The Sugar Bear Demos

Here's a really nice release that probably slid under many of your radars - it certainly did mine - Sugar Bear's Never Lost: My '99 Demos on Spitslam Records,  Spitslam, if you didn't realize, is Chuck D's label, which you might remember for putting out the Chill Rob G comeback album a few years ago.  They've also been putting out the new Stetsasonic material and a bunch of other interesting projects from old school and new artists.  And Sugar Bear's album, which actually came out last summer, but I just discovered recently, is exactly what its title promises: a preservation of Sugar Bear's previously unreleased demo recordings from 1988.

There are essentially six tracks.  These have been remastered and are pretty clean, but listening closely, I'd guess they're from a retail cassette dub, and they do still sound a little thin.  And admittedly, they're not all on par with his most famous single.  The opening "Get It Together" has a catchy sample, but it's a slower track that's more focused on delivering a message than the hyped up delivery on his Next Plateau material.  And lyrically, frankly, it's a little clunky:

"Some people say
That life is not easy.
Some things out there
Are always not pleasing.
Handle it;
Take one step at a time.
And make it slow,
And maybe you will find
What you've been looking for.
That's important,
Not miscellaneous.
What I'm saying is:
There is a better way.
You gotta find it.
Use your brain
Before you bind it."

Like, contriving phrases like "are always not pleasing" from "are not always pleasing" just sounds awkward; and a lot of those rhymes are pretty basic to also be so forced ("easy" and "pleasing?").  It shows that his heart's in the right place, and again, the instrumental will hook you in, so it's a funky little track, but not on the level of what we've heard before.  It's both dope (especially now that we're not getting any more music like this from that era) and easy to see why it's remained a demo.

The next track, however, is the one.  "Violated" comes hard and fast, using some of the same samples as Eric B and Rakim's "Let the Rhythm Hit 'Em," but with its own unique flavor.  Sugar's at his most aggressive, there's a breakdown slicing up Kool G Rap's "Cold Cuts," and they mix in additional unique samples throughout the track.  And had this actually come out in 1988, it would've been first, beating them to the punch by about two years.  I'm not saying it's better than that all-time classic, Rakim is definitely the smoother MC, but it gives it a respectable run for its money.  And again, it's a precursor from the 80s.  It's a real shame this didn't come out at the time; it would've really made a mark.

"Cadence" and "Super Monster" are respectable runners up: two more high energy tracks where the Long Islander comes hard over some strong instrumentals.  I did find myself wishing he was just a little slicker with the wordplay, and it's a bit goofy on the latter track when they do an acapella of the Sugar Crisps theme song.  But overall these are some tight 80's tracks any Hip-Hopper would be delighted to have in their collection.  And "Chillin" is almost on the same level, it's just a little bit slower and looser, with more playful lyrics, a little more MC Rell than Rakim.

And finally there's the token love song, "My Girl" with its sung chorus and cheesy lyrics, "the moment that I laid/ my eyes on you/ for you to be my girl/ it can only be true/ you carry yourself/ with no suspicion/ the thought of you/ makes me wonder why I'm missin'/ you, my girl/ there can never be another/ the patter of my heart/ makes it sound like thunder."  It's a bit silly; but it's still fun to uncover a vintage track like that.

Those six demos are it, but he's also re-recorded a new 2024 version of "Get It Together."  It's the same lyrics and instrumental, just a fresh recording of it.  And comparing the two versions, you can appreciate that even though the remastered demos removed the hiss and any other possible issues, the new version definitely sounds deeper and warmer.  Bear's voice is also a little deeper now that he's older, but he does a good job matching his original delivery.  It sounds a little different, but he basically manages to recapture the magic, and it probably helps that none of us grew up with the originals, so we won't be put off by any slight variation.  I kinda wish he remade "Violated," too.

So that's the meat of the album, I guess you'd say EP.  But besides the demos, Never Lost is packed with bonus tracks, including both cuts from the 1988 12" that made him famous, his 1989 song from Richie Rich's album and some kind of Greek electro-dance remix of "Don't Scandalize Mine" from 2015, which they kindly put at the end of the album so you can just turn it off before that track starts.  The only things they didn't include are his 2018 single "I'm Hot" and some guest spots he recorded for a few R&B artists throughout the years.

