When the summer has faded and fall is kicking in, I love my 90’s east coast hip hop from the likes of the lost boys and smif-n-wessun… yup… razor up under the tongue type rap once I put that first hoodie on for the season. but let me set it straight right quick… i can’t listen to just that style of rap over and over… for me, fall usually means a break from summer grasshopping. fall means i need to slow it down a bit in the headphones… you know… enjoy that coffee while listening to some mellow tunes. something like this have always made me feel cool.
sure i love some top notch emceeing from rap’s greats but we gotta tranquilo just a bit… need to have something that makes you feel like you can sing and has you thinking that you might actually be good? you should see me in the car solo dolo… i got the crazy croons and harmonizing… you do too though right? there’s no way you listen to this track and then aren’t dancing just a bit… moving just a bit… singing just a bit… raphael saadiq and d’angelo… sh*t, damn, motha….
how about the production on this? janet jackson was sooooooooooooooo smooth on this… Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis with the sounds that had a crazy amount of depth… i heard this beat and it made me feel like i was 6 different places at once. this song grounded me but at the same time showed me how to fly… the adlibs… the background pitched down vocals… wow… perfection.
even a white dude like mayer hawthorne can find himself in this vibe too… i remember telling my dad to close his eyes while i played him one of mayer hawthorne’s first few songs on his stones throw album… was that his debut album? i guess it doesn’t matter… my dad had his eyes closed and i let him listen for about 30 seconds and he totally thought it was an oldie that he wasn’t up on. he loved that i was listening to music like this. i can’t be gangsta rap 24/7/365…
i loved mos def the rapper but i think i like mos def the artist more… umi says just stays with me in a way that not many songs do. the mighty mos def just seems so unpolished on this and it makes it str8 perfection to me. i didn’t know he was a singer… but then again, i just knew a few songs from him… little did i know his aspirations within hip hop let alone his dreams as a human being… i just knew i would always be a fan of his art whether his name be mos def or yasiin bey.
when amy winehouse was gaining popularity, the media focused on her downfalls so much. she was making beautiful music but was obviously going through a lot… her music was beautiful… her soul was beautiful… but she was an addict… not cool to put that spotlight on somebody like the media did back then… i could look past anything for a kindred spirit who drops off something like this for the world to hear.
anderson .paak dropped the album, malibu in 2016. it will go down as one of the best 100 albums of all time. it was a new sound… a new wave… a new vibe from a kid who worked very hard to get to the levels he achieved. anderson .paak couldn’t become anderson .paak without breezy lovejoy… anderson .paak caught me forever with that malibu album. “your heart don’t stand a chance” is just one of those songs… that makes my soundtrack 2 life playlist… no doubt.
childish gambino with “sober” tho? that’s another one i’m trying to sing after one listen… you could just tell that childish gambino felt about as free as possible when recording this… full artistry on display from an entertainer who can really do anything he wants in front or behind the camera… wait, he directs right? yeah… i just figure he does everything. i’ll never forget seeing him live in solana beach at belly up… there were only a few hundred people there… he did stand up… he rapped with a live band… he killed it… just like he did on “sober”… that beat thooooooooooooooooooooooooo
mac miller easily came thru on this vibe… his later album showed he had an affinity for this type of slowed down rap and r&b with some singing in the mix… “2009” is so sad sounding… but then malcom’s voice comes in and it is special… his vocals bleed the pain he had in his life… but when he shined, young mac miller shined for the entire world to see.
vel nine out of los angeles, california gives me the kali uchis x jhene aiko type vibes but as a legit emcee… she’s like shohei ohtani hitting 3 bombs in a game with 10 ribbies but then snagging a couple of bags in the process… you can’t fence her in because she’s gonna tag that thing up and then hop over it with the quickness. vel nine reminds me of jean grae back in the day… a female emcee in a league of her own.
phonte coleman aka phonte from little brother blended so well with smooth r&b… he had the bars for the days on the hip hop side, but slow that beat down and he just seemed more at home. i don’t know how many rappers that can keep up the “rap act” into their late 40’s and 50’s… phonte was early on this as he seemed to be a soul singer in the 70’s before he was reborn was phontigallo.
i have so many tracks that fill this souful r&b and jazz rap neo-soul tunes… i have a hard time naming genres right… what did i miss? the word chillhop? coffee shop? soul? what do i even call a track like “love taps” from fashawn… the beat from producertrenttaylor is too damn buttery… it’s a grown folks type beat… it’s something you put the nice shoes on for… sadgalnina on the feature and then matching fash’s soul with their singing at the end? this is too damn smooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooth.
peep this playlist below… it brings a lot of badu, d’angelo, raphael saadiq type vibes all in one longggggggggggggg playlist. i’m at 640 songs right now totalling just under 42 hours… 4,216 followers… not too shabby… tap in with the vibe and see if you can catch the wave.