Not Drugs – Art, Graffiti, Music and Culture for the Almost Grown-Up

Hiiii Aunt Joanie.

Yea, Mom made her stuffing.

You like to cover it in gravy too? I think I ate too much. Yes I know, it expands in your stomach.

I just had to lay down for a while.

Yes, don’t worry I’m alright.

No, no I’ll be fine, you don’t need to send me any medicine.

What was I thankful for?

Reminiscent optimism.

Meet Brother Nature, comprised of Real J. Wallace, and Bam Circa ’86. They’re a couple hip hop heads from San Diego.

They’ve put out (with endorsement by 5andadime) a brief mixtape called Fresh Squeezed Lemonade, in connection with and in anticipation of their debut album, A Midsummer Night Dream, due out early summer.

Is it any good?

These guys got promise. Focus on strong production? check (look up Rob Viktum [viktumsbeat.com] he’s a frequent collaborator) Take humor in themselves, check. Make reference to 90s kid pop culture, check.

I’m an (early stage) fan.

Listen up:

Where Did You Go

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22 Odd Years (take note of the Dark Side of the Moon sample)

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or download the whole mixtape for FREE here: Fresh Squeezed Lemonade

As I watch the Green Bay Packers have their way with Matthew Stafford’s Detriot Lions, I wanted to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving. My day’s off well with homemade cheesecake for breakfast, and I hope yours is too.

And here’s a new video from everyone’s favorite weirdos, The Flaming Lips. Full of nude people running around, being birthed out of some vagina-looking thing. Fantastic Thanksgiving viewing.

(I found out the video is not wanting to be embedded on the site, so here’s the link to Watching the Planets by The Flaming Lips, Awesome.)

Enjoy the eats.

Dwb.

Being who I am…which is eestinally nobody(yet), I come up on a lot of music.  I mean A LOT of music.  Sometimes through word of mouth, sometimes off a beat I hear somewhere, sometimes by chance.

I heard of this cat, Chase Davis, through a good friend of mine named Jared.  Jared is hood shit. Period.  So, based solely on the fact that Jared was harder than most cats I know, I gave a listen to Chase Davis’ mixtape “Davis ’68″.

Chase Davis

It became quite evident that Chase Davis was Not Drugs. “Davis ’68″ is an elegant portrait of  street while also being a pretty obvious statement of the future aspirations of hip hop.  In other words, it’s incredibly hood, but shows so much room for improvement…which is a good thing.  Most rappers…you get what you get.  I, for one, feel as though 50 cent peaked with his first record and it’s been a downhill free fall since then. (Have you heard “Before I Self Destruct”?  Awful is not nearly a good enough word to describe it.

Dig on Chase Davis’s music here. Also, if you’re living in the Northeast, Chase will be performing at Toad’s Place in New Haven, CT on December 23rd, 2009.  Click here for more on that.

One.

The Blakroc LP finally hits stores on Black Friday. This should be the last supporting case of why it needs to be in your possession no later than that.

BlakRoc Trailer from Creative Control on Vimeo.

Dwb.

My boy Mr Chi-City drops some knowledge on youtube.

Did he just mix good ol’ American street smarts with good ol’ American greedy business politics? What an unfortunately unusual combination.

Now everybody just hold on a goddamn second.

We gotta talk about something.

I don’t like what’s going on here. Somebody I really like is veering off track, and I’m kinda concerned that things will ya know, not be the same.

I’m talking about Wale. He’s blowing up too fast.

Attention Deficit dropped earlier this month, and man, come on. He tightened up. He sounds rigid. And the beat recycling creativity that made his last three mixtapes legendary is gone.

I’ll give it to him, Mirrors, Pretty Girls and 90210 are all entertaining. But they’re too pop. Wale aint no chorus looper. He’s a lyricist. Shoot.

This is reminding me of Kanye’s story. Remember when College Dropout debuted? Like back in high school? And everybody was kinda digging this dude that’s making beats for Jay-Z (check Lucifer off The Black Album) but weren’t too sure why he had some song about a car accident he was in? I loved that Kanye.

Then he started experimenting with being in charge, found out about evil sound manipulators from the future, and now he harasses little girls on national tv. Way to go Mr. West.

Wale had to make a studio album. But he doesn’t have to do it twice. Wale please, I know making albums gets you bumpin on MTV and at red lights across the country. I know you’re getting a lot of attention, and probably making a whole bunch of money. But please stay loose. Keep working with people like Mark Ronson and 9th Wonder. Keep taking girly dance party songs and turning them into pop culture parodying flows. We need it. We don’t need another fish-stick-loving-little-girl-hating-stupid-sunglass-wearing-used-to-be-cool-hip-hop-artist. We don’t need another Kanye. We need Wale Ovechkin.

So I met this guy a couple years ago while working at a running store. He’s originally from Evergreen, Colorado, a Harvard graduate, and currently is an adjunct professor at St. Francis College for Film History.

