One of my favourite tracks from Travis Barker’s debut studio album, which features Beanie Sigel, Bun B & upcoming R&B singer Kobe. Didn’t expect much from the album, so was pleasantly surprised with what I heard - a few skippable tracks, but a very enjoyable listen on the whole.
One of two iTunes bonus tracks from the Chef’s latest album, which was released a couple of days ago. This one features the GZA and Killah Priest. Go get your copy now, it’s definitely worth it.
Today is the 14th anniversary of the death of Christopher George Latore Wallace, better known as The Notorious B.I.G., or Biggie Smalls. His career, all be it short lived, will go down in history as one of the most influential of all-time - with only two studio albums he changed the way that everyone looked at Hip-Hop as a whole. Biggie Smalls was definitely the illest.
Here is my favourite track from Akira The Don’s new mixtape ATD25. Lyrically this is brilliant, and the beat is sick. He is a top guy, extremely talented and has a incredibly dope blog. You can go and get the mixtape from HERE and follow him on twitter HERE.
It was a different word, 2004. No Youtube. No Myspace even. You got mixtapes from barber shops and through the mail back then. There were no free mixtapes online. There were no rappers with blogs posting free mixtapes on them. There was just me, and my complete lack of technical ability, not one clue what I was doing other than it was what I had always wanted to do, and it made me happy to do it.
It took over an hour to render, and about three hours to force its way up the pipes.
PING!
The internets went nuts. To my utter joy and amazement it was a huge success. Over 100,000 downloads in under a month! But like I said, providing an hour of musicfor people to listen to, at no charge, was a novelty in 2004. I had the market cornered. I was the market.
Now look! A billion blogs, all churning out hours of free music every second of the day. A mixtape every minute. Some days it seems the inerenet is wholly comprised of free mixtapes.
But none of them are like mine.
See, I work hard at this. And I have been getting better and better, over the years, pushing myself further and harder with each release, making sure that every time I put together a block of music, I learn something new, and do something I haven’t done before.
And now, with nearly seven years of hard lessons learned, I am proud to present to you my most accomplished home grown project yet:
ATD25 For The Ultimate Victory!
YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!
This great landmark, my quarter century, silver anniversary mixtape was recorded between November 2010 and April 2011 with my excellent friends and the skills I’ve assessed in the past decade, and it was mixed by myself and DJ Jack Nimble right here in Don Studios, LAST NIGHT, with the aid of NO WEED and a small bottle of Jack Daniels.
I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who contributed to this, and all the ATD mixtapes, past, present and future.
THANK YOU!
OK. Click the individual track titles below to read additional information, click the links below to download, and most importantly, ENJOY IT. It is my gift to you.
Oh, and look out for the very exciting announcement at the end.
Lupe’s long awaited and highly anticipated 3rd studio album, Lasers, is set to be released on March 7th. Below are two of my favourite tracks from it - Coming Up is a piano driven banger, which is produced by The Future and features MDMA who appear on 3 of the 12 tracks. Secondly is the track that I was looking forward to hearing most, Break The Chain, which features Eric Turner & Sway and is produced by Ishi who is a man that has taken the UK music scene by storm over the past 12 months. On the whole this is a massive album, definitely worth purchasing, but I expect more from the next project. Lupe will always be one of my favourite rappers.
Two of my favourite joints from Raekwon’s upcoming 5th solo album, Shaolin Vs Wu-Tang. First up is Rich And Black, which features fellow Hip-Hop legend NaS, and is an absolute monster - Sean C & L went crazy on the beat. The second track is Masters Of Our Fate, which has a much more laid back vibe and features Roots member Black Thought. Everything about this album screams classic and is guaranteed to be one of the best Hip-Hop albums of 2011. Make sure you get your copy on March 8th. Wu-Tang forever baby.
A new one from Rapper Big Pooh, which features the lovely Carlitta Durand. Nice to see them both doing their thing still, and doing it VERY well. Always been huge supporters of them both since day one, and will continue to be if they keep producing music like this. LB4L.
Monday, March 14, 2011 at 1:31PM 