The only bummer is it's CD only.  CD-R to be precise, which is how Spitslam releases most of their music.  On the one hand, it's cheap and absolutely 100% worth it.  But it would be sweet if they teamed up with another label, like Chopped Herring, Dope Folks or whoever's more experienced in pressing up this kind of stuff on wax.  I know they've done that once or twice before, like with Schoolly D's new album (which I'm also interested in picking up myself), so maybe there's still hope.  But if not, you can find a whole bunch of CD-R only projects from them that would come to the same price as one LP from a lot of other places.

DJ War B

We took a look back at the oeuvre of DJ Raw B a couple years ago, and now he's back with a brand new album called The Fog of War.  Raw B first appeared on my radar for his collaborations with Luke Sick and that whole extended Sacred Hoop family of artists.  They did a whole album together in 2019, but otherwise most of B's albums have been largely instrumental.  So I was already heartened to see that this one is comprised mostly of full vocal songs, gathering together an ensemble of guest MCs to create one consistent work of art.

Is Luke Sick one of those guest MCs, and did I immediately jump to his song as soon as I popped off the shrink-wrap?  Sure, and he does have one of the best tracks on here ("Shogun's Decapitator").  But here's the interesting thing I discovered about this album: it's stronger played straight through from the beginning to the end.  Hip-Hop's had a lot of producer albums over the years, and usually they feel like compilations to be jumped around and picked apart.  Like In Control vol. 2 - how many of us are playing the Nexx Phase or Portia songs as much as "The Symphony Part 2?"  Not that this is a Deltron-like "concept album" or anything; it's not that conjoined.  But I started out needle dropping, and when I jumped to the On Tilt song (at this point, regular readers should not need to be told that On Tilt is the duo of Luke Sick and QM), I was disappointed.  I didn't think it was bad, just not as effective as I usually find them to be.  Maybe it just needed a catchier beat.

But when I finally played the whole album through, I liked their song better in context.  And I found that to be true of a lot of this, especially in the production, so let's take The Fog Of War as a cohesive album.  Instrumentally, it isn't super dark and moody, but it is gritty.  I didn't know a lot of these artists.  Googling around, several of them seem to be from Chicago, one's from Atlanta... The first MC, Infinite, I only know from having one of the tighter tracks on the prior Raw B album, Uncorrupted.  He comes off nice here, too, impressively flipping between a variety of styles; and Raw B lays down a really fresh collection of samples for him.  It's a good opener to pull you in, but it's track 2 where this album really takes off.

Raw B starts off juggling up vocal samples from "The Message" and "Mind Playing Tricks," which tells you all you need to know.  Low, rumbling bass and air raid sirens kick in as somebody named Fable Angelo really sets off a series of tragic narrative raps.  The vibes are like early Paris, documenting the failure of the American project, "I seen the young dude approachin' me with his crew.  They stood right in front of me and wouldn't let me move; said the color of my laces was disrespectful and rude; but today was my lucky day, he gonna let me choose.  He said I could take off my shoes or I could be the next one dead on the news.  Hold up, this dude tryin' to punk me?  I punched him in his face, yeah, they jumped me.  I walked home barefooted and bloody, but I know where my momma keeps her gun and her money.  I'll be right back."  Damn.

Whoever this guy is, he just stole the show from my favorite rappers on here.  Although, with that said, approaching their song after all this bleaker Art of War material, I appreciated hearing On Tilt pop up when they did: a distorted party jam that only makes sense in a war zone.

It's fourteen tracks total.  Eleven full vocal songs with three instrumentals floating in between.  The only other MC I know on here is Gennessee, Raw B's old mate from Double Life (along with L'Roneous da Versifier), who you might best remember from that "Sucker MCs 2000" record with Masta Ace.  The variety of styles on here, brought together by a singular production style, helps keep this engaging and smooths over any bumps along the way to the end.  Maybe I wouldn't be feeling some of these guys so much if I dug into their Spotify pages, but mixed together in this soup, it all works.  And anyway, B's scratch hooks are the real stars in this sky.

This is available digitally wherever, but the limited edition CD can be ordered direct from his site or on Bandcamp.  A nice bonus there is that the track-listing, on the case and online, lists 14 tracks; but when you pop the disc in, there's 24.  That's because he's added the instrumentals for nine of the vocal songs (skipping "Bad Wreck" and "Flowing," for the record) as uncredited bonus tracks, which I believe are only available on the physical release.

