Fake For Real - Tag - ChicagoThe English written companion of Fake For Real: since 1997, reviews and articles about rap music2024-03-11T20:40:46+01:00Sylvain Bertoturn:md5:a035ff44a020bb716e18191580d6e9ecDotclearCHIEF KEEF - 4NEMurn:md5:ec1632a45b179b6e7a0b318ba4c3c4f42022-01-25T22:16:00+01:002023-07-27T17:31:25+02:00codotusylvAlbums2021ChicagoChief KeefDrill MusicGlory Boyz Entertainment <p>In the last few years, Chief Keef didn't stop being the prolific rapper we know. He collaborated with Zaytoven and he provided follow-ups to the <em>Leek</em> and <em>GloFiles</em> mixtapes. None of these, though, pretended to be an official work. The only one that can be qualified as such is the album he released in 2021, the first since <em>Dedication</em>, four years earlier.</p>
<p><img src="https://english.fakeforreal.net/public/Pochettes/2021/chief-keef-4nem.jpg" alt="CHIEF KEEF - 4NEM" style="display:table; margin:0 auto;" title="CHIEF KEEF - 4NEM" /></p>
<p>And damned… it was definitely worth the wait. Here, Chief Keef is euphoric and triumphant. He starts <em>4NEM</em> with a reminder that, in Chicago – he lives in L.A., nowadays – he was a survivor, which his grandmother confirms on the first track, "Bitch Where". And on the rest of the album, Keith Cozart proves it: he is still alive, he is even at his very best.</p>
<p>"Foenem" is some slang from Chicago that designates a clan, friends, close ones. And actually, this album is entirely that: an entrenchment into Chief Keef's old foundations. The only guests are Tadoe and BallOut, two pillars of his Glo Gang collective, and the music looks like he's back to basics.</p>
<p>Incendiary tracks such as "Tuxedo", "Say I Ain’t Pick Yo Weak Ass Up" and "Picking Big Sean Up" remind us about everything the original drill music owes to Lex Luger and Waka Flocka, with their hedonism, violence, and nihilism, and with their defiant and boisterous trap music that likes to play the same simplistic melodies over different octaves.</p>
<p>There are other influences, like Memphis, when Chief Keef uses the old production style of the city on "Shady", when he changes Three 6 Mafia's "Slob On My Knob" into “Like It’s Yo Job”, with the same pornographic approach as the original, or when he hijacks Young Buck's "Stomp", also produced by DJ Paul and Juicy J, on his own “Hadouken”.</p>
<p>Recently, some blamed J. Cole for looting hip-hop in a similar way. However, while the Fayetteville guy tries to mimic his idols, Chief Keef just follows his instinct and desires. He never sacrificed them to his career plans. And when he goes back to the sound that defined him, it's not to tread water.</p>
<p>Chief Keef doesn't make his influences look clean. Quite the opposite: he mistreats them, crudely, like with the amazing drums and brutal admonitions on "See Through", the changes of tone on "The Talk", "Hadouken", and "Picking Big Sean Up", or the peculiar flow he arrogates on "Yes Sir".</p>
<p>Apart from bland moments such as the lazily Auto-Tuned "Ice Cream Man", "Wazzup" and "I Don't Think They Love Me", this is Chief Keef like in the early days, but in 2021.</p>
<p><strong><a href="https://amzn.to/3Oo2Tdr" hreflang="en">Buy this album</a></strong><br /></p>
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https://english.fakeforreal.net/index.php/post/2022/CHIEF-KEEF-4NEM#comment-formhttps://english.fakeforreal.net/index.php/feed/atom/comments/3373POLO G - Die a Legendurn:md5:2497555ec95309a12872e4edfcb88fee2019-09-14T18:23:00+02:002023-01-13T18:03:49+01:00codotusylvAlbums2019ChicagoColumbia RecordsDrill MusicPolo G <p>Polo G, as we know him, was born in a prison. Before he was incarcerated, Taurus Bartlett, like other Chicago rookies, used to deliver some generic kind of drill music. But in 2018, behind bars, he decided to change his style with "Finer Things", a melodic song with a melancholic piano, that talked about better days with limited expectations that they would come. Released shortly afterwards, the video was viewed millions of times on Youtube. And later on with "Pop Out", a duo with Lil Tjay, he became a Columbia signee and, at 20, Chicago's next big thing.</p>
