

Hey y'all... still chillin' on the THAT REAL SCHITT content for now, but looks like I'm about to get snowed in yet again here in Philly (we just got hit with 29 inches on white flakes last weekend, now Mama Nature's about to dump another foot and a half on us tonight and all day tomorrow... yikes) so maybe while I'm stuck in the house for a day or two I'll come up with some new schitt for the site. Meanwhile, here are a couple of Youtube vids that have been making the rounds already all over the internet, but if you haven't already seen 'em you really need to get a load of these. My homie Jake One and one of my favorite rappers, Philly homeboy Freeway, are prepared to drop an album that's gonna bring the rap world to a halt just like this cotdamned snow is about to stop everything from moving here in Philly. Not trying to make this into a commercial, but as crazy as any Jake Wizzle / Philly Freezer fan knows the music is gonna be.... well, just check out the packaging. INSANE. I just ordered seven copies, no lie (and will probably cop another five or so... even if this album sells a million, sealed minty copies are probably gonna be worth some dough one day... real collectors know the deal). Check out both the cd and the LP and tell me what's f***in' with this. WOWWWW.

Download:

FLVMP43GP

Download:

FLVMP43GP

PHILLY PHILL - FIGHT GAME (MORE YOUTUBERRY)

Yoooo... been mad busy getting my eBay on and whatever else, haven't had time to update in a minute. Until I get back into the flow, here's some more Youtubbery I put up whilst experimenting with the whole upload process. Another sneak peak from the Phill Most Chill "Philly Phill's Old School Album" which I hopefully will finish up one of these years. Have a happy old school winter's day and I'll be back soon.

 

SOULMAN - DRUGS (MY FIRST YOUTUBE VID)

Hey, my realschitters... this is my first little test attempt at putting up a Youtube vid, a clip from my Soulman "Drugs" cd from back in 2001. Seems easy enough, so I'm gonna see about making some more of these- my own music but also just some other stuff that hasn't been put up on the Tube by anybody else yet. My Youtube username is thatrealschitt (what else?), so check me out periodically.
Meanwhile, here a few other Soulman / Phill Most Chill related music vids I stumbled on while browsing Youtube the other day. Happy 2010!

HIP HOP LESSONS 2009: MORE OLD SCHOOL TAPE HISTORY FOR Y'ALL

A schittload of old school tapes have flooded the internets since I first started dropping my Hip Hop Lessons for the holidays a few years back, so I wasn't so sure that there was still a need for me to continue with it. But, as always, the people have spoken and informed me that the world is still in need of an education on the true meaning of Hip Hop. So here we go again-

COLD CRUSH BROTHERS vs. DOCTOR ROCK & THE FORCE MC'S - One of the great battle tapes from Hip Hop's early days, a battle that was really more like a sucker punch TKO. The CC4 had no idea that a battle was even taking place, so they did their normal show then bounced to go make another engagement later that night. After the Cold Crush was gone from the premises, the Force MC's took the stage and proceeded to go at them with an unprecedented level of sheer disrespect, even beyond Kool Moe Dee vs. Busy Bee preportions. As legend has it, when the Cold Crush later got wind of what had gone down, they made a point of stepping to the Force HARD the next time their paths crossed- made them apologize and seriously warned them to never pull a stunt like that again. What surprised me when I read about this battle was that the Force MC's really were not all that respected among the top groups of the day... I know they were from Staten Island, which at that time I guess was like being from Martha's Vinyard as far as the hardcore Bronx dudes were concerned. But I'd heard so many tapes where the Force was rocking at shows with all the other groups and were killing it with the harmonies and routines, I just assumed that everybody respected them as being among the elite. Regardless, they most definitely made their mark in the streets with this battle- if you don't already have it you certainly need it.


COLD CRUSH BROTHERS & TREACHEROUS THREE BOATRIDE TO BEAR MOUNTAIN, 1982 - I used to go to Bear Mountain (in Verplanck, NY) almost every summer when I was a teenager... a great place to see nature and all that schitt but also an ideal spot to bring a few cases of brew and find a secluded flat rock up in the hills where you could get busy with the fly girly of your choosing. Such fond memories. Anyway, it seems that some of the early Hip Hop legends also used to venture out to the Mountain- by boat, it would appear- and actually did shows during their fantastic voyage. This clip features LA Sunshine and Moe Dee of the Treach rockin' the m-i-c along with Easy AD, JDL and GMC of the Cold Crush, with the highlight being Caz not only saying the original "Knucklehead Rap" but ALSO the rarely heard part two.

TREACHEROUS THREE FREESTYLING - Yes, I know I post a lot of clips with the Treach rhyming... an indication of how much admiration I have for the group and their skills in their heyday. I was blown away by "New Rap Language" back in 1980 and just thought T3 had the best rhymes out of all the other groups runnin' schitt in the early days. Most crews back then had one or maybe two emcees who were strong and then the rest of them were kinda nondescript, but all three of the Treacherous rappers were real nice IMO... super clear voices, style, intelligent well constructed lyrics, etc. For me, not much beats hearing Moe, LA and K rhyming to "Life On Mars", "Truck Turner", etc... RAW.


