Anyone on this bitch like AZ?

Ho Happy Jackie might seriously be my favorite song ever, ever, ever, ever.

Really though I only know AZ from his Illmatic verse, and that's pretty good.

DOE OR DIE

ok this isnt as good as i thought, a few nice tracks i guess (uncut raw, gimme yours)

Rather Unique = classic east coast feelgood loop

i've basically been listening to uncut raw over and over again in my car this week

Poverty-stricken, they even turn a church kid into stickin
It seems sickenin, but what? Whatever makes the pockets thickin

the memphis sessions might be one of my top albums of this decade

az = one of the most consistent rappers of the last couple decades?

saying "of the last couple decades" w/ rap is kinda like saying "of all time," isn't it?

haha well i was going to say "of the last decade" but dudes been around since at least '93? so decade-and-a-half?

this new one ain't bad, none of the beats are really jumping out at me but dude can still bring it

kinda scared to check Legendary out now that i've realized it's on the same fly-by-night label that put out that lame new Freeway album

Diamonds, & furs is all she want, that damned Glamour girl
Lovin' it, out there clubbin' it, dancin' like one of Hammer girls

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=covkh9ShXz4

take some time out of your day and listen to this.

az = one of the most consistent rappers of the last couple decades?

― rip dom passantino 3/5/09 never forget (max), Monday, May 25, 2009 12:00 PM (4 months ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

consistent in terms of writing for sure
the listenability of some of the songs tho can be mad hit or miss

hes released like 2 albums / year for the past couple hasnt he?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIhxgeki3BQ

fav az track probably:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hzODMXKxNcU

i know nothing by him, but his verse on life's a bitch would be enough to cement his greatness

luckily for his greatness he's also released more than a few great albums. i'll admit, though, that his verse on the nas track might be the highlight of his career for me. listening to a whole az album is a grand pleasure, but there's something about the way dude just comes out of nowhere three tracks in and drops the best verse on the entire album only to disappear leaving nas to take care of the rest that's kind of magical. like "we now interrupt regular programming for something that will blow your fucking mind, nas resumes at 9:15."

hahah true life's a bitch is a great song, and az probably steals the show from nas and i will be sure to check out his albums, is there one anyone would recommend?

Like AZ, but ever time I love his flow I'm reminded of his average lyrics. But love Cormega. So fragile, so expressive. More than Tragedy Khadaffi, or Capone: why was he never more loved?

mega has a new album dropping, excited abt it

word ive been meaning to listen to that

when i listen to az stuff that's PERFECT, i get a feeling like, damn this is good WHY AREN'T PEOPLE WRITING BOOKS ABOUT THIS and why isn't he-- you know, japan has that living national treasure title, 人間国宝. i feel like az needs to get some shit like that. that song there, "never change" is like... it's a perfect rap song but it does all these other things that are great outside of rap. not sure how to say this, but it's like a perfect short story, too. all these careful details and every line necessary and fitted in. he has a perfect eye for little colorful bits to stick in, and he can stay on the narrative like nobody else. to me, it's sort of self-evident that he's fucking amazing and there should be BOOKS about this guy, but he sells like 12 cds, but i guess it's enough to keep him in gucci sneakers and givenchy backpacks from the sounds of that raekwon song, so, aight, i'm cool with that.

i spend all day reading chinese literature, contemporary chinese literature, and writing about it, and i get the same feeling, like, damn, why is 99% of the shit i love completely inaccessible to the rest of the world? like, why is this kid from qinghai that nobody's ever heard of, writing stories about lamb meat soup and getting wasted, and he's got this perfect knowledge of how a short story should be constructed and it's all so SOUND, (which a lot of writing is, right?) but at the same time, fucking invigorating and exciting. and it's basically inaccessible to the world at large, even if they can read it. you DIG? why am i stuck explaining why jia pingwa is better than delilo OR ANYONE ELSE, and writes these dense fucked up books about sex and masculinity and impotence and it's really good, when i don't even give a shit about anybody but jia pingwa and his shit and his deal, and i want to say, "yo, jia pingwa, guys." but i get that it's just one of those things.

common to people that love music or poetry or whatever and want to tell people why they're passionate about it, and it's all very subjective, what makes people flip out or bores them to death, and they end up making tshirts that say LISTEN TO BOB MARLEY because they were listening to could you be loved and it made them cry and, so it's not very interesting in that respect but...

i used to really dig on that aspect, though! like, pouring out my heart on how perfect and passionate a cormega song is, but i really can't do it anymore. i'm content to say this is dope this is some bullshit, whatever. with literature, it's a lot more satisfying and i can actually... well, it's the same thing, finding shit that i like and pitching it and making the case for why it's good (and nobody cares about it, so it's the same there), but there's the final concrete aspect of translating it into another language, which i guess is SORT OF missing from writing about music, you get the final say over how it's received, in a way. i wish i could translate az songs into another language and somehow communicate: THIS IS HOW THIS SONG MAKES ME FEEL AND LOOK AT HOW PERFECT IT IS, LOOK AT HOW IT'S PUT TOGETHER. when you translate something, you kinda get to do that, because you're almost tearing down the structure and building it again, in another context, another language, but trying to maintain the same emotion, you dig. this isn't even the craziest shit i've ever put on ilx, so it's aight.

what i'm saying is. this is very frustrating. just listen to az.

