I’ll start this list with a somewhat obscure and lyrically-original ‘underground’ hip hop album, The Bake Sale by The Cool Kids. So bass clap bass bass clap, let’s get this milk milk pouring into the bowl..

“The chicken I was eatin’ with the mashed potatoes needs a little bit of gold. Oops, wrong song lyric, I mean a little bit of pepper … All I got is 5 dollars. So you broke man? I thought I had 10 dollars. So you broke then. TV dinner on the counter, warm it up then. Warm it up man … That ice cream truck just left. If you run you can catch, but it’s out ’cause I got the last one. But I got a box of cones that I’m willing to sell. Did you know I made this beat with my mouth and a bell? Just a’ F-Y-I I’m F-L-Y.” “All you whack rappers need to keep your day jobs, and my work here is done, I’mma take the day off.”

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Amanda Blank is probably the combined reincarnation of a posse of card playing sailors, because it’s hard to find an artist, let alone a female one, who seems to naturally drop more vulgarities per minute (VPM)! It’s probably no surprise then, that she tours with Spank Rock, who together (and often with other collaborators) make a quite awesome group. So enjoy a clip from this Philadelphian fly jawn. I’m actually using a tamer song here than orginally intended just to keep this post PG-13..

“They call me kitsch, I do it for the kids, and designer drugs ’cause I’m so damn rich! Hottest m-f-k-r on the damn block, do my thing and the girlie-girls watch. Break necks with the way I walk, my sugar so sweet, it’ll make your teeth rot!” “I get off on top and get on again” “I keep it dirty, not like Fergi, ain’t the Black Eyed Peas. This shit ain’t happy, I’m a trashy, boastful bitch MC.”

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Now, Dan the Automator is a very well known producer, for the Handome Boy Modeling School and Lovage albums (and perhaps best as a founding member of Gorillaz, producing their first single, Clint Eastwood), but his earlier 1996 production with Kool Keith, Dr. Octagonecologyst, always wavered between obscurity and underground fame.

“Same data, same systems .. Psychedelic, I come in rainbows. Look at the green lights, and y’all’ll see my brain glow .. Forecast for today: gaseous with a 30% chance of meteor showers. Prepare for excess radiation. Earth people, I was born on Jupiter.” And, of course, my favorite lines from the album, “Dr. Octagon, please come to the office. Come now. Oh f-k! Patient just died in room 105- cirrhosis of the eye! Nurse, come in! Please, where are you? F-k it, he’s dead. Oh s-t, there’s a horse in the hospital!”

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Depending on where in the world you are (especially South Africa), you might think what the Hell is the mega-Zef doing here?? But it’s still like recognizing Too Phat outside of SE Asia or Major Lazer outside of Jamaica – which is about the equivalent of asking who Jay-Z is in the states. Although it sounds like English profanity of sorts, the chorus “Wat Kyk Jy” is Afrikaans for “What are you looking at?” The legit profanity ‘jou naai!’ isn’t even English. Video is an off-the-cuff shot of them singing along in their taxi.

“On the microphone, I’m like the evilest ruler. Mind control many stupid people like Zuma .. Yo, what the f-k are you saying? I’m not wise with your street lingo. Show me the money, I like gold like C-3PO” “I’m all up in the club in my underpants .. Girls wanna say ‘hello’ to me, from the Zef-side to the f-k-n overseas!” And of course, “never make a pretty woman your wife; you can’t trust the funny look in her eye.” Link to my other Die Antwoord post.

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P.O.S. is also decently known, but again, the title of this post isn’t “Hip-hop songs that elude your local hipster”. (Perhaps that can be a later post though..)

“So here I am in the Middle West. The heartland, m-f-k-r, sippin’ on whole milk, m-f-k-r … Joe, do you like Fresca? You’re fired. Yea, you’re not getting paid.” Given the album Audition was released in 2006, I love that the first actual lyric is “First of all, fuck Bush. That’s all, that’s the end of it.” Another gem on the album is De La Souls. And I will never forget the lyric of [watching suburbia] “fill up the tanks of their SUV’s, and you wonder why terrorism is a joke to me?”

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This is the song Google Music shows I’ve listened to most in the past month. Granted, this techno-metal cover of Method Man by Mindless Self Indulgence is well-known, but given it’s age, I think it’s well-worth sharing here. Especially since I, too, like my metal black, just like my coffee.