<p><img src="https://english.fakeforreal.net/public/Pochettes/2019/polo-g-die-a-legend.jpg" alt="POLO G - Die a Legend" style="display:table; margin:0 auto;" title="POLO G - Die a Legend" /></p>
<p><em>Die a Legend</em> uses the same formula. Here, Polo G appropriates Lil Durk's melodic kind of drill music, and he mutates it even further. He makes it even cleaner, more pop. The drums, the relentless rhymes, and lyrics portraying the urban jungle, are still there, like on his dark "A King’s Nightmare". Declaimed in a more aggressive way, a track like "Dying Breed" looks like the original drill music, with its repetitive flow, and its depiction of lost youths, abandoned to crime, drugs and death. The ambiance is paranoid: treason is round the corner, according to "Last Strike". But instead of shrill sounds, Polo G opts for sad pianos, or comparable instruments like the acoustic guitar on "Chosen 1". And while he employs these, he hums with a resigned voice.</p>
<p>None of this alters drill music. On the opposite, these highlight one of its latent qualities. By removing all the pride and triumphalism from the formula, it shows all the despair behind the nihilism. The remarkable "Through da Storm", for example, looks like a typical braggadocio about illegally earned money, but the depressed tone of the rapper says the contrary, as well as the hook, about her mother crying and her little sister hearing him through the telephone of the prison. "Effortless", another stirring track, is not exactly optimistic when it talks about bullet hissing close to children in his neighborhood. Same with tracks such as "Battle Cry", "Finer Things", "Chosen 1", and "Deep Wounds", when Polo G fights his distress with pills of ecstasy.</p>
<p>Even when he talks about his ascent on "Picture This", even when he compares his new status with his difficult past, Polo G looks heavily depressed. The very title of the album is equally deceptive. It is not about the road to success. On the opposite, it is about his chagrin, his disappointment, the certitude that death waits round the corner, and that recognition will only happen afterwards. This is what says the hook on "BST", where he alludes to his forthcoming child: "for my family, gotta build a legacy, I'ma be the man when I'm dead". This album, indeed, is <em>Die a Legend</em>, and not <em>Get Rich or Die Tryin</em>'. Nevertheless, considering how much praised Polo G is nowadays, he looks well equipped to consolidate his legend before the end comes.</p>
<p><strong><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07SLMQLQR/ref=as_li_tf_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B07SLMQLQR&linkCode=as2&tag=fafore05-20" hreflang="en">Buy this album</a></strong></p>
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https://english.fakeforreal.net/index.php/post/2019/POLO-G-Die-a-Legend#comment-formhttps://english.fakeforreal.net/index.php/feed/atom/comments/3177QUEEN KEY - Your Highnessurn:md5:3f782465f51b457b9ddebdd8c54d352f2018-12-22T23:05:00+01:002020-05-17T10:38:48+02:00codotusylvMixtapes2016ChicagoDJ LegacyQueen KeyYdot Gdot <p>Queen Key is the embodiment of rap's take on feminism. Instead of desexualizing women, she talks about lust, loudly and proudly. Her approach, though, is different from CupcaKke's, her Chicago colleague,. Ke'Asha McClure is not that frontal and pornographic. She goes the humorous way, with a raspy voice that sounds older than she is. While male rappers like to say "suck my dick", she titled <em>Eat my Pussy</em> the very project aimed at accelerating her career, now that she joined Machine Entertainment Group. That EP was well received, and it was included to many year-end lists. Its strong moment, "My Way", is one of the rapper's most powerful anthems. But the greatest of Queen – her first nickname, before she realized that some brit band had already employed the same – might be found on her two <em>Your Highness</em> mixtapes.</p>
