A Tribe Called Quest - Can I Kick It

I've been listening to a whole heap of old school and new school hip-hop lately thanks to my beats coach Ren-Dawg.

The boy sure knows his hip-hop and can put together a complation disc for a bro like it's nobody's business!

His latest compilation 'Sumthin From The Old School' features this awesome song, which asks the simple question, can he kick it, according to the lyrics the answer is yes he can.

I love the Lou Reed sample, certainly a lot better than his work with Metallica!

Kick it!

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Bliss N Eso - Down By The River

Ah, camping and the great outdoors.

I grew up in the country and have lived my adult life in the city. I'd say that these days I love the big city life, the fast paced environment, huge buildings, bars and restaurants.

But I do also love getting away from it all, dropping out of mobile phone coverage for a few days and just sitting around a camp fire and chilling out with a full esky of beer.

That's exactly what I did this Easter weekend, a big crew of friends raced away from the city and headed up into the hills to get primal.

We climbed mountains, saw plenty of snakes, kangaroos, cows and even a platypus. All while chilling on the side of an amazing river.

Down By The River, was a very good weekend indeed.

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Public Enemy - 911 Is A Joke

All of Australia is Public Enemy crazy at the moment.

One of the world's most influential hip-hop acts hit up our shores this summer for a selection of festivals and side shows. I was lucky enough to catch Chuck D, Flava Flav and co at the Falls Festival and they blew everyone away.

Celebrating it's 20th year anniversary they played their album Fear Of The Black Planet in it's entirety. So here's one of my favourite tunes off of their killer album.

Bust out your novelty sized clocks and jump around and sing with me! 911's a joke!


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Urthboy - Shruggin feat. Jane Tyrrell

Hadn't ever really listened to Urthboy, but a mate put this song on his facebook page the other day so I checked it out.

It's a great tune, and I also really like the film clip which is filmed all around Sydney, with some of our local Inner West spots.

So here's Urthboy for you all, hope you dig it as much as I am right now.


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Bliss N Eso - Addicted

It's been impossible to escape this awesome Aussie hip-hop tune this year.

It's been on high-rotation on national radio, Sports Tonight highlight clips and the One HD NBA commercials.

Now after three months in the making, Bliss N Eso return with the highly anticipated clip for Addicted! The moving graffiti in the clip is animated entirely in stop motion using over 2,200 photos.

The clip was shot in a warehouse in West Auckland (NZ) which was previously the headquarters for bikie crew "Headhunters". It features artwork from world-famous graff writers Askew One and Deus, who spent six days straight working their way around the warehouse and used over 300 cans of paint.


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Running on Air

De La Soul - Eye Know

Wayne S is a cool cat who is all about his hip-hop, and through Wayne and Ren-Dawg over the last 18 months I've been schooled in the way of the hip-hop.

Wayne thinks this song should be song of the month, but sadly that ain't the name of the game here. haha. This is what he had to say...

Eye Know featured on De La Soul's landmark first album 3 Feet High and Rising. It's easily in my top five hip-hop tracks of all time. The sampling is so fucking tight and the lyrics are just amazing. This shows how beautiful hip hop can be.

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Run-DMC - Run's House

A mate of mine was only nine-years-old when he purchased his first album (well tape, but I guesst hat's still an album). Said album was none other than Run-DMC's Tougher Than Leather, and bod did he feel cool, and rightly so!

Run-DMC are one of the greatest hip-hop acts of all-time, paving the way for others to follow in their Adidas trainer footsteps. If you got some slick beats and rhymes sharper than a razor, you gotta ask the question, who's house am I in? And the answer will always be, who's house, Run's House!

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Bliss N Eso - Bullet And A Target

Friends who know me may be confused by my choice today being the rock and indie lover that I am. But over the last 18 months I've really been getting into my old school hip-hop, and in that time I've also been extremely impressed with Sydney hip-hoppers Bliss n Eso.

Their lyrics are some of the smartest (in any genre of music), their rhymes are smooth and flow so damn well, and their beats, samples, orchestra, guitars and drums make for some of the finest tunes to come out of Australia.

They've got a new album out that's so damn good, but I thought I had to show off one of my favourites from the previous album first.

Bliss n Eso traveled to The Valley of A Thousand Hills to immerse themselves in the culture, and finish off this song they had started writing back in Sydney. The song was eventually released as a charity single with all proceeds going to a peer education program operating within the province of KZN.

It's a powerful tune, but most of the stuff these guys do is (even though it's tongue in cheek half the time).


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Ice Cube - It Was A Good Day

Yep, it's been one of those weeks for me. Everything is golden, and I'm not talking the shower version. Awards, gigs, events, everything's coming up Duck.

So I thought a little bit of Ice Cube would be appropriate! Got into this tune in a big way last year thanks to two awesome mates who educated me in the way of the hip-hop with some of the best playlists I've ever listened to. Plus there's a really cool Nike skate ad that features the song as well which I rather like, so I've included clips for both.

Hope you're having a good day...


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