what's new yo?

so it's not really new news that most artists do their best work early in their careers. why? success is a huge game changer. i guess in short, that's my theory and I'm not going to expand on it much tonight as i'm freakin fried. a 2 hour final exam and 7 hours spent on a final paper today leave me with little left in the left lobe.

anyway, i've heard a lot of new music lately by artists who've been around the block (a few times) and overall i'm pretty disappointed. the new rjd2 is pretty lame compared to his older stuff; the new gorillaz is just ok even though it has a really diverse mixture of artists guesting it; and even the new pretty lights is rather boring.

finally this week I heard something interesting. It's not mind blowing, but definitely worth the purchase. James Mercer and Danger Mouse have decided to combine their powers for awesome into a new band called Broken Bells. James Mercer is the lead singer of a pretty rad band called The Shins. and Danger Mouse is probably most well known for being one half of the duo Gnarles Barkley, but is also worth checking out in his collaboration with MF Doom (Danger Doom), and on his solo act perversion of Jay-Z's black album and the Beatles white album (the grey album). I think he even produced the Gorillaz demon days album (which didn't suck).

anyway, Broken Bells is pretty catchy. if you like the shins you'll probably think it's a rather experimental version of the shins. though nothing too crazy. it's not like going from rattle and hum to achtung baby. cause yea, that was crazy.

here's a taste...

the high road - broken bells

the ghost inside - broken bells

maybe the hokey pokey isn't what it's all about...

but popin and lockin is. maybe? i think so.

ahhh. what is it about a deliciously funky hip-hop beat that gets a b-boy to bop and wiggle as he crosses his feet? or her feet? with fuzzy white boots on. gettin her groove on. movin to a beat cuz i got the roots on.

dag. what a night.

big ups, palm slaps and nuckle bumps to all the b-boys and b-girls that came out last night. sometimes I get burnt out, fried out, and forget what it's all about, but watchin you all movin on the floor reminds me what i do this for. thanks. really. thanks yall.

here's a jam by one of the most real skool rap acts around that sums friday night up better than I can.

b-boy - crown city rockers

and as an encore, here's raashan battling max, words vs. drums.