^^^such a real post

jeezis, yeah. why isn't that dude here everyday to set shit right?

The post has me interested in Jia Pingwa as well so there's this link to share:

http://paper-republic.org/dylanking/jia-pingwa-records-album-of-jazz-standards-writes-cultural-revolution-novel/

Still one of my favorite of the rappers

man dylann was the best

so what you're facin, is realism in the activation
livin off land with five honeys playin my hand
me and fam sippin off guiness stout and eatin clams

i'm recognized by the illest of individuals
killers and criminals, even willies thats really into jewels

so in god i trust
i lust for a 850 deluxe

az is the best rapper ever

just bought vinyl version of aziatic for like 4 bucks

;)

Aziatic is pretty much my favourite rap album of the 00s.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=covkh9ShXz4

you know the happenings, homies just yappin and
hand shaking, laughing and
exchanging all they math again
you usually lose touch when you traveling
a few dudes bruise up in the battling
parked on madison across from the radisson
we talked about the tattlin some niggas did in maryland
plus discussed old homicides unraveling
i asked was he dabbling
he laughed and said he managing
his carti frames was as clear as a camera lens
he hardly changed, i was near in comparison
we joked about how police choked him out
and he claimed as far as fame i had enough to bust in oprah's mouth
in other words i was up in clout
and from the curb i need to pull a larry bird before i'm up and out
without a sound, snatched my guinness off the ground
rose up, gave him a pound and told him, homie, hold it down

i know i've written about this song before but i like it a lot and i think it might be approaching my idea of perfection, when it comes to this sort of writing. i've said this before, too: i think az writes better than anyone else. and as much as i don't give a fuck at all about this, if you give a fuck about reading rap lyrics, his come off the best because they preserve so much of his appeal. what do i mean here? i guess i mean that passively reading them in your head, they still have great little details and rhythmic things going on. beyond the rhythmic shit, there's the storytelling, the arc. nobody else has that (other people have it too but this is about az and he's almost the best).

i've been listening to supreme clientele recently and the same longform storytelling shit is in there but it's so cartoonish visual to me PULL OUT BLACK BURNERS LIKE TONSILS but when i listen to az, i think i just picture the words in my head. even when he's trying to go for detailed visual scenes, like in 'never change,' in my head, i just see it as text. i think part of it is the dull, clear voice. droning.

teddy p pumpin out of the gt
in 9-3, niggas had it jumpin in dc

could give a fuck, got a whole lotta dough
PLUS i'm on the low
got a whole lot of hoes YUP
suckin and fuckin, got me huffin and puffin
cussin for nothin,
clutchin heat buckin and duckin

"Never Change" is really one of the best songs ever. (It's on A.W.O.L. tho, not "the Format")

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-R08-HyLNuM

Youtube upthread wasn't working

Something really accurate about running into a friend you haven't seen in years,

a few months ago i found out about an az live show about a week too late. still kills me to think about missing that, this guy never fucking tours!

az got me drinking guiness for weeks

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1KWViwwWHdI

first track sets it up and then it's the sweepy sped up drums on magic hour and az

take paper til they close the door

never saw this video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5gwtCEtnm6g

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFFpFeTZXFA

az's one of those guys who actually made jiggy music that i could stomach.

"how ya livin" makes me want to spill champagne on a boat somewhere.

i'm standing on my balcony
working thw qaction on 1 glock 19
listening to az

so testin' is wrong cause once guns is drawn, that's it

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xhDb8LoScpI

appropriate this was one of the last things prodigy did, 3 legends

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Qk9i4KM46Y

https//www.youtube.com/watch?v=khi5oy68tL0

FOR GOOODNESS SAKE
WHAT YOU THINK YOU THE MAN YOU GOT A PLATINUM CHAIN
WE SOLD SO MANY GRAMS WE GOT PLATINUM HANDS NIGGA
WHEN THE COKE WENT UP WE HAD IT FOR 27
WHEN WE WAS IN THESE STREETS IT WAS LIKE GOD IN HEAVEN

RIP PRODIGY
TRUE LEGEND

why does he like guinness so much

black people like guiness ime

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CbkNmf8rGPI

african people (ime south africa, uganda, kenya) love black beer

does he mention guiness in this?

i think like nigeria consumes a huge amount of guinness consumed worldwide but too drunk to google it, ime jamaicans drink guiness too

having solddrugs does it fuck up your appreciateion of coke lyrics

prodigy is such a ag

never swung like new york rap called for
never fit with formal constrained iof new york rap
true uyntil the ned
named an ealbum hegelain dialectss

truest n word alive

i want to behead some motherucker too

4:11
Az最終的なコール別名真実

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khi5oy68tL0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akEC4UGX-8g

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6RMIB-6hHQ

Yo it's hard to shake this feeling that I might get knocked

Son you know it don't stop, we can't close up shop

digging Doe or Die II
he still comes correct lyrically

Top 5 MC voice for me