MASTERDON AND DEATH COMMITTEE (a.k.a. The Turn It Out Three), HARLEM WORLD 1982 - A couple of clips from one of my favorite old school tapes. Always love those Death Committee routines back when Boo-Ski was down with the crew. And BTW, for those who don't know, in the Hip Hop world "def" was spelled D-E-A-T-H before Def Jam records hit the scene in '84.


FEARLESS FOUR at HARLEM WORLD, 1982 - Since a few people requested more Fearless Four recently and my homeboy Oldskool4real said he hadn't heard many tapes with the whole crew together, here's a clip with DLB, Tito, Mike C and Peso passing the mic around during one of their shows at Harlem World sometime between the release of "It's Magic" and "Rockin' It". Would've included more of their performance but IMO their harmonizing routines really were not their strongpoint so I cut those parts out... maybe I'll drop the whole show some other time.
SOULSONIC FORCE & JAZZY JAY at the T-CONNECTION, 1980 - Love those Zulu Nation tapes- they're always rocking some beats you don't hear on anybody else's tapes. This time I'm hearing stuff like Kenny Rogers' "Tulsa Turnaround" and "Funky Soul Shake" by E.T. White.

There you have it... as always, if you are looking for the full tapes and / or for other long lost old school live Hip Hop cassettes, hit up my brother Troy L. Smith over at the Old School Hip Hop forum (and Troy, if you want to feel free to leave your contact info in the comments or get in touch with me and I'll put the info up right here). Class dismissed.

PRE-XMAS SNOWSTORM OLD SCHOOL YOUTUBE REAL SCHITT MEGABLAST

I'm snowed in my crib on a Saturday watching the Cowboys put it on the Saints (could this be the end of the unbeaten season? )... seemed like a perfect time to post some raw mid 80's hip hop courtesy of Youtube...

























So dope...

ASTRONOMICAL LYRICAL WHEREWITHAL AWAKENS YOUR SENSES

WORD POWER. What up MC Paul B!

SEE YOU TOMORROW (MONTY STARK 1940 - 2009)

I'm not gonna make this post about how I copped my Stark Reality og vinyl or how much it's selling for according to Popsike or any of that. I'm not gonna write a full fledged eulogy, either (but I will direct you to what Egon wrote on the Now Again Records site)... just a few words about the man Monty Stark. Although I only knew Monty personally from a few e-mails and posts on Soulstrut, MySpace, etc., it was clear to me that he was cool people. Just little stuff like his posting of the cover of my Archaeologists' Classics Vol. 82 cassette - the one with the Stark Reality-bitten artwork- on the 'Strut, his way of winking at me and saying "I see you, Soulman!" Putting the picture of my kids holding my copy of the Stark lp up on his site (Akilah and Khalil loved that). Hearing a beat I made using his "All You Need To Make Music" and giving it the thumbs up, even if he probably didn't really get my "hiphopizationing" of his original tune. Cool people. So of course I'm sad to know that the world has lost not only a brilliant music man but also a very cool human being... I don't know, maybe it's me but it doesn't seem like they make so many of those anymore. Anyway, I'm rockin' "Comrades" right now as I type these words, and I'm feeling pretty good. "Friendship for life... see you tomorrow." Word up. Thanks, Monty.

SOULMAN - BEAUTIFUL

I was at the Old Country Buffet (one of my favorite eating spots- I'm cheap) awhile back and I noticed one of the employees, a barely legal if even legal at all young dude, hitting on a customer, a cute late 30-ish older woman. She rebuffed his advances, claiming that she was too old for him. Young dude, undeterred, stared her in the eye and calmly replied "I know what I like." Gotta give it to the youngin'- swag for days.
That's kinda how I feel about psych rock, which is my current favorite genre of music to listen to. I probably don't really know a damn thing about psych- every time I look up info on a psych album online, the reviews rarely sing the praises of the songs on the album that I like the most. They'll talk about the genius of some song on the lp that I'm not familiar with, then I'll go back to the record to listen to this song and be like WTF is this? Obviously I'm not hearing it from a true psych enthusiasts' perspective. Which I guess makes sense, since I'm a black first generation Hip Hop dude... I didn't grow up on Zep or Sabbath or the Beach Boys or Zappa or even Hendrix. I grew up on James Brown and Earth Wind & Fire and Stevie Wonder and the Furious 5.
Yet and still, I know what I like. Music with soul, music that touches you somewhere deeper than the epidermis. And any real music head knows that soul isn't just found on albums that have pics of dudes with afros on the jacket. I hear the soul in Aretha Franklin but I also hear it in Rachmaninoff's 2nd. In fact, "hear it" isn't the best way to put it- I feel it. That's what music is all about, man... people can tell you all day that this is the hot schitt, this is what's banging now, whateva whateva, but it doesn't matter. Music isn't a popularity contest, it's not about soundscan numbers, it's only about what you feel or don't feel. No matter what I say about something being THATREALSCHITT, if you can't feel what I'm feeling then it's a waste of time even trying to explain it.
So anyway, enough of my yadda-yadda-ing. Yes, it's true- I'm dropping another new Soulman mix a mere three days after the last new Soulman mix. Guess the hiatus is officially over, eh? This one, entitled Beautiful, basically picks up where The Truth Is Forever left off. Just playing a bunch of soft, mellow psych songs that I really love. Familiar folky stuff that the Vashti Bunyan and Linda Perhacs fans out there may already know and love but also some other very nice tunes that only the most hardcore psych dudes are gonna be hip to. This joint may be too light for the more gnarly real schitters, and my Hip Hop real schitters can probably just fuggetaboutit, but I'm hoping folks will dig this (Beautiful Pt. 2 and maybe even Pt. 3 are on deck already, so if y'all are feelin' it more will be dropped ASAP). Thanks for listening.