It Only Took Thirty Years... The Almighty Arrogant Album!

(I'm beyond excited for this one - the long lost Almighty Arrogant Perspective album from 1996 is finally getting released, on triple vinyl, double CD and tape! Youtube version is here.)

The Bottom Of the Father MC Barrel

We've finally hit it, folks!  Today's post will probably have most vinyl heads, even those with deep Father MC collections, saying, "hmm, I don't have that."  And then, "hmm, I don't want that."  But, in all fairness, it's not because the people who made the music are necessarily terrible, so much as it's just not what we want here at Werner's: a proper Hip-Hop record.  Or even a Hip-Hop record at all.  Yes, today we'll be examining "Alright" by Jazzed Up, co-written by Father.

Don't worry, I'm not going to string out the suspense here.  "Alright" is a 1996 remix of Father MC's 1992 hit single, "Everything's Gonna Be Alright" featuring Jodeci.  It's a UK club dance thing, and none of Father's rapping is included, so he's got a writing credit but his voice isn't on here at all.  Prince Markie Dee and The Soul Convention's and other Mark are also credited as "originally produced by," but this uses virtually (entirely?) none of their instrumental either.  All it takes is Jodeci's hook.  They play different pieces of it at different times, laying it down over a very bouncy, late 90s house kinda track.  The vocals aren't quite "chipmunk soul," but they're pitched up enough that you might mistake them for female vocalists if you didn't recognize the source.

Jazzed Up is a one-off alias for a guy named Mark Truman, who's produced a whole ton of clubby dance records I'd never listen to under different alias and with different groups over the years.  I guess he's best known for being a part of Hybrid, who've put out a bunch of albums and been featured on the soundtracks for several movies and video games.

It comes in a picture cover from a small label called Final Phase Records, but it has connections going all the way up to Warner Bros, who probably had to pay a decent amount to clear Father's record, so this was presumably a decent payday for him, or at least Puffy and Uptown Records.  Father would've been off Uptown for several years by this point.

There are three mixes of the song, but they're all pretty similar stuff and use roughly the same amount of Jodeci, and none of Father.  One's credited to Hybrid and another is credited to The Solid Collective, which is another one of Truman's side groups.  They're both extended a bit.  The Hybrid version is a bit moodier with deeper bass notes while the Solid Collective mix has more of an electro flavor and has a tonal keyboard riff midway through that doesn't really jel with the rest of the music.

It's the kind of record I wouldn't ordinarily bother to write about if I weren't bent on ultimately covering every Father MC record ever.  So we may be scrapping the bottom, but it's it's an interesting bit of trivia for the Father MC fan who thinks he has everything.

Super Santa: An Old School Holiday Mystery

(Happy Holidays, everybody!  Today we're casting back to an O.G. disco-era Christmas rap, by one or more people known only as Super Jay.  Youtube version is here.)

The Cellar Is Back Open, People!

Unlike my last post, I had absolutely nothing to do with this release, but I sure am excited for it!  No Sleep/ Gentleman's Relief Records long running Cellar Sounds series of rare and unreleased Nick Wiz productions is back, with the first new volume in over seven years.  Yeah, we recently had that mix CD, but now the series is really restarting, because to be clear, this is not another reissue or anything; Cellar Sounds Volume 6 is another 2-CD collection of 43 full, rare and unreleased tracks from 1992-2000 (with one 2010 bonus track I was quite happy about).

Let's run through the rarities before we get into the truly unreleased stuff.  The first one I clocked was that both sides of UG's 2000 "Do U Know" 12" from Bronx Science are on here.  We get some more tracks from the very hard to find Lyricist Lounge tapes, including two of the "Cypha Sessions" (it's actually a real treat to get these remastered now), two songs from Pudgee's Angel Dust EP, F.O.D.'s "No More" and "Frontline," Main One's collaborative singles "Main Event" "Droppin' Gramma" & "Bring the Drama" 12"s, Gauge's "Insane," and so on.  The biggest surprise was seeing Shabaam Sahdeeq's Rawkus singles on here, "Arabian Nights" and "Every Rhyme I Write," oh and Mad Skillz' "Nod Factor" remix, because those were relatively major releases.