<p><img src="https://english.fakeforreal.net/public/Pochettes/2016/queen-key-your-highness.jpg" alt="QUEEN KEY - Your Highness" style="display:table; margin:0 auto;" title="QUEEN KEY - Your Highness" /></p>
<p>Nowadays, Queen Key transcends the artificial borders segmenting the Chicago rap scene. She can collaborate with <em>drill music</em> artists like King Louie, Dreezy and G Herbo, as well as with Tink, or Joey Purp on his <em>Quarterthing</em> album. <em>Your Highness</em>, though, was quite homogeneous: it was exclusively made of <em>trap music</em>. It was full of excessive and over-the-top ego-trips, like the freestyles on Famous Dex's "Drip from My Walk", and O.T. Genasis' and Young Dolph's "Cut It". On "Panic", Queen Key positioned herself above her female peers. Per this project's title, she presented herself like a superior being on "Been a Fan", with another <em>drill music</em> figurehead, Sasha Go Hard. With "Killa", on a sample from the above-mentioned rock band, as well as with "WTF You Looking At", "Exposed", "Fuck Y All", and the two episodes of "Queen Shit", she was hostile and threatening. She assaulted each and everyone, independently from their genders. And she enjoyed drugs and lust on "Baked as a Pie", the single that revealed her in 2015.</p>
<p>None of this was entirely new, except maybe her feminine view. But that, this inverted perspective, was precisely the essential part of the project. What mattered was, through the frequent mention of "eaters", her strong taste for cunnilingus; or her way to approach men on "Disrespect", with the same derogatory mode they had used for decades, toward women. <em>"I got mo' balls than yo dick boy"</em>, stated the diminutive lady on "Senile"; and indeed, she had guts. Queen Key was there to make a point. And sometimes, she managed it, with memorable tracks like "Panic", the main banger on the mixtape, or the pornographic nursery rhymes of "Hit a Lic". <em>Your Highness</em> was not perfect, far from it. But it was enough to recognize a potential star in Queen Key. On "Panic", some guy stated the following: <em>"See. There's two types of chicks in this world, chicks that make it happen, and chicks that watch it happen. What kind of chick is you?"</em>. As far as Queen Key was concerned, there was absolutely no ambiguity about the answer.</p>
<p><strong><a href="https://mymixtapez.com/album/107773" hreflang="en">Download this mixtape</a></strong></p>
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https://english.fakeforreal.net/index.php/post/2018/QUEEN-KEY-Your-Highness#comment-formhttps://english.fakeforreal.net/index.php/feed/atom/comments/2867KATIE GOT BANDZ - Bandz And Hittazurn:md5:8fcb5c7b1ec24d759fda17f9d1e7e0112018-08-10T13:15:00+02:002023-12-07T08:32:17+01:00codotusylvMixtapes2012ChicagoDrill musicKatie Got BandzLawless Inc. <p>By 2011, just when drill music starts buzzing outside of Chicago, BlockOnDaTrack, a local beatmaker, decides it is time to offer a feminine voice to this virile sound. He convinces his cousin Kiara Johnson - a student trying to make a living out of a waitress job at McDonalds, who never thought she could be a rapper - to record a song with him. This results into "I Need A Hitta", a hit with the Chicago youth, and leads to another, "Ridin' Around And Drillin'".</p>
<p><img src="https://english.fakeforreal.net/public/Pochettes/2012/katie-got-bandz-bandz-and-hittaz.jpg" alt="KATIE GOT BANDZ - Bandz and Hittaz" class="media-center" title="KATIE GOT BANDZ - Bandz and Hittaz" /></p>
<p>Then, King Louie notices the young woman, he asks her to join his own Lawless Inc. imprint, and he contributes to her most famous and defining banger: "Pop Out". Thus begins the career of Katie Got Bandz. Afterwards, she will release several mixtapes, and become the undisputed queen of drill.</p>