SOULMAN - BEAUTIFUL

SOULMAN - COME TO ME SOFTLY

Told you I'd be back... and here I is with another Soulman mix. This is really more of a Best Of Archaeologists compilation type joint... I'm just putting my name on all of 'em from now on (why not?). No cutting and scratching, just playing some music I like.
This is another one of those mixes that's been sitting around unfinished for a long azz time- probably a couple of these songs I wouldn't have put on the mix if I did it yesterday just because I've heard them on too many other people's mixes. But who cares... I like all the selections regardless if I heard them a hundred times before or if they're still new to my ears. Like a wise dude once said, the truth is forever. Besides, I think it's a pretty decent mosaic of uncommon and commonplace, rarefied and somewhat routine. Soul, psych, jazzy, modern, whatever's clever.
The working title on this was "Spring Mix" because most of the stuff is light and breezy and soulful... unfortunately I'm like a couple of season changes late on the release date and I didn't feel like waiting until next March to drop it, so here it is. F--- it, autumn is pretty breezy too, right? I can see the leaves falling in the background while sipping a mug of hot apple cider and vibing out to this schitt. Hope y'all like it, and if not I got another one in the chamber that may be ready by this weekend as well. Happy turkey day to whoever's celebrating it and peace to everybody else too.

SOULMAN - COME TO ME SOFTLY

A COUPLE OF VIDEOS I LIKE

Yo... thanks to all who have hit me up during The Hiatus via comments or e-mail. Wish I could say I'm back, but really I'm not... just wanted to post these videos I peeped recently because they were both made to be posted on THAT REAL SCHITT.
First is an excerpt from the film SBX! Holding Down The Tradition, which is a real nice slice of Hip Hop from the home of Hip Hop, the Bronx, New York. Featuring cats like Lord Finesse and other D.I.T.C. members / affiliates... real nice. Highlight of the film is this little performance by Edan in which he simply kills it... watch for yourself and see what I mean. Be sure to buy that Echo Party joint by Edan when it drops shortly... haven't heard it yet but word is that it's bananaramas.



My favorite music video of the moment, and possibly my favorite music video of the last and current centuries, is this joint here by my brothers PUTS. People Under The Stairs just seem to make great videos... man, they shoulda been out in the Yo! MTV Raps days back when good rap videos actually got a lot of airtime. This, IMHO, is a great rap video.



One last thing: I WILL be back. Working on some stuff now. See y'all soon...

THE HIATUS

Yep, I'm in the middle of it right now. Hot fun in the summertime + real schitt malaise + another possible external hard drive issue (yep, even my extra back-up drive is acting like it's about to push up daisies) = hiatus status for the time being. I may be back in effect tomorrow, I may NEVER return to regular real schitt blogposts, who knows. Football season's about to start, I'm getting my young people ready to go back to school and I'm rockin' Jay-Z's latest collection of old man rapps in the whip... my mind is just not into bloggery right now. I do have some mixes that just need to be finalized, so once that's done maybe I'll make my comeback at that time. Like I said previously, who knows. I'm checkin' the stats though, I see a lot of folks are still coming through on a daily basis, so that's most definitely appreciated. Until I get my mojo back (IF I get my mojo back), feel free to drop me a comment and tell me what kind of schitt you'd like to see here at THAT REAL SCHITT in the future... maybe that'll light a fire under my azz. ONE.

SEASON OF DA VICK

Yep, it's NFL Football (the american version of football... you know, with the brown ball) time again.... don't know how many people who are reading THAT REAL SCHITT can help me with this, but if there are any pissed off Eagles fans out there who want to sell their season tickets, I will buy them. Contact me at philasoul@aol.com and we can do biz. Hey, I love dogs too, but season tickets are season tickets.