“I came to bring the pain, hardcore from the brain. Let’s go inside my astral plane .. I came to represent and carve my name in your chest .. Rhymes be the proof when I’m drinking 90 proof vodka. No OJ, no straw, when you give it to me, yea, give it to me raw. ‘Cause I burn, and I like it absolute straight. It burns, enough to give my chest hairs a perm.”

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I thought I had room for one more song, and probably the least known of all, so check out some Tone Tank and Scott Thorough: “The Dalai Lama said when I’m on my death bed, I will receive total consciousness. So I got that going for me, which is nice. But in the meanwhile I like to fish around for some different advice.”

So keep it rare like Mr. Clean with hair, make sure you got some front and back and side to side, and let your Alpine play! Enjoy.

Why is everyone so fascinated by Deadmau5? It’s just mediocre house music. I sort of see it as U2 to the techno world. I don’t get it– I thought Daft Punk’s Homework album was repetitive, this /really/ just loops.. “this is a hook” “this is a hook”. (wat really?) Skrillex sounds over-produced and I agree “like varied dial-up modems”. I mean, it’s alright, but it’s just dance music. Am I not finding the good dubstep? Aphex Twin in the 90’s, just for example, did a few house/rave albums (hell even Elephant Song off Analogue Bubblebath is better) and there’s no comparison to this. Modern techno-hipsters, you suck.. The closest I can compare this to is Crystal Method or Chemical Brothers gone wrong. I guess what I expected techno-house to trend towards is more like recent GusGus or Massive Attack. If this were the mainstream “dubstep” trend, I wouldn’t even complain (and I’m not even a huge fan of these groups).

Modern music has some big shoes to fill – especially from the ’60’s and 90’s – and it won’t do it by copycatting what came before it. It either has to be original now or take the respective genres to a whole new level – in the case of dubstep – the electronica gods of the late ’90s and early ’00’s. I mean, come on, modern synth technology is phenomenal. Don’t make the most limitless form of music to be hypnotically repetitive for munching on power-pills in darkened rooms now. Or “house” music like Black Eyed Peas will continue being pervasive. That’s the deal.

Here’s a good Wired article on artist Laurie Spiegel with a very captivating photo from 1972 and included song: http://www.wired.com/underwire/2012/03/rare-electronic-music-hunger-games .. This is how music was made in the Kraftwerk days; it’s more artistic than most electronic music now, and far, far more complicated to make. Old synth experts make modern transistor twisters look like amateurs. When retards today call Deadmau5 the “King of electronic music”, as a longtime listener of the genre, it feels like a rusty nail is hammered into my soul. Also, a baby chipmunk gets eaten. And even when that statement is just thought, the universe makes it happen. So if for not my soul, please think of the innocent chipmunks. And what kind of a horrible, sinful world doesn’t have baby chipmunks?

[If I'm missing something I should hear, leave a comment to let me know]

Love the intensity of this piece. (I think) I’m posting this the day after this video was released – at least according to the band’s Vimeo. I love Ninja’s “PRETTY WISE” neck ink, and I almost immediately noticed his large Aphex Twin tattoo on his left arm. The DJ’s ‘faggot’ part at the end is frightening, and I think the face is also influenced by Aphex (Window Licker). In a brief disclaimer posted along with the video, Ninja says the DJ’s actually gay (making it even more frightening), and explains that ‘faggot’ and ‘nigga’ are mostly casual colloquialisms in South Africa and not to be too offended.. I think the legitimacy of these artists is clear in little visual time, as well as the hard knock life of living in South Africa. Ninja’s moustache handlebars alone are enough to make an armed burglar change directions in a dark alley. The dozens of rats featured in their videos are also Yolandi’s own personal pets. Badass? No doubt. Ek kan nie goed Afrikaans praat nie .. marr .. FOK JULLE NAAIERS!!!

“May My Enemies Live Long so They Can See Me Progress”

For a lighter side of the group check out a rhyme from when they were known as Max Normal. “Take a deep breath. You sound weak if you don’t inhale deep before you speak.” “Yo Yo Yo Yo Yo Yo Yolandi. So so so so so so So Funky!”