He also was the runner-up contestant for the 3rd installment of the Reality Show Beauty and The Geek. Oh, that caught your attention.

His name is Nate Dern.

Now what’s so special about him? Why is Not Drugs concerned with his existence? Well, first, he’s a cool guy. That should be enough, right? That isn’t enough? Okay, here’s some more.

Besides being a cool guy, he’s funny…real funny. He’s part of the Upright Citizens Brigade, does live stand-up, his own shorts and has his own video blog called QuarterlifePounder. This blog is chronicling his 25th year with a video every week or so. His most recent video is what prompted me to post about him. As much as this post is about how funny he is, this video actually isn’t as much funny as it is, just, intelligent. You’ll see why after watching it.

Be a fan of Nate Dern. It’s part of a healthy diet.

Dwb.

With winter coming, the sun isn’t showing up as much as everyone would like it to. So I figured I’d try and help by keeping the sun around for a little longer.

Here’s a pretty dope song by Theophilus London, with an even doper video. It’s called Enjoy The Sun.

Enjoy the video.

Theophilus London- Enjoy The Sun (Prod. By Machine Drum) from GFCnewyork on Vimeo.

DWB.

Remember when I said I wasn’t really feeling too much of the new music goin around recently. Well, I think I may have to recant my statement. In the past few days I’ve obtained FOUR new albums that all y’all need to get your listenin’ on to. I’m gonna count this down in reverse order as I see fit to you obtaining them. You still following?…Good.

Number 4 – Emilio Rojas The Natural

Rochester native Emilio Rojas recently put out a free mixtape, presented by DJ Green Lantern, called The Natural. As always, here’s the link, get your listen on. Since Green Lantern was the man behind the mixtape in this case, there’s a strong commercial sound to it (yes, there is some autotune), but I believe Rojas does a really good job at not making it sound too commercial, with his nice delivery. His flow is very Talib-esque if you ask me. Here’s a sample, peep the track, enjoy the sounds.

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Untouched

Number 3 - Felt (Slug & Murs) – Tribute to Rosie Perez

I love these guys. This collaboration started as a joke to see whether Slug or Murs would be able to sleep with Christina Ricci first. They named their first album Tribute to Christina Ricci in hopes of Ricci hearing about it, wanting to meet them, and then Slug and Murs would work their game to see who could sweep her off her feet and into a nearby bed. Sadly, it never happened, so they came out with Tribute to Lisa Bonet. That failed too. And so now it’s Rosie Perez’s turn. We’ll see.

Aseop Rock does the production on this album, so the beats are pretty weird (in a good way), but besides Aseop occasionally jumpin in front of the mic for a couple lines, it’s just Murs and Slug goin back and forth and havin some fun. This album does have a darker vibe to it than their prior ones (I think it has a lot to do with the Aseop beats) but I still find it pretty enjoyable. Check this sample, then go find your own copy to bump on repeat.

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Permanent Standby

Number 2 - Rakim The Seventh Seal

Literally, straight bananas. The dude is 41 and still has got fire comin out of him. There’s a gospel kinda sound to it (with a lot of the guest singers having that preacher type singing voice), but also the album has a ton of meaning bleeding from it, based on Rakim’s 5 percenter belief, and their number system representing various meanings (in this case the number 7 stands for God, since G is the seventh letter in the alphabet and Rakim is known as the GOD EmCee). But there’s a bunch of bangers of this album, more than I can post on this site. One of his jams is on this playlist I made available free for download, so you should definitely grab that. But here’s another for ya listenin pleasures.

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Man Above

Number 1 – Blakroc.

This is the dopest thing out there right now. It’s better than whatever you’re thinking about, and whatever you’re gonna start thinking about in order to try and prove me wrong. Have you heard The Black Keys? Let’s take a minute (or 4) to get to know them.

Bam!

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Strange Times

Filthy. Anyway, They’ve put out a handful of albums (most recently Attack & Release) and then decided to attempt producing a hip hop album. Sounds crazy, right? Well it was…crazy-sick-dope-ill-etc-etc-etc. They got Mos Def, Raekwon, The RZA, and Pharoahe Monch (among others) to jump on these tracks and blow almost every other album this year out of the water (especially this girl Nikki Wray; she’s on two tracks and it’s like buildings fall because they’re too weak in the knees when she starts singing). It’s so different, so unlike anything that’s on the radio — or anything that’s not on the radio for that matter. This track below captures the great sound of the Black Keys with The Rza and The Pharoahe blowin up over it. Hate it…I dare you.

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Dollaz & Sense

So that’s your to-do list for the next week or so. Get these albums, listen to these albums, and thoroughly amaze yourself as to how good your music library will have become with the additions. Enjoy the rest of the weekend.

Dwb.

It’s Coming.  I mean for real for real.  There are two types of people who say for real for real, 15-year-old girls and me in regards to The Boondocks Season 3.

Riley, Granddad, Huey

Note:  The fact that it’s about The Boondocks does not take away from the fact that saying “for real for real” is lame as hell.

One.