Leaders of the new school - Del 1 av 5

En gang i fjor lot XXL 10 nye og unge (alt er veldig relativt) pryde forsiden av deres magasin under overskriften ”Leaders of the new school”. Disse, Saigon, Plies, Lupe Fiasco, Rich Boy, Papoose, Young Dro, Joell Ortiz, Crooked I, Gorilla Zoe og Lil Boosie, skulle liksom være hiphopens nye superstjerner. Unødvendig å si; men lista sugde mugne poteter. Preget mer av dagens situasjon enn fremtiden, og industriens ønsker mer enn kvalitet.




Bloggeren Noz, kom rett før jul med sin egen liste… bedre enn XXL sin, men likevel preget