Date:Posted By:Category:blog, Hip Hop, remixesTag:, , , , ,

Recent Hip Hop Releases

Wow. Already almost thru winter. The world is a blur. Here are a few recent drops from my YouTube channel.

Hold Dat Remix is what I think could and should have been an official release from Das Efx. Over a decade ago Krazy Drayz brought this beat to the table. It was from a producer he met over the internet. It came with the hook already built in so I didn’t do the chorus on this one. Dray laid a verse to it and left the 2nd open for Skoob. I don’t think Skoob was too crazy about the beat so we never got a verse from him. One day while going over some files I came across the incomplete song with the open verse and decided to mix in an acapella verse from Skoob I had on a record. The song was “Raisin’ Hell” and was a very small white label type of release that not many people heard and made absolutely no noise. Everything seemed to be tailor made and it sounded like a hot record. I played it for the guys and they knew it was fire but Skoob didn’t want to release a recycled verse and never got around to recording a new verse. Dray went on the touch up his first verse and add a second for the original version of Hold Dat that appeared on his solo album “Showtime”. We shot a video for it, made a Big L Remix and everything.

Recently while going thru some old hard drives digging up some gems to post on my YouTube channel I came across the “demo” mix I did. I decided to use the upgraded, mixed and mastered studio version this time from Krazy Drayz’s album and recreate it. I rolled up my sleeves and got in the lab to work my magic and this was the final product. I also edited down an animated still video for YouTube which is below. Everyone that hears it swears its some new Das Efx heat but little do they know the true story behind it.

Also posted are 2 other classic remixes from G-Unit, Mobb Deep and M.O.P. taken from Napalm 1 & 2 which YouTube has taken down when I tried to post the entire mixtape. =(

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Date:Posted By:Category:Dirty South, Hip Hop, Lil Wayne, remixes

YO HIPS YO THIGHS/SHOW ME MY OPPONENT

Every great artist in the music business has a “run”. Some are short, some are longer but a good “run” is when the artist/group is at their top relevancy. There is no denying Lil Wayne had one of the best runs ever in hip-hop. From around 2007 until the mid 2010’s he was everywhere. Several multi-platinum albums and an endless stream of features and mixtape music solidified his legacy around this time. Here are 2 of the many Lil Wayne remixes I made during this period.

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Date:Posted By:Category:blog, Hip Hop, RnB

ESSENCE (BOLD & BEAUTIFUL)

By the late 90’s I had got my weight up considerably as a producer and was working with a lot of up and coming artists. I was still doing some parties and mixtapes here and there but my main goal was to make it as a producer. My MPC 2000 would stay turned on for months. My partner in crime on the beats Kev a.k.a. Bugged Out would spend days at my crib locked in on tracks.

After a while I had compiled a good amount of songs I did with numerous groups/artists. It was time for people to start hearing the music we were making. Kev came up with the idea to put out a project with some of the people we were working with and call it “The Dangerous Minded Clik”. It would not necessarily be a group but a collective of people we were building with. I liked the idea and decided to put out a maxi-single with 3 songs.

I picked 3 of the better songs in the stash. They were “For My Niggaz” by Mr. Phace , “Shorty How U Like That?” by Lod Boy and “Essence (Bold & Beautiful) by N.S.E.C. With these 3 songs I tried to cover all bases. “For My Niggaz” was the street song, “Shorty How U Like That” was the “jiggy” club joint and “Essence” was something smooth for the ladies but the fellas could get with it too. I went to VP records in Queens to get the lacquer master made by Paul Shields to try to get the biggest and best sound I could for my budget. I got my man Pito aka Drew to draw the eye catching label art. I found a record pressing plant in Brooklyn and everyone made contributions to the cause and we did our first pressing.

I hit the streets and put them in as many record stores as I could including the legendary Beat Street in downtown Brooklyn, Upstairs Records and Rock & Soul Records in Manhattan. I hit off as many magazines and DJs with promo copies as I could. I even took out some ads in some small magazines. As time would go on the project proved to be a success and helped pave the way for things to come in the future.

