The New York Times ran an interesting article a couple of days ago assessing Ludacris’ decision to enlist DJ Premier for his newest album, Theater of the Mind.  Check out the opening couple of paragraphs:
In a video on the YouTube channel of Ludacris’s label, Disturbing tha Peace, he watches as DJ Premier, the primary architect of 1990s East Coast rap formalism, picks out a line from an old Ludacris song, “Stand Up,” and cues up his turntable. Casually the D.J. begins cutting the vocals immaculately into smaller and smaller bits …

Ugly Duckling is a group that we here at 4080 have covered before.  In fact, I even went so far as to say this:
Ugly Duckling is one of the the dopest hip hop groups around. They definitely don’t get anywhere near enough credit, often being disregarded as “silly”. As three dudes from Long Beach who definitely don’t take themselves too seriously, I think they’re exactly what hip hop needs to appeal to a wider audience.
With all of that still being said, I must say with some trepdiation that the new …

In the early 1970s, nine American servicemen stationed in Germany formed a soul band.  They called themselves 100% Pure Poison (it was the seventies, after all). After sneaking in to a music industry conference and snagging a deal with British EMI, they released their first and only album, Coming Right At You.  According to All Music Guide, the album features vocal interplay “recalling the Temptations” and “a jazzy instrumental sophistication equal to the Blackbyrds.”  
While I can’t vouch for the whole thing, one track on Coming Right At You has found …

Earlier today, the annual Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade was Rick Rolled – as in Rick Astley himself jumped out of a float and started singing “Never Gonna Give You Up.”  Greatest. Parade. Ever.

Hip Hop Renatus is the latest mixtape burnin’ up the interweb.  Presented by DUB MD – admittedly a cat I’ve never heard of – Renatus features a host of up-and-coming wordsmiths spitting hot 16s over “new, rare, classic and unreleased” beats by hip-hop’s finest producers: Dilla, Primo, Madlib, Pete Rock, Large Pro, 9th Wonder and more.
Apparently, ‘renatus’ means rebirth in Latin.  And on this album, DUB MD and his guests do just that by providing new life to some absolutely bananas beats.
In DUB MD’s own words, the project is “thirty …

Earlier this morning, Fox News announced that Alan Colmes (pictured above) will leave the network’s popular Hannity & Colmes debate program at the end of the year.  Apparently, after twelve years of ’sparring’ with conservative counterpart Sean Hannity, Colmes is moving on “to develop new and challenging ways to contribute to the growth of the network.”  Whatever that means.
If you’ve ever seen Hannity & Colmes, you know that despite its billing as a “debate talk show,” the program offers neither enlightening discussion nor insightful commentary.  Colmes, ostensibly the duo’s liberal half, …

If you listen to hip-hop, you know ”Seven Minutes of Funk” by Tyrone Thomas and the Whole Darn Family.  Even if you can’t identify it by name, or have any idea who Tyrone Thomas or his apparently massive family are, the first twenty second of this track have been indelibly etched into your subconscious. Have a listen:

A quick search of the sample database at The Breaks shows that “Seven Minutes” has been sampled for thirteen songs.  I suspect, however, that that list is incomplete given how damn funky and perfectly sample-able the …

I can’t tell you how much I love the internet.  It’s the eternal time-waster, but it also lets me get exposed to things I never would have seen otherwise.  Playing for Change is just one such example.
This movie (brought to me courtesy of Metafilter) is fascinating.  The filmmaker went to a variety of different countries all over the world, and had different musicians sing/play along to the song Stand By Me.  He then layered the tracks together and created a pretty amazing song.  Check it out below.

I didn’t even know about this until yesterday, but Pitchfork is reporting that the Roots were involved in a bus accident on their tour in Europe.  Their tour bus collided with another car and thankfully everyone is okay.  ?uestlove blogged about it and said ““In reality the crash was all of about 7 seconds….but to do a 360 on the highway and end up ramped up (the van that crashed into ours was UNDER our double decker bus) in the air….is….well… a frigging miracle.””
You can see a picture of the …

[adult swim] is a pretty crazy concept.  It started off as the late night Cartoon Network and has now branched off to be this international force.  Basically, it’s now it’s own network.  They release albums, participate in crazy advertising campaigns, run an internet radio station, have a podcast.  The [adult swim] network has an agreement with Stones Throw Records, one of the more progressive labels out there.

Their newest album is a compilation of South African hip hop and is definitely worth checking out.

You can listen to the whole album below.  …