The Musik Lounge

Download the August Heatrocks here! Emotion in a verse is a powerful tool. It can make a weak verse sound dope. But if you are actually spitting, and displaying some real passion about those words - game over. Don Trip kicks off the August Heatrocks with “Letter 2 My Son." Sounds like his son's mom is putting him through some bullshit and he couldn’t handle it anymore. The dude just wants to be their for his child. Big K.R.I.T. has stormed the rap world in 2010 dropping K.R.I.T. Wuz Here early on and not letting up, connecting with Def Jam, Curren$y and that camp things just seem to be falling into place for the Mississippi representer. He has been at it for awhile though and their is a lot of fresh work to dig through if you so desire. I’ve done my hardest to find as much as I can and start that process. Here is one jam I found that displays a little more hunger than on much of what I’ve heard as of late. I had a random song for a long time that I loved by a guy named Rozew...

Half way through 2010. I'm another year older. Time is flying and life is exciting. Apologies for the lack of updates around these parts, the sun coming out and my own lack of direction have been on my mind lately. I'm ready to make a move and find a home, it's been a long run since coming back to Seattle in October of last year. But let's dispense with the personal stuff, that ain't why you come to The Musik Lounge! Download June Heatrocks here. Kicking off this month's edition of the Heatrocks is "Think 4 Yourself" by La Finne Equipe & Mattic. I know nothing. The name is eloquent. The song is fun. Truth couldn't be realer. Get down with it. I need to go back into my Ani DiFranco archieves and see if this really is her voice they flipped for the sample in the hook. One of the last records I rocked at my old job in the Bistro on Seattle University's campus was Long Distance from Onra. As I remember it, it's great. "Wonderland...

These Heatrock compilations never seem to make it up to the blog in a timely manner? The two jobs are over and summer is about here. I took a brief hiatus this weekend from the antics of Seattle life to come home and visit with my mom. Always feels good to return to the place of my beginings but I'm ready to get back and keep things moving. Shouts out to all my Jet Set fam, rock tonight for me! Download the May Heatrocks here . May saw the release of the Jeezy tape Trap or Die 2, picking up from the last tape and as is usual with mixtapes things stay just a little harder than you would hear on a full length issued by a label. The Clipse and Jeezy are three of the only emcees who own the coke raps today. This song doesn't really pull on their mutual trade but they deliver a high energy banger for you to rock out with none the less! Detroit is a cold hard place. People say the grey skies round Seattle keep our youth depressed more than anywhere else. Maybe so, but depression has...

My favorite feature of iTunes has to be the play count and top 25 most played lists. I love being able to see what is getting the most plays from me. With my computer crashing and the subsequent reloads I found myself loosing the valuable information that makes up my play count and helps determine what you all are blessed in these here posts I like to call the heatrocks. A few of the songs from last month were so ingrained in my ears i couldn't forget them, others just jumped out as I scrolled. Just 11 bangers this time around due to technical difficulty but you'll enjoy them! J Rocc, Daedelus, Ras G & Nobody all participated in a little project with Dublab outta LA entitled Secondhand Sureshots and it is one of the dopest documentaries about diggin I've ever seen. They all went out with 5 bucks and picked up 5 records from thrift shops in LA. Took them home and made tunes out of them, dublab pressed em on to dubplates (and subsequent full 12" vinyl) and had each ...

The March Heatrocks have been broken into two volumes, get the first here ! Download March Heatrocks: Vol. 2 here Kicking off this volume of the March Heatrocks is Starlito, formerly known as All Star, which I previously blogged about here . Renaissance Gangster is fresh and "Weed Smoker Music" is as good a description of his genre as anything else. The song is pretty self explainatory, he captures a mood well. "Straight A student might focus to it/Just don't defocus to it" Changing it up but keeping it on track I was struck by this Don Cherry and Brent Roesenberg tune "In A Geodetic Dome." The song is basically a four minute long trumpet solo. There are repetitive hits on a gong very quietly in the background, an perhaps a few other equally quiet sounds. The point here is the trumpet, and a beautiful piece of playing it is. Slow and melancholy it's also reflective. Boom Bap Project haven't been active in some time but five years ago they dro...