<p>BlockOnDaTrack, actually, has urged her cousin to start rapping for another reason: she is also a delinquent, walking a dangerous path, and he wants to remove her from the streets. At first, he isn't too successful: Katie is imprisoned on gun charges, at the very moment "I Need A Hitta" buzzes. However, upon her release, surprised with the popularity of her own song, she eventually takes rap seriously.</p>
<p>This translates into her association with King Louie. And in 2012, just when drill music turns into a national sensation, she releases a first project, <em>Bandz And Hittaz</em>. Expectedly produced by her cousin, it is already worth - or it is even better than - her infamous <em>Drillary Clinton</em> mixtape series.</p>
<p>Loyal to her roots, Katie follows the gospel of drill music, the only variation being her harsh and proud feminine voice. This is the full formula: short and catchy rhymes, declaimed mechanically; a kind of rap relying on the weight and aggressiveness of her lyrics, more than her skills; trap music rhythmic patterns; emphatic, heavy and threatening synthesizer sounds; and here and there, a few gun claps.</p>
<p>The lyrics smell of gangs and the 'hood. On "I Need A Hitta", the rapper looks for a lover as brutal as she is, and she claims loudly her love for money. With the tough "Yall Niggaz Ain't Hittaz", she pretends she will shoot her rival. With "Middle Fingers To Da Opps", she fucks the police.</p>
<p>The rapper, actually, never exposes her feminine side. Sex is a common topic, but it is bestial, and definitely not about her attractiveness. The only romance there, "Lady Hitta", is actually sung by a man, and his object of desire, Katie herself, is everything but a cute, fragile and sensible woman.</p>
<p>Katie copies the thuggish attitudes of her male colleagues. She postures as a gang leader in the videos of "I Need A Hitta" and "Ridin' Round And We Drillin", surrounded by accomplices of both genders. Thus, she defines what female drill music will look like. She edicts a model that most women in that genre will follow, in the months to come.</p>
<p><strong><a href="http://www.certifiedmixtapez.com/Main/Details?refId=fadc431c" hreflang="en">Download this mixtape</a></strong></p>
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https://english.fakeforreal.net/index.php/post/2018/KATIE-GOT-BANDZ-Bandz-and-Hittaz#comment-formhttps://english.fakeforreal.net/index.php/feed/atom/comments/2796CUPCAKKE - Queen Elizabitchurn:md5:29f466dfc65c972f03535f5bccb5957c2017-08-10T13:07:00+02:002021-03-22T08:46:05+01:00codotusylvAlbums2017ChicagoCupcakKe <p>According to her Twitter profile, Elizabeth Harris is "going to suck 2017 dicks in 2017". No surprise then, if her first official album – or her second, depending on how they are counted – remains quite similar to her three releases last year: <em>Cum Cake</em>, <em>S.T.D.</em>, and <em>Audacious</em>. With <em>Queen Elizabitch</em>, once again, the Chicago rapper delivers very hardcore pornographic lyrics. Compared to her, Lil' Kim would look like a nun. The humorous "CPR", for example, is dedicated to her passion for sex, and it is full of suction and orgasmic sounds. "I got 3 holes for it like a pretzel", does she say on it; or "I fuck doggy style so much I need to go to the vet". And on "Cumshot", she expects her partner to ejaculate in each of her orifices. Isn't that classy?</p>
<p><img src="https://english.fakeforreal.net/public/Pochettes/2017/cupcakke-queen-elizabitch.jpg" alt="CUPCAKKE - Queen Elizabitch" style="display:table; margin:0 auto;" title="CUPCAKKE - Queen Elizabitch" /></p>
<p>The exaggeratedly explicit lyrics on <em>Queen Elizabitch</em> are misleading, though. In reality, CupcakKe's targets a large audience. While tracks like "Author", "Quick Thought" and the threatening "Tarzan" use harrowing and repetitive sounds, not too far from those of drill music – after all, Elizabeth used to be a classmate of Chief Keef – others have more mainstream melodies, like the diss track "33rd", or the bouncy "CPR", "Biggie Smalls", and "Cumshot". The aura of Harris, as a matter of fact, goes much beyond rap's little world. She featured on pop singer Charli XCX's last mixtape, and she is also a muse to some homosexuals. A true champion of the LGBT cause, she recently offered a hotel room to a young gay fan kicked out of his home.</p>
