Thoughts
A few really exciting releases from the homies and crew at Saskatoon Folk Rap Records. The first is the the homie sign one dropped a super dope maxi-cassette single for the track The Huzzahs from his latest album The Mighty Highs and The Lonely Lows out on Endemik Records on tape and vinyl. This 6 track single features the original version from the album along with remixes from the Saskatoon Folk Rap Records crew Rove, Dren, Noblonski Pasquale and the The Gumshoestrut who raps on his remix as well. There is a bonus digital only remix from Dren when you cop the tape from Saskatoon Folk Rap Records Bandcamp.
The second is the homie Mc Homeless is going back with this one and dropping a 12” vinyl single! Yeah a vinyl single in 2022, Saskatoon Folk rap brining back the maxi cassette single and vinyl 12”. So dope! The track is called Aliens and features the legendary Kool Keith. It is produced by the homie Rove who is the second biggest Kool Keith fan I know and the perfect producer for this project. The B Side is a remix by Noblonski with additional raps from Epic. There are also instrumentals of each track to round out the record. The art work is next level dope and worth purchasing the record alone. It drops Tuesday and you can cop it from the bandcamp pages of Saskatoon Folk Rap Records (Canada), Pen Thief Records (Europe) and Audio Recon (United States)
The third release from the crew is what we have dubbed the posse cut 12”. Again from the lets take it back and do something insane files. It is a two song 12” with Rob Crooks handling the production on the A side and Noblonski on the B Side. The A side features raps from Chadio, The Gumshoe Strut, Mc Homeless, Add-Vice, Id Obelus, Nolto Epic and cuts by me. The B side features raps from Id Obelus, sign one, Chadio, Rob Crooks, The Gumshoe Strut, Staplemouth, Nolto, Hermit of The Woods, and Kitz Willman with Rove on the cuts. I even got to model for the cover of the 12” as Rob Crooks had the idea of paying homage to the Eric B and Rakim album cover for Follow The Leader. I think it turned out awesome. We enlisted the homie Chad Coombs to do the photo shoot and I think he killed it. He was even a great sport when we got my whip caught up in the snow. Dren did a super dope job on the layout and design! I am really excited for this record to be released. It drops on July 12 and you can cop it from the bandcamp pages of Saskatoon Folk Rap Records (Canada), Pen Thief Records (Europe) and Audio Recon (United States). I am really excited for these three releases and I really hope you are as well.
Pip Skid drops his newest album A Really Nice Day on Peanuts and Corn Records tomorrow. I was hoping for a tape but no dice, however there are Compact Discs limited to 50 copies available right now for order. The album is produced by mcenroe which is their first full length album together since 2004. That seems insane to me and I had to do a double check and it turns out the last album they did together was Funny Farm. Wow! The album has some great features including Leonard Sumner who is incredible and who I have to thank Nestor Wynrush for putting me on to, that track is not avainlbe to listen to yet but I am really looking forward to it. Check out his Leonard Sumner’s track Best of Me if you are unfamiliar with his work as it is my favourite track of his. Also really looking forward to that and the Birdapres feature on Thoughts and Prayers. There is a dope video for the track Cop Chopper and all the singles have been incredible. Tomorrow can’t come soon enough to check this one out.
Sole launched a Bandcamp vinyl campain for a rerelease of the seminal album Selling Live Water. It feature two bonus tracks an Alias remix of Plutonium and Selling Live Water Remix by Odd Nosdam with Jel. There are a few supporter tiers with some nice perks and it has been fully funded so it will be produced. So if you missed it the first time or are just a completest collector you will want to pick this up.
Aj Seude dropped a crowdsourcing campaign via Crane City Music for the album Avada Kedavra. Crane City Music is a super dope Seattle based rap label speciliazig in releasing Seattle based hip hop on vinyl. It is a 21 track double LP produced entirely by Aj Seude. Aj Seude is quickly becoming one of my favourites. Also grab the Long May We Rain album while you are there. You will thank me.
Record 1
The Cloaks (Awol One & Gel Roc) - Cloakwork Orange
The Cloaks are back with their third release. The album is produced by Awkward who they worked with previously and who made that incredible record with the The Roughneck Jihad - Return Of The Rawk. The worlds greatest turntablist, D-Styles is also all over the record. I love Awol One, that is no secrete, so this album is the best, however I think this is their best album to date as the Cloaks. There is something comforting about Gel Roc and the way he raps. It just seems to make sense and has that energy you get recording in the studio with the homies that is hard to replicate on record. My jam is the posse cut Covenant Of The Cloaks feat Quaser, Megabuive, Mestizo and Dose One. That is really all you need to say about that to be honest. Grab this record before it is gone and you have to pay record gouger prices on Discogs.