I'm making it a priority to get the heatrocks posted in the first week of the new month from here on out. This month was a slow one on the new music front, at one point I was convinced this was gonna be a short collection. Shuffle knew better though, hitting me with a number of gems that I just had to add to the mix. In the end I had enough to make this the first "double disc" heatrocks edition. Keep reading for what Vol. 1 holds and tune in tomorrow for Vol. 2! Download March 2010: Vol. 1 Here I have a folder of Jazz releases from '08 that a particular blog dubbed "best of" and of the handful that I've listened to they live up to the title. Quiet Village was among that collection and while the album has never gotten a full length play from me cuts come into my mind frame from time to time. "Too High To Move" is a great example of a smooth and melodic track letting you ride along with it. Don't be afraid by it's long nature, a trumpet ...

Without music life would be a mistake. ~Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche DOWNLOAD those February Heatrocks! It's about that time once again y'all! New month, time to run through those tracks tht got me through the last 30... well 28 in this case. February was a great month, stayed busy, partied and listened to some great music! Did you cop that Magnectic Blackness 7"? As per usual in the first months of the year it's always slow to hear new music. But I still stayed at it digging up just a few jams and going back into time to bump some older gems. Dibia$e has been making a name for himself in the LA beat scene and his 10" with P.U.D.G.E. def deserves some shine. The track "Smoke It Over" is a great stoner vibe out jam that you are gonna have to get blunted to. Take (who will be dropping the follow up in that 10" series soon) dropped an album called The Dirty Decibles of Thomas Two Thousand . While not quite as dope as his debut from a few years back, ...

Yo I don’t know where to start dog, check it out. Music is my total existence, dog straight up. Everything in my life revolves around music. It’s like I can’t get in a relationship because I’m still with my first love, music. You know what I’m sayin for real, it’s the reason I’m here. J Dilla it’s like that, peace. Rest In Peace A little late but just consider it a Valentines day treat. Here were the tracks from January that kept me warm at night. Before you get into this go ahead and grab the tunes! Download January 2010 Heatrocks OC Notes is Seattles biggest musical secret. Blowing both those who were familiar and were not away with his late '09 smash with THEESatisfaction "Icing" - the song proved that the narcoleptic from the basement of the Okay Hotel should not be ignored. Sitting down with him for an interview (watch for that to drop soon!) opened my eyes to just how much work this man has done and excites me to think that their is so much we have yet to hear. Enjo...

“It’s Music, its spirituality; they’re really one and the same to me.” -Alice Coltrane In a discussion about rap it was repeated to me that the art form was dead. It's a cop out that has been floating since before Nas decided to decry it with his Def Jam debut but it begs the question what defines the death of an art form? Nas didn't have the answer and neither do I. I do have some hot tracks for you that caught my ear in December . Surprisingly just as the year was coming to a close I was still finding some fresh rap and routinely disproving my own criticisms of the years Hip Hop offerings. The first three tracks here fall into that category. Aarophat & Illustrate have been making noise for years and uniting as Black Noise sounds great. Hip Hop that is jazzy and smoothed out but still thumps. The Dynas come through for a guest verse and it sounds like they have been riding together from day one. Chops grabs an old a cappella from the Drake and Nickelus F sessions and turns...

“Music is enough for a lifetime, but a lifetime is not enough for music” -Sergei Rachmaninov It what has to feel like typical fashion by now, I vanished from these parts of the Internet once again. As usual there is no telling when and where I'll strike again but one thing I hope to continue in the coming months will be collections of tracks that were in my ear for the last month. October was crazy for me as I quite my jobs and left Oregon to once again return to Seattle – I just can't stay away! Between the move, not having a place of my own and the general craziness that is life on party mountain I wasn't surrounded with as much time to devour new music as per usual. I did have 10 cuts catch my attention and I hope they might catch yours as well. Anyone around me lately knows that I've become fascinated by all things electronic music. While mainly focused in the dubstep sub genre, house, glitch, electro and an assortment of other sounds have been blowing my mind. B. R...