But even if your collection is 100% thorough, and you dismiss all of those as duplicates (color me impressed), that still leaves 24 unreleased tracks by my count.  Some of these are remixes or "original versions" of released songs, like alternate mixes of N-Tyce's "Sure Ya Right" and Emskee's "Black Boys, Baseball Caps & Beepers."  There's an extended version of Pudgee's indie single "U Ain't Know" with DMX now with a verse by Hostile (his cousin, not to be confused with Hostyle of Screwball - whoops!) that was cut off the release version.  Then most of the rest are demos or songs recorded for unfinished projects, like a Moonie D (of FOD) solo joint or a fun promo song Madhouse recorded for the Wendy Williams Show.  Some of these demos are by guys who never came out, but Nick Wiz is a reliably consistent producer, so they're all tight.

A couple of my personal favorites was a particularly hardcore duet between UG and Main One called "Got Luv" and a hype cut called "Bring It" by the Native Assassins, who you should remember from previous Cellar Sounds.  What will surely be the biggest deal for many fans, and yes also one of my favorites, is an unreleased Rakim track, recorded his Seventh Seal album, but criminally left on the cutting room floor.  And that bonus track I mentioned?  Remember when The Cella Dwellas announced they were reuniting and recording with Nick Wiz again?  I guess nothing more ever came of that, sadly, but that one song is on here, and it's so great to finally have it in our collections.

And once again, Nick Wiz writes liner notes for every single song on the booklet.  This release is limited to 400 copies and is already out now.  GRR has also repressed the long out of print Ran Reed compilation, Nick Wiz Presents: Respect the Architect 1992-1998.  It has all the same tracks as the original 2012 release, so you've got another shot if you missed it the first time.  There's a double-LP on black or blue & orange vinyl coming soon; and the CD with the bonus track, which is out as of this writing.

The Lost Omniscenct Tapes

Alright, I'm psyched to be able to share with you guys another release I helped out on!  This is a brand new compilation of vintage, mostly never before heard songs by Omniscence on Gentleman's Relief Records called The Lost Tapes.  It's a limited edition (to 400 copies) CD, and if you're reading this, you can already order it now.  Update 11/22/24: And yes, a vinyl LP version is coming soon, too.

This collection is twenty tracks deep, nineteen of which were recorded between 1994 and 1998... although, strictly speaking, the first  and last are an intro and outro.  But the outro does feature Omni freestyling, and they were both produced in '95 with a smooth beat by Fanatic; so we'll count them as one song.  So that's eighteen songs from the 90s, and one self-produced track Omni recorded in 2002, where he was starting to test the waters for his comeback.  That song is called "Testin' the Waters."

The enclosed booklet has some great notes by Omniscence himself, where he helpfully explains that these songs are largely from three distinct eras.  The first are tracks originally recorded for Raw Factor, but the label rejected because they were literally too raw and not commercial enough.  Then you've got some tracks from '96 with a little harder edge ("I'd been scorned by the industry") he made for a 6th Boro compilation.  Then there are a few songs from '97-'98 that he recorded in NY as a demo he shopped around, but that otherwise went completely unheard.  And finally, there are a couple loosies, like two songs he recorded with Mixmasta D and that 2002 comeback track.

So what did I do?  I basically contributed one song.  If you've followed along with my Omniscence coverage, you might recall that I have an old Raw Factor promo EP with one song (called "Keep Giving Me Love") that had still never been released anywhere, despite the recovery and eventual release of the long lost Raw Factor album.  I now realize it must have been one of those tracks the label stupidly didn't want.  I described it in my initial post as one of the tightest tracks, and now you can finally hear it for yourselves.  In fact, you can hear two versions, because it turns out mine was a later release of a demo they already had called "The Flav's About To Drop," with the same raps and instrumental, but a completely different hook and some other subtle variations.  The Lost Tapes includes both.

There are a couple other points where you'll hear verses or elements repeat across songs here, because these were all unreleased tracks, so why not recycle something from them?  You know, the same situation as the Children of the Corn album Dust & Dope was able to release.  But it's pretty minimal.  This is a satisfyingly full and diverse album.  I said these were mostly unheard songs earlier because four of them were already featured on the 2015 Dope Folks EP Elektra Emancipation: No A&R and No R&B Niggas In the Studio, but this is their first time on CD at least.  And we have the original version of "This Year," a song that was titled "Dick Suck" on the Raw Factor album, with an entirely different instrumental.