Record 2
Dj Moves - Pam Grier’s Kids
The homie Moves is back with another sick compilation with some real heavyweight canadian MCs with tracks featuring CEE!!!!!!!!, Governor Bolts, Mindbender, Tachichi, Jeff Spec, and Stinkin Rich. What year is this? Is this on Four Ways To Rock? I am loving the resurgence and productivity of a lot of my favourite rappers these days. These are good days we are living in. Rap is the best! Lxvndr and Sum01 killit on Bitch! They need to form a group and release an album. This is a great album you can cop the CD and Tape from Black Buffalo Records. I wish this would have got a vinyl press but what can you do?
Classic Material
Farm Fresh - Crazy Friction
The Sam The Record Man in Midtown Mall had some great indie releases back in the day. That was thanks to the homie Knowskills that worked there. He was a nerd and super genius and one of those obsessions was rap music. I don’t say genius lightly, he has a PHD in Astro Phyiscs and is a Professor at the University of The Fraser Valley in British Columbia. He became familiar with Peanuts and Corn at a festival called Fields that I believe took place near Eagle Creek or Ness Creek or something like that. I think it was called Fields if I remember correctly as well. I was not there and this is only my recollections of some conversations from the 90’s. As a result of meeting them there and making a connection with Dj Hunnicutt who also worked at A Sam The Record Man but in Winnipeg and they were both Beat Factory Reps and had those really cool Beat Factory record bags they send all the reps. Knowskills who was known to bring in random rap things brought in Farm Fresh - Crazy Friction Cassette.
Now I didn’t know Knowskills yet but me and the homie Funky were regulars at the Sam The Record Man going at least once a week on Tuesdays which was new release day or on pay days. When you went into the store if you turned to your immediate left and walked to the wall witch was to the right of the check out counter, they had small section on the wall that featured Canadian indie releases. I remember seeing the Barenaked Ladies cassette before the blew up on the wall. We saw the Crazy Friction tape and it had sign that said rap from Winnipeg on it. We were super intrigued by this. Our rap world really only consisted of what was on Rap City, in the Source Magazine or on a major labels. We were not really that hip then to the indie rap world but we soon would be. We took a shot on the tape. It was pretty cheap. I am not sure if we went halves on it or if I or Funky bought it but I have it today. When we took it to the counter Knowskills was working and we had a pretty short conversation and he assured us it was dope. Little did I know that he would become one of my best friends a couple years later and we would be in a dj crew together and i would be doing community radio with him eventually taking the reins from him.
We left the store and listened to the album in Funky's whip which was a 1973 Mazda Rx3 with a rotary engine. He had a killer stereo and had a cassette deck and six disc changer in the trunk so we had both formats of the day covered. I think he was more into cd’s but I was really into tapes so that rubbed off on him and is why he had the tape deck and disc changer combo. The album was super dope and really different but really relatable especially songs like Hugs and Kisses and 8 Bells. We were hooked and instant fans.
It was 1996 and I had graduated High School that spring and had begun djing 8 or so months before. I think through meeting Epic at this hip hop show at an abandoned bank we linked up in the days to come and became fast friends. He introduced me to soso and invited me to go down to Knowskills radio show Trunk Of Funk The Vinyl Frontier which is the precursor to Third Verse. I was familiar with the show which we used to listen to Sunday Nights from Midnight to 1:30 am and we started dubbing it. He moved days and times slots to Wednesdays 10:30pm to Midnight and then after a year or so of me going weekly we moved to the current time slot of 9-10:30pm which is perfect. Knowskills and I hit it off instantly and became fast friends. That February Knowskills told me about an upcoming show. It was two groups from Winnipeg Farm Fresh and Frek Sho. It was at a bar in Saskatoon called Checkers which has been long closed. I was like, “I am only 18” (I didn’t have fake ID like I did for the Alkaholiks show if you remember from a previous TFTRN), he was like don’t swear it I am djing and I will say you are djing too so come with me and help me carry in a crate of records. The carrying a crate of records to get in a venue underage was one of the all time classics. We used to get Factor to help carry in crates so he could get into shows underage all the time. It seemed to always work no questions asked. So I carried in the records and got in no sweat. They had a closed off dj booth so I hung out inside with him and watched him play records. He asked if I wanted to play some records while he took a break and I jumped at the chance. It was the first time I ever dj’d in public. It was amazing. I only probably played like 5 or 6 tracks but it was the ultimate and my fist gig so to say.
The show was one of my all time favourites because it was pretty much the first live rap show I ever went to. The highlights were Frek Sho doing Wax Museum where they all frozen on stage and had masks on and then became animated when it was their turn to rap. There was a recording on the track introducing each one of them. It was incredible and one of the greatest things I have ever seen in Rap. The other highlight was meeting mcenroe. Knowskills, mcenroe and I had a cool conversation outside the venue as they were packing up. This show as monumental as it was the first in what would be many between our two scenes.