I Can't Forget New Jersey

Heavy D was a talented dude. Without necessarily knowing everything he had a hand in, I was/am fairly familiar with a bunch of his work, moreso through Uptown Records than anything else. Still, somehow it's this cameo in Nick Gomez/Spike Lee's "New Jersey Drive" that seems to come to mind more than anything when I think of him. Heavy was a gifted musician, but he also was a strong actor, as you can see here.

While we're talking about it, the soundtrack for "New Jersey Drive" is real nice too. Tommy Boy released it in 2 volumes, and there's some truly classic records on there, including BIG & Total's "Can't You See," Outkast's "Benz or Beamer," and a few others.

This one below from Latifah really speaks to me, though. As someone who has spent some time in Jersey over the years, albeit not in Newark, I love this record..and I love that Biz Markie sample too!!!

Queen Latifah - Jersey





And here's a couple other favorite odds & ends from Heavy D's catalog.

Reacquainted...

I went out the other week to this event at the 9:30 Club hosted by Red Bull called the Big Tune competition. Nottz was a featured performer, and though I recognized his name, I couldn't really put the name to any tracks off the top...it soon came to my attention that he was responsible for this from 'Extinction Level Event' and this from 'Graduation' (one of just a few other producers credited on Kanye's latest.) Outside of those, I've been a big fan of "W.O.L.V.E.S." which is off the Training Day soundtrack, but the tune that really caught my attention was the joint he opened up with as his hype-man was setting the stage a bit. I couldn't place it, so I asked him the name of it afterwards when I saw him outside the venue...a little Motown flavor for ya, Edwin Starr - Easin In.

Anyway, there were some good producers involved in the competition (K. Murdock of Panacea, Young Slim, Best Kept Secret, etc.) and an energetic performance from Wale, who seems to be a favorite of some/many these days, or at least a buzzworthy name.  He was good, I'll give him that...good energy, good music, all around, dude did his thing.

In between competitors/performers, the DJ was playing some tracks, and it turns out that he was actually spinning DVDs which was kinda cool...interesting to see some of the music videos showing on the big screens for the joints he was spinning. At one point he was playing 'Da Rockwilder' from Meth and Red, which was a dope little jam when it came out at the beginning of this decade, but even more memorable than the track, was the video. It got me to thinking about some of the videos from that era (late 90's, early 00's) and some of the video directors, including the cat who did the 'Rockwilder' video, Dave Meyers. Many of the videos back then really defined the tracks that blew up cats like Cash Money and their whole crew (surprisingly, I don't believe Meyers did any videos for Cash Money, but it sparked the idea and his name is the one that stands out the most.) Of course, keep in mind that this was in a different time when heads would spend a huge budget on a video because there were not countless outlets for music videos yet, and in order to get your video played, it needed to be big. Nowadays, the math just doesn't make sense (obviously.) Back to the lecture at hand though, many of the joints that really blew up around this time had dope videos, and while I don't find myself checking MTV2/Jamz/VHI Soul/Fuse/etc. nearly as much as I did years ago, I don't think these type videos are being made as much. The look they accomplished was pretty impactful. Here's some of the vids from those days that stand out:

Some of that cosmic dust...

I first heard of Sa-Ra Creative Partners back when Pharoah’s “Agent Orange” single came out, probably the same time everyone else would’ve first caught wind of these cats. Their name itself sounds like they’re a hair salon or something, so needless to say I had no clue who they were, but then again, they were brand new on the scene. Considering how few releases they’ve put out over the years, it always surprised me how much hype they’d gotten. Still, apparently their talents were evident enough to be signed to deals with both Sound In Color and Kanye West’s G.O.O.D. Music label, though unfortunately all that would result from these two situations was a single 6-track EP (a fairly lackluster one at that if you ask me.)

For whatever reason though, I still check for these cats, and so when I came across their first full-length recently, I picked it up to see what the real deal is. Released in 2007 via independent label Babygrande, “The Hollywood Recordings” is (if nothing else) a good look at what they’re capable of. With nearly 20 tracks on the album, there is definitely a bunch of filler and just straight-up mediocre material, too much to really speak on this project as a cohesive album or even to rate it particularly high as a collective. However, there are definitely moments that stand out and suggest that some of the hype has been warranted in years past.

I want to compare them (on some level) to Organized Noize…funk, soul, intergalactic isht. Or as they describe themselves: Afro Magnetic Electronic Spiritualism. I wouldn’t go as far as to say these two groups are on the same level, but Sa-Ra is heading in the right direction, and I’m hopeful that they keep doing what they do because the future looks (potentially) bright. It sounds like they may have a major label debut ready or in the works, but who knows if/when that will arrive.

Sa-Ra / Goapele / Outkast

Sa-Ra - Rosebuds  (Babygrande)

Sa-Ra - And If feat. Ty  (Babygrande)

Sa-Ra - So Special feat. Rozzi Daime  (Babygrande)

Sa-Ra - Fly Away feat. Erykah Badu & Georgia Anne  (Babygrande)

Goapele - Fly Away  (Sony/Skyblaze)

Outkast - Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik (ON remix)  (Laface)