Overall, Omni fans should be delighted.  Lots of lost music has been uncovered, and this isn't a case of the final, weakest scraps.  They might be the final ones, but they're as strong as any previous Omniscence record.  Most of the production's by Fanatic, and there are a handful of guest spots by the usual suspects.  Some of these songs could make the 'Greatest Hits.'

And if you missed it the first go around, GRR is also repressing Omni's long out of print God Hour album from 2014.  Now, if you'll recall that started out as an EP of brand new (at the time) Omniscence music flushed out to an LP by the inclusion of remixes for every single song.  And the CD version expanded it to 22 songs by also including his 2012 "Raw Factor 2.0" single and his 2013 Sharp Objects EP, in a big 2-disc set.  Well, this 2024 reissue is now a single CD, but it still includes all 22 songs from across the three releases.  It's also a limited edition (to 250 copies) and available as of this writing (in fact, I think you can get both releases cheaper as a bundle), but it's not a perfect one-to-one.

The original release was a 2-disc set in a digipack.  This new one is a single disc in a jewel case.  It still has all 22 tracks from the three releases; but it's missing the four uncredited bonus tracks: additional remixes of "Raw Factor 2.0," "Ease My Mind," "Letter To the Better" and "Welcome" that had mostly been cassette exclusives prior to that.  You still get two versions of every song from all three releases on one disc, so it's pretty packed and more than enough for most fans, I'm sure.  But serious collectors should be aware that the original's a little preferable.  ...And serious serious collectors will have those bonus remixes on their initial releases anyway, so I guess it's a pretty niche distinction.  But still.  Just so ya know.

Zombie Killers' Delight

(A couple of anti-zombie novelty records for the holiday, and a tangent on Rappin' Duke.  Happy Halloween!  Youtube version is here.)

Questionable Lyrics #6: When MCs Talk E.F. Hutton, Do People Listen?

It all started in 1984, when Grandmaster Melle Mel and the Furious Five released "The Truth" on their Sugarhill Records album Work Party.  Before they start rapping, and even before the music kicks in, they declare in unison, "rap is our way of life; that's why we do what we like.  Born to rock the mic like E. F. Hutton, so don't say nothin'.  Just listen!"  It's the type of line to leave younger listeners puzzling, "who the hell is E.F. Hutton?"  But old school heads will remember the reference.

E.F. Hutton was an old stock brokerage firm founded in the early 1900s by the Hutton brothers, Edward and Franklyn.  It became most famous thanks to a series of ubiquitous television commercials in the 70s and 80s that all followed the same basic premise.  Two business people are walking in a crowded - airport, park, elevator, etc - discussing vague business dealings amid the constant murmur of bustling people.  One of them will say, "well, my broker's E.F. Hutton, and E.F. Hutton says..." and everyone around them suddenly falls silent.  Then a narrator comes on and says, "when E.F. Hutton talks, people listen."  The end.  They'd tart setting it in more absurd situations, like swimming pools, garden parties or little children in a classroom, because it had become such a thing in pop culture.  As a kid, everybody in the schoolyard would quote that line, and it mostly just left us wondering "who the hell is E.F. Hutton?"

Well, the 80s also saw E.F. Hutton run an early check kiting scam (something made popular again with the recent "Chase glitch"), a major mafia money laundering scheme, and go broke during the stock market crash, eventually dissolving in the early 90s.  But we just knew the commercials.  Not just in the playground, but in Hip-Hop, where it took off as a major, recurring punchline.  It's not witty; everybody was just basically repeating a popular commercial tagline line in reference to themselves.  It wasn't generally punny or making any kind of statement about crooked financial institutions.  You wouldn't even accuse anyone of biting anyone else, because it was so basic and even kinda dumb, though of course everyone used it their own way.

Let's dive into all the instances!


"When my voice gets cuttin', everybody listens up like I'm E.F. Hutton."

Also in 1984, over on the west coast, the Triple Threat Three had already turned it into a more traditional punchline for their record "Scratch Motion."


"You know what I notice all of a sudden? When I speak people diss E.F. Hutton."

Then, in 1985, Kool Doobie of Whistle made it more famous by spitting it on a much more popular record, their debut classic "(Nothin' Serious) Just Buggin'." [And yes, I did come up with this post idea when quoting that record in my last article about P-Man.]


"I'm like E.F. Hutton, E.F. Hutton, E.F. Hutton when I start to talk; 'cause everybody listens.  If they don't, then walk."