<p>As nasty as she wanna be, CupcakKe is still a gentle one. A closer look at her lyrics testifies about her ethics. "Biggie Smalls" is not only the pop song of the album: it is a hymn to all kinds of bodies, and a charge against the canons of beauty. "Barcodes" defends the right for women to control their sexuality, be it only dedicated to pleasure. As soon as with "Scraps", the first song, Harris talks about the world sufferings. She describes in a raw way the context in which she grew up – as a teenager, she's been homeless for a while – and she spits at her absent father. And with a new episode of her "Reality" series, she delivers social comments, <em>a cappella</em>.</p>
<p>As a matter of fact, this is some kind of conscious rap. <em>Queen Elizabitch</em>, as CupcakKe's other projects, tells us an old story: the one about the oppressed - the poor, the black, the women, and the ugly, all of them - and their never-ending battles. At the end of the day, the only distinguishing feature of the rapper is her banalization of pornography, a sign of our times.</p>
<p><strong><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XWVHGCT/ref=as_li_tf_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B06XWVHGCT&linkCode=as2&tag=fafore05-20" hreflang="en">Buy this album</a></strong></p>
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https://english.fakeforreal.net/index.php/post/2017/CUPCAKKE-Queen-Elizabitch#comment-formhttps://english.fakeforreal.net/index.php/feed/atom/comments/2801NONAME - Telefoneurn:md5:de3015088a3b8c5dd2b38017b21051ba2017-05-31T22:32:00+02:002021-02-01T08:37:51+01:00codotusylvMixtapes2016ChicagoNoname <p>The wait was long, before Fatimah Warner's first project, <em>Telefone</em>, was disclosed. Released in 2016 only, it was first announced three years earlier, when Noname Gypsy – now just Noname – made a name for herself with her contribution to Chance the Rapper's <em>Acid Rap</em> mixtape. Quicker to feature on others' projects than to record her own, she also participated to Mick Jenkins's conceptual - and quite strong - <em>The Water(s)</em>, and more recently to Saba's <em> Bucket List Project</em>, and to <em>Late Knight Special</em>, an album from New-York's rapper and producer Kirk Knight.</p>
<p><img src="https://english.fakeforreal.net/public/Pochettes/2016/noname-telefone.jpg" alt="NONAME - Telefone" style="display:table; margin:0 auto;" title="NONAME - Telefone" /></p>
<p>Chance the Rapper, Mick Jenkins, Saba… These represent Chicago's rap artsiest side, providing us with a good scent of Noname's kind of music. Coming from a slam and poetry background, she is light, intimate and articulate, and quite the opposite to a drill music rapper. This is visible as soon as with her first track, "Yesterday", where she questions the value of fame and money. Haunted by her grandmother's death, she wants to keep away from dangers like alcohols, ecstasy and partying, and her lyrics have biblical references. On "All I Need", also, she makes a distinction between what she desires and what she needs. And when she stops sharing moral thoughts, she talks about love's pitfalls, like with "Sunny Duet", with R&B singer TheMIND.</p>
<p>Her music is on par with her lyrics: it is deeply rooted into the African-American legacy. It is, indeed, made of sweet and erratic jazz, full of delicate pianos, xylophones, handclaps. It also has singing melodies, vocal harmonies, and a bit of gospel with "Shadow Man". Also, like with Chance, what Noname calls a mixtape is indeed a true album, recorded with science and care. Short and dense, <em>Telefone</em> is a well thought thing, articulated around a clear concept: the phone conversations which mattered in her life. No surprise, then, if Noname's rhymes look more like a lighthearted discussion, or poetry recitations, or sing-songs, than to real raps.</p>
