Normal Bias

The Hillbillies – Bottom of the Hamper Jam

I’ve got a few bigger posts lined up, but for now I wanted to share with you a song I’ve been looking for on my PRB tapes for years. It’s one that can’t be found anywhere online (if you can believe it), so I’m happy to be able to offer it up here. I’m talking about Mount Holly, NJ’s own The Hillbillies (later, the Muck Men) with what I’m calling “Bottom of the Hamper Jam.” It may or may not be the track’s official title, but that’s how I remember the PRB crew referring to the track the few times they played it. I believe the track came out in 1991.

The recording is from a tape of the January 2, 1992 episode of “Raw Deal,” which is coming soon. I did some minor noise reduction.

For a little more Hillbillies goodness, check the December 1992 episode with some freestyles by the crew.

The Hillbillies - Bottom of the Hamper Jam [ 4:40 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (357)

Posted in 1990s, 1991, Hip-Hop, Single track | No Comments »

DJ Jay-Ski: “Jay-Ski Vol. 11″ [1995]

Earlier this year, I posted volume nine of the mighty DJ Jay-Ski’s mixtape series from the mid-90s. We jump ahead to volume 11 from a little later in the same year. Lots of good stuff here, including gems from the Jersey Sluggaz and, of course, Zulu–now Zxulu–The One Man Gang.

Oh, and the tape kicks off with DJ Premier screwing up a drop. Hilarious.

My copy is a dub, but the rip is alright.

And now, the Maestro of Funk…

Side One

1. Intro
2. Right Back at You… Mobb Deep
3. Total (Jay-Ski Faith Mix)… Speical Ed, Keith Murray, and Method Man
4. You Used to Love Me… Faith
5. Rather Unique… AZ
6. I’m Goin’ Down (Remix)… Mary J. Blige
7. What I’m After (Remix)… Lords of the Underground and Keith Murray
8. Ask of You (Jay-Ski Remix)… Raphael
9. Live!… Onyx
10. U Know Now (Buckwild Remix)… Show & AG
11. Letha Brainz Blo… Heltah Skeltah
12. Jersey Sluggers Freestyle Session

Side Two

1. Freestyle… Raekwon
2. Criminology… Raekwon
3. Slow Down (Jay-Ski Remix)… T. Covington
4. Da Ladies… Bahamadia, Precise, Tripp, Uneek, & L.)
5. Labels… The Gza
6. Keep it Real (Remix)… Milkbone
7. The Riddler… Method Man
8. The Cycle… Blaque Spurm
9. A Little of This… Grand Puba
10. Sprite Break… Grand Puba/Extra P
11. Survival (Remix)… Mobb Deep
12. How High?… Redman & Method Man
13. For Real (Remix)… Ruggedness
14. Fuckin’ Wit da Zu… Zulu the One Man Gang

Download

Posted in 1990s, 1995, Hip-Hop, Mixtape | No Comments »

Remembering Tony D, three years later

I’ve been bumping a bunch of Tony D favorites this morning and remembering Tone and his musical legacy.

In case you didn’t catch it the first time around, here’s the first track from a new project that Shawn Lov, G, and others from the NJ underground are putting together. It’s dedicated to Tony and features a bunch of Trenton legends:

Miss you, Tone.

Posted in Remembering Tony D | No Comments »

Club Krush: August 1990

Starting with this posting, all Club Krush and Raw Deal postings will be uploaded as WAV files to the Internet Archive. This helps ensure that the files will be safe for years to come (and not suffer the fate of the files that had been uploaded to Megaupload) as well as offloading bandwidth and storage costs to the kind folks at the IA. This also means that files will be available in a variety of formats, both lossless and lossy, and will be easily streamable. In time, I’ll be moving all old episodes of the show over to the IA.

Please consider donating to the Internet Archive to help support the amazing work they do archive web sites, audio, video, and more.

This episode of Club Krush came from one of those colorful Memorex tapes that were everywhere in the late-80s and early-90s. While they were on the lower end in terms of tape quality, they occasionally made things even worse by tacking on an extra 20 minutes of blank tape as a bonus. Unfortunately, tapes over 90 minutes are more prone to breakage. Thankfully, this particular 110-minute tape hadn’t yet snapped, so I wanted to make sure it was archived early on.

I place this show in August 1990, though it’s possible it came from as early as July 1990. Three clues:

• They talk about moving back to Thursday nights (for a brief time, they were on on Friday nights) in the third week of September,
• DJ Cut Master B and DJ Juice talk up a DJ competition on September 7th and 8th, and
• G heavily hypes the new Boogie Down Production album, Edutainment, which came out in July 1990 (source: AllMusic)

The tape quality’s not great and the show’s not terribly remarkable, but it is a solid one with some guests in the studio, discussing and debuting new music. Guests include the Suicide Posse, whose EP had just been pressed, 360 Degrees, whose very underrated EP had just hit stores, and Cut Master B and DJ Juice, who talked up an upcoming North Side Production$ 12″.

There’s a nice blend of an instrumental of EPMD’s “The Big Payback” with the vocals Eric B. & Rakim’s “I Know You Got Soul.”

Download:
side 1 / side 2

(Raw notes, including a track list, are available on the IA archive page. So are additional file formats.)

Posted in 1990, 1990s, Hip-Hop, Radio, WPRB | No Comments »

DJ Jay-Ski: “Jay-Ski Vol. 9″ [1995]

When I first met Jay-Ski online over 20 years ago, I had no idea what a big deal the guy would become. Of course, it totally makes sense, as he was one of the most talented DJs and turntablists in the New Jersey/Philadelphia area (still).

Today, I’ve got one of the early entries in Jay-Ski’s mixtape series. Volume 9 comes from 1995 and has plenty of patented Jay-Ski cuts, remixes, and a slew of local MCs you’ve probably never heard before (except maybe for WPRB regular Zulu–now Zxulu–The One Man Gang).

My copy is a dub (oops, sorry, Jay), but the rip is still pretty decent quality. My favorite cut on here is the super-long Jersey-centric posse cut, “Session Numba Nine.” Maybe Jay can chime in with the full MC line-up.

And, get this: Jay-Ski even spits a verse. Not something you hear every day!

Side One

1. Intro
2. Mad Ism 95 (new lyrics)… Channel Live
3. Masta I.C…. Mic Geronimo
4. A-1 Lover (Total Mix)… Spragga Benz
5. Can’t You See… Total
6. Where Am I? (unreleased version)… Redman
7. The Flavas… Show & AG and Method Man
8. All I Need… Method Man & Mary J. Blige
9. Session Numba Nine… Jersey Sluggers
10. World Goes Round… Naughty By Nature

Side Two

1. Think of U (Jay-Ski Remix)… Usher
2. Who Shot Ya… Notorious B.I.G.
3. All Glocks Down… Heather B
4. Freestyle… Ol’ Dirty Bastard
5. Protect Ya Neck… Ol’ Dirty Bastard
6. Aw Yeah… KRS-One
7. Frustrated Nigga… Jeru the Damaja
8. Resurrection (Large Professor Remix)… Common Sense
9. Wontime… Smif-n-Wessun
10. Next Level (Jay-Ski Remix)… Tha Alkaholiks
11. Freestyle/Put It On (Remix)… Big L
12. U Won’t Go Far… OC/Organized Konfusion
13. Lick a Shot… Da Goons

Download

Posted in 1990s, 1995, Hip-Hop, Mixtape | 1 Comment »