That same year, obscure Connecticut rapper Terrible T tripled it up it on his surprisingly catchy record "He's Terrible," where he employed similar commercial slogans like, "I'm finger lickin' good like Kentucky Fried Chicken."


"Like E.F. Hutton, when I talk, people listen."

The great Grandmaster Caz used the line sometime in '86-'87.  We don't know for sure because "Good, Fresh, Down, Time" wasn't released until the 2006 Tuff City Ol' Skool Flava compilation.


"I'm Hip-Hop's E.F. Hutton, 'cause all the people listen."

In 1989, the not as great MC Twist used it on his album track "B-L-N-T" (which stands for "better luck next time").


"You talk shit, I get like E.F. Hutton: BLAOW!!  Oh, y'all sure got quiet all of a sudden."

And the trend continued on into the 90s.  On Greek's 1993 posse cut "Rhyme for Ya Life," K-Rino got finally started getting a little more clever with it.


"It's goin' through me, got me struttin'. When E.F. Hutton talks, everybody listens."

One of the ones people probably remember most is Mystikal closing out his breakout 1995 single "Mind of Mystikal" with this last line, though he kind of just lays it down as a random non-sequitur.


"Like E.F. Hutton, when I talk, niggas listen."

And other big names were using it to.  On Mase's "Will They Die 4 You?," Lil Kim says it, even though by 1997 E.F. Hutton had pretty much ceased to exist.  What did that matter?  It was just clutter floating around in our collective subconscious.


"Like E.F. Hutton, don't say nothin'."

"Colonel nigga becoming the ghetto E.F. Hutton: holler 'UGHH' and every fuckin' soldier start stuntin'."

In 1998, Keith Murray used it on the Def Squad single "Ride Wit Us," as well as Silkk the Shocker on "I'm a Soldier."  See if you can guess which is which.


"40 talk like E.F. Hutton. Shhh, people listen."

And on into the 2000s, E-40 said it on 2002's "Mustard & Mayonnaise."


"I'm in the hood where the guns is nothin', and niggas don't say shit, like E.F. Hutton."

And Cappadonna brought it up on his 2003 posse cut "We Got This."


The Beastie Boys finally put it to bed on their 2004 album To the 5 Boroughs, specifically with the song "Rhyme the Rhyme Well," where they conclude the song with a big celebration of the throwback reference.  Mike D ends his last verse with the line, "now push the pause button, then start duckin'. Shh, you heard me like I'm E.F. Hutton."  Then, as Mix Master Mike cuts loose with a copy of "Public Enemy No. 1," they start repeating, "E.F. Shhh, Hutton!  Shhh, Hutton!  Shhh, Hutton!  Shhh, Hutton!"  Could the shush be a nod to E-40's record?  Maybe, but I'm more confident saying that the larger point of the E.F. Hutton routine was to embrace the endearing hoakiness of the random, and very old school recurring reference in our genre.  and maybe it was an intentional move to quash it, since they did make it hard for MCs to use it again after this, at least unironically; and I can't think of anyone saying it on a record since.

Meanwhile, the more business savvy or socially conscious amongst us will be interested to hear that E.F. Hutton came back in the 2010s.  Well, it quickly went into massive debt and closed down again.  But then it was resurrected a second time in the 2020s.  And now they've been uncovered as the company financially underwriting Donald Trump's Truth Social, and the new CEO has already been ousted for defrauding millions of dollars.  Good times!

Giving The P-Man His Props

For those that don't know, P-Man was sort of the third member of Young and Restless.  Like, if you looked at the back of their album, he seemed to be their DJ/ producer; though the conventional wisdom is that he was really just the money man, managing and financing the group while somebody else did all the music.  And he may not even really have been much of a money man if you heard what Dr. Ace and Prince P. said when they fired him after he got sent away for drug trafficking before their second album.  Well, that's all as may be, but P-Man was an actual DJ and he definitely did the music for his 1987 solo 12" from Bound Sound Records called "Rock it Baby."  And it's dope.

No, P-Man does not rap on this.  This is a DJ joint, in the tradition of "Touch of Jazz," "DJ Premier In Deep Concentration" and those other all-too rare songs where the DJ got to shine and his turntables were given the lead track rather than a rapper's vocals.  Admittedly, the scratching might sound a little rudimentary today compared to later examples guys like Magic Mike or DJ Aladdin would come up with just a year or two later.  This is more akin to, say, N.Y.C. Cutter (Marley Marl)'s "DJ Cuttin."  But that was an important record in its day.