<p>The similarities with the man who made her famous are obvious. However, Noname is more than just a feminine version of Chance the Rapper. Even though the right codes are there, like her reference to Nina Simone on "Freedom Interlude", she is much more than a conscious rapper. Yes, for sure, with "Casket Pretty", she criticizes the brutal, discriminating and murderous side of Chicago, the one which birthed drill music. Nonetheless, per the cover art – a funny self-portrait with a skull – her most sinister themes are handled with a joyous tone and a naïve sound, as if she was translating into music the end of her childhood's optimism.</p>
<p>On "Diddy Bop", indeed, one of the record's best track – featuring Cam O'bi and Raury – Noname reminisces about her happy childhood, despite the violence and dangers of the ghetto lurking in the background. A similar contrast is observed with the very melodic "Shadow Man", where she pictures her funerals. The same goes with "Bye Bye Baby". At first glance, this song looks like an anthem to her baby, but it is in fact a song about Noname's abortion. <em>Telefone</em>, actually, is a coming-of-age album, exactly like there are coming-of-age novels. It is the story of a young and ingenuous lady, confronted to a difficult world. It is about the loss of innocence.</p>
<p><strong><a href="http://www.hotnewhiphop.com/noname-gypsy-telefone-new-mixtape.116496.html" hreflang="fr">Download this mixtape</a></strong></p>https://english.fakeforreal.net/index.php/post/2017/NONAME-Telefone#comment-formhttps://english.fakeforreal.net/index.php/feed/atom/comments/2643CHIEF KEEF - Back From The Deadurn:md5:83f76e78e0c790b19880527304711af12014-03-05T23:19:00+01:002023-10-07T14:09:59+02:00codotusylvMixtapes2012ChicagoChief KeefDJ MoondawgDJ VictoriouzDrill MusicGlory Boyz Entertainment <p>It is no coincidence if, in February this year, Chief Keef announced the release of a mixtape called <em>Back From The Dead 2</em>. While titling it as the release that revealed him, the figurehead of Chicago's drill music scene probably wants to put 2013 - a year marked by his mischiefs and mediocre mixtapes - behind him. He might want to make it as successful as the original release, quite probably his best, to this day.</p>
<p><img src="https://english.fakeforreal.net/public/Pochettes/2012/chief-keef-back-from-the-dead.jpg" alt="CHIEF KEEF - Back From the Dead" class="media-center" title="CHIEF KEEF - Back From the Dead" /></p>
<p>The title sets the tone. In 2012, when pretending to be back from the dead, Chief Keef alludes to his time in prison, and more generally to the disreputable districts he is from, areas invaded by drugs, gangs, and violence, where criminality is standard and parenthood happens shortly after puberty: at the age of sixteen, "Chief" Keith Cozart already fathered a daughter, while his own mother is still in her early thirties.</p>
<p>The lyrics are the usual subject matters of gangsta rap. This is the manifesto of self-proclaimed monsters, but with a thrill of reality and danger. This is something prone to challenge and to hurt the most gentrified portions of rap music.</p>
<p>Chief Keef, though, is a man of his times. His rhymes are not sophisticated, they are mostly made of slogans and adlibs, such as his signature, the “bang bangs” he keeps on repeating. He is not a lyrical acrobat but, a bit like Waka Flocka, a rapper he’s often been compared with, he compensates this with his presence, his diction, and his catchy hooks, his aggressive and asocial personality as a boy who burned his life at both ends, his juvenile insolence, his “couldn't-give-a-damn” personality, and unstoppable beats.</p>
<p>Produced by Young Chop, the music is melodic and catchy, but it hits hard, using sirens and gun sounds ad nauseam. It bangs with the irresistible "I Don't Like", with Lil Reese, Chief Keef’s defining hit single, the one that caught the attention of Kanye, Pusha T, and other hip-hop figureheads. And it does it again, elsewhere on this first-class mixtape.</p>