The record received favorable reviews in many publications including RER magazine in France that even included “Essence (Bold & Beautiful)” on a promo cd that came with every copy of that month’s issue and it was mentioned by DJ Rhude of XXL magazine in his column in the well known “Murder Inc” issue with Jay-Z, Ja-Rule and DMX on the cover. 2 songs from the single were also selected to be included on “D-Originators”, a compilation album in France that also included Pete Rock, Pharoahe Monch, Group Home and others.

It did good sales in most places, especially Rock & Soul Records, and has gone on to become somewhat of a collectors item. One day I googled the record out of the blue only to find copies selling for up to $100 from collectors all over the world on E Bay and Discogs. It’s been posted by several YouTube channels with rather high view counts and comments of many who purchased the actual vinyl record when it dropped. Although vinyl would be pretty much phased out in the years to come this experience as an independent record label helped when it came time to work my other projects from the perspective of an actual label doing business and the things that come with it. Look out for the other songs from this single and the full album that followed in the future.

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Date:Posted By:Category:blog, Hip Hop, throwbacks

DJ RONDEVU ON THE TRACK – CAN YOU FEEL IT

When I was younger The Fat Boys were one of my favorite groups. They were actually the Disco 3 when I bought their first 12” single. I spent hours trying to emulate the beat box sounds of Buffy and replaying their amazing songs. Years later I produced a track for Das Efx sampling one of their songs to pay homage to them as well as Larry Smith, the criminally slept on producer of the original Can You Feel It. You don’t want to do too much to a classic but I put a few touched to the timeless original beat to create the Das Efx version which was made to be a feel good, throwback type of song. Check it out below and don’t be afraid to do a break dance move or pop lock while listening. 😃#RealHipHop

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Date:Posted By:Category:blog, Hip Hop

DJ RONDEVU ON THE TRACK – UN PACINO – IT’S GANGSTA

I met Un Pacino around the same time I met Das Efx. When I first got with Das it wasn’t as a Dj, it was as a producer. They had taken a liking to my beats and I had become an in house producer of sorts. They put together a roster of artists they would attempt to put out and they were called The Ressless Clique. It was comprised of Dray and Skoob themselves, an R&B singer from Atlanta named J Dirty and 2 MCs from Far Rockaway, Queens. They were Scott Caine and Un which was short for Unforgettable. They were kind of a duo and had great chemistry together on a track but Un always showed that he could also be a solo artist. There was no denying he was lyrically gifted and had a unique voice.

We recorded a few Ressless Clique songs that weren’t released and eventually hit the road together. When I began to dj the shows for Das Efx we went on a nationwide tour with Black Sheep and the whole crew came. We hit just about every state in the continental US and we lived on a tour bus for over a month. We all got really tight from that experience.

After the tour Das Efx and the Ressless Clique would record some freestyles for my mixtapes and they even got released as underground white labels. We would continue to do shows together while working on new material. When we were together there would be a steady menu of blunts and beats. After one session with the guys there was a beat I played that while it wasn’t quite Das Efx’s style Un was feeling it and wanted to record a song to it. At the time I was putting together a compilation project of songs I produced so I figured I could use it on there. We hit the studio and “It’s Gangsta” was born. This was probably Un’s first solo song. It would later be on my “Dangerous Minded” album and dvd.

Un would add “Pacino” to his name and began to come into his own as an MC. I featured him on many of my mixtapes and his name began to spread. He was featured on a few songs on Das Efx’s 5th studio album “How We Do” and he did some work with Mic Geronimo before becoming a fixture of the mixtape and dvd scene. His “Hard White” mixtape series with Scott Caine and H. Brando became some of the hardest out and his freestyles and songs would appear on countless DJ mixtapes. This led to him working with Prodigy from Mobb Deep. They created many songs and eventually went on to release an album together called “Product of the 80’s” before Prodigy’s untimely death.

Since then Un Pacino has gone on to “underground legend” status. With no record deal he has released a catalog of mixtapes, albums and music videos that rival many artists signed to labels. While his style may never be commercial it’s nice to see him maintain a certain lyrical integrity that is lacking in the game today and make a respected name for himself by doing so.

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