One element that immediately makes "Rock It Baby" stand out is that it loops the same famous riff from Rick James' "Super Freak" years before MC Hammer's "U Can’t Touch This" blew it up.  The P-Man came first!  But this record doesn't rely as heavily on it, frequently flipping the script and changing the root samples and drum machine effects its instrumental is based on.  And then of course he's cutting up various soundbites like Kool Doobie saying "perpetrators praise me" from the Whistle classic "(Nothing Serious) Just Buggin'" on top of that.  Again, a lot of the scratches are fairly old school and basic, but if you pay attention, he lays in some trickier, more forward looking tricks in there, like some scribbles.

Oh, and it's worth noting that there are two versions, the Scratch Mix and The Other Mix.  Both actually feature full scratching and stuff; it's not like one is just a dub mix or something.  In fact, you might not notice the difference on a first, casual listen.  But they are different lengths with different edits throughout.  I guess you could say The Other Mix is an extended mix, lasting approximately two minutes longer and letting more of the beats ride unencumbered for a while.  As such, I'd say the Scratch Mix is the tighter and more energetic of the two, and it has a couple additional keyboard samples (it sounds like he's mixing in "Saturday Love" maybe, but it's hard to tell because he's juggling it so much), but The Other Mix is nice for when you want to just vibe out to a longer-lasting experience.

P-Man did return to music when he was released from prison sometime around 1993, including a group called If Looks Could Kill with his then wife, and the Polo Boyz/ Dynaztee.  He later changed his name to Sam Silvasteen and got into publishing Hip-Hop mags and websites, before he was tragically killed in 2009.  So his image has almost always been about his management, his various businesses (on both sides of the law), his beef with Rick Ross, etc.  But it's worth remembering he had this fresh little record with his own music to his name, too.

A Quick Nip Before the Show

"Sambuca" is a track from D's last album, Libra; but this is an all new Smoove Mix - that is to say, a remix by UK producer Smoove - for the vinyl single.  This isn't the first Smoove remix D's released on 7", following the "Labels" Smoove Mix in 2021.  The only other track they've done together is "Do It Now," the B-side to his "Lucky Number" single in 2022.  For whatever reason, he's become his exclusive 7" remix guy.

And like their last two collaborations, this one has a high energy, 70s vibe to it, almost like a foreign funk band recorded it live.  In my Libra review, I wrote that "'Sambuca' slows things down a little, but is still full of life, a light-hearted anthem for D's liqueur of choice."  It might've been a bit funny to say "slows things down," since it actually has a pretty high bpm; but it immediately followed "When It's Fast," and that whole side of the album was pretty hyper.  Anyway, this remix is basically the same speed, but this live party sound is quite distinct from the original, like a completely new song: a second ode to Sambuca, which just happens to have all the same lyrics.

The first two verses are about D preparing for a performance and stopping for two precious drinks first, "dashing through the town, clutching a wealth of wax and vinyl from many years gone by/ We arrive at the club about ten minutes shy/ Of the time to go on. What rhymes like 'bazooka?'/ You know what?  Just time for Sambuca!"  Finally, uh-oh, he's maybe a little too drunk to go on...  But sure enough, the show goes well, so to celebrate?  More Sambuca!  It ain't deep.  In 2Pac terms, "Sambuca" was an "I Get Around" moment, not a "Trapped;" and now Smoove's turned it into more of a full-blown "Doowhutchyalike."

The blaring horns are easily the first thing to grab your attention, but it's the groovy bassline that really locks you in.  To blow up the party element even further, Smoove adds a chorus of additional voices shouting out "SAMBUCA" on the hook.  More subtly, he also adds these little snippets of 90s R&B style vocalisms that sound really fresh.  The one drawback is just, in order to gain all of that, we have to lose Djar One's killer Premier-style scratch hooks from the original.  But that's alright; we still have the Libra version on the album, still perfectly viable.

So as you can see up top, this B-Line Records 7" comes in a sticker cover with a stamped label.  Oh, and the B-side is the instrumental; the vinyl is the only way to get that.  It's out now, and is apparently limited to just 100 copies, so if you're interested, act fast!  Because the only thing worse than FOMO is AMO (actually missing out).  I've been there plenty; it sucks.