<p><em>Back From The Dead</em> is short enough to be full of bangers. It is almost all good as <em>Finally Rich</em>, Chief Keef's first official album, he will release a few months later, at the end of 2012, a year he started among the dead, and he will end rich and famous, heralded as a young new hero of modern hip-hop.</p>
<p><strong><a href="https://mixtapemonkey.com/450/chief-keef-back-from-the-dead" hreflang="en">Download this mixtape</a></strong></p>
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https://english.fakeforreal.net/index.php/post/2014/CHIEF-KEEF-Back-From-The-Dead#comment-formhttps://english.fakeforreal.net/index.php/feed/atom/comments/3397ALL NATURAL - No Additives, No Preservativesurn:md5:15918f33e8019dfa702e1020af80c36a2012-06-01T23:05:00+02:002023-12-29T10:50:04+01:00codotusylvAlbums1998All NaturalAll Natural IncChicagoUppercut Records <p>The story of All Natural is typical of indie rappers. Here we have, by the end of the 90's, a promising band coming from Chicago - by then not a rap stronghold yet. These guys start negotiating a contract with the Wild Pitch label, but its closure forces them soon to manage their career by themselves. Then, while taking the lead of a new crew, the Family Tree, the duo launches its own facility, All Natural Inc. And by the beginning of the new decade, they associate with two indie institutions, their neighbors Tortoise's Thrill Jockey label on the rock side, and Fat Beats on the hip-hop side. The former releases their records as CDs, and the latter as vinyls.</p>
<p><img src="https://english.fakeforreal.net/public/Pochettes/1998/all-natural-no-additives-no-preservatives.jpg" alt="ALL NATURAL - No Additives, No Preservatives" class="media-center" title="ALL NATURAL - No Additives, No Preservatives" /></p>
<p>However, before All Natural joins these labels, before they release an album, <em>Second Nature</em>, featuring Slug, J.U.I.C.E. and the Lone Catalysts, and positioning them as a part of the Midwest indie intelligentsia, the duo made of Capital D and Tone B Nimble proposes remarkable singles, all collected on another record, <em>No Additives, No Preservatives</em>.</p>
<p>Considered by some as a cult album, this record has two key assets: first, it is sold with an interesting booklet full of political observations, <em>Fresh Air</em>, concocted by The Writer's Bloc, a hip-hop writers collective led by Capital D; and also, it addresses exactly the underground's demands of the time.</p>
<p>The two guys offer what they want to hip-hop heads, hostile to the bling bling pop that has come to dominate rap music by these days. Their raps are dark and sober. They are declaimed with skills and clarity, on simple but impactful loops. Scratches are prominent. Lessons are shared about the best way to do rap. And the archenemy is the wack MC.</p>
<p>Sometimes, when people play this game, the risk is to replace clichés by others. And this is precisely what Capital D and Tone B Nimble do, at times. Many of the album's tracks, however, haven't lost much of their original luster.</p>
<p>On several occasions, the duo drops their usual boom bap for weirder sounds, like with the insane beat of "Fresh Air", or the vibrating "MC Avenger". The heavy bass and emphatic strings of the sumptuous "Phantoms Of The Opera", a strange story about vanishing wack MCs, are also worth noticing. And the atmosphere is still the same, oppressive but delectable, with "Take It To Em" and the progressive beat of "No Nonsense", while the single "50 Years", where All Natural projects themselves in the future, is luminous.</p>
<p>Last but not least, there is "It's O.K.", a song where, more than the light flute proposed by Panic of the Molemen, we can enjoy lyrics where rappers are invited to follow the only valid guidelines in any form of art: to do their own things, not to mimic their idols, to be nothing else than themselves.</p>
<p><strong><a href="https://amzn.to/3TB17bW" hreflang="en">Buy this record</a></strong></p>
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<p><em>PS : the cover art above belongs to the British version, the one I own, released by the short-lived rap subsidiary of the trip-hop label Cup of Tea (Monk & Canatella, Statik Sound System), Uppercut. The American edition's is the following.</em></p>
<p><img src="https://english.fakeforreal.net/public/Pochettes/1998/all-natural-no-additives-no-preservatives-2.jpg" alt="ALL NATURAL - No Additives, No Preservatives" class="media-center" title="ALL NATURAL - No Additives, No Preservatives" /></p>https://english.fakeforreal.net/index.php/post/2012/ALL-NATURAL-No-Additives-No-Preservatives#comment-formhttps://english.fakeforreal.net/index.php/feed/atom/comments/1793QWEL & MAKER - The Harvesturn:md5:e43637485ec40f8f2c4937f90ef1017e2011-06-12T23:07:00+02:002021-02-22T08:51:35+01:00codotusylvAlbums2004ChicagoGalapagos4MakerQwel <p>Prior to this album, Qwel was mostly known as a member of the Typical Cats, one of the main acts of Galapagos4, an indie rap label from Chicago. His two albums, <em>If It Ain't Been In a Pawn Shop...</em> and <em>The Rubber Duckie Experiment</em>, also received some praise in the underground. As for Maker, he had authored <em>Honestly</em>, a semi-instrumental record, and produced <em>Seconds Away</em>, another great album recorded jointly with DJ DQ and Adeem, under the name of Glue.</p>
<p><img src="https://english.fakeforreal.net/public/Pochettes/2004/qwel-maker-the-harvest.jpg" alt="QWEL &amp; MAKER - The Harvest" style="display:table; margin:0 auto;" title="QWEL &amp; MAKER - The Harvest" /></p>
<p>Having them collaborating on a full-length project was anything but a surprise. Qwel and Maker, indeed, were coming from the same circles. Actually, they had already recorded a song together, available on <em>Honestly</em>. And Maker had produced some tracks – the best, most of the time – on Galapagos4's most recent releases. However, <em>The Harvest</em> – the first of a series of projects inspired by the four seasons, Antonio Vivaldi-style – was some kind of revolution. Finally, Qwel had found the beatmaker he had missed so far, the one who would fit his style the best. As a result, he would be outstanding all along this new album, declaiming without a pause his relentless kind of rap, previously perfected through freestyles and MC battles.</p>
<p>Whatever he was doing - commenting about the current state of hip-hop ("The IT In Keeping It Real"); disparaging his country ("The Siren of Liberty Island") or the mass media ("The Network"); being critical and sarcastic, tearful ("Ugly Hungry Puppy", "Ruby Ragdollenne"), expressive, sensitive though not "emo", or in love ("Where I Go, There I Go"); moving from spoken word to double time - Qwel was almost flawless. He knew how to play with samples and loops. He knew when to let them go, or when to interrupt or mistreat them. He employed various tones, and Maker's beats used plenty of instruments, but none of this was garish.</p>
<p><em>The Harvest</em> is one of the gems, indie hip-hop sometimes delivered in the 2000's. It is a lost classic, released by two unsung heroes, talented enough to be respected in the indie world, but not demagogic enough to reach a larger audience. Their formula, actually, was not exactly new, it was deeply rooted in the 90's; but it was close to perfection. Together, Qwel and Maker had released a rare album in rap music: a highly delectable one, from the first to the final track.</p>
<p><strong><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0002SPS0W/ref=as_li_tf_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B0002SPS0W&linkCode=as2&tag=fafore05-20" hreflang="en">Buy this record</a></strong></p>https://english.fakeforreal.net/index.php/post/2011/QWEL-MAKER-The-Harvest#comment-formhttps://english.fakeforreal.net/index.php/feed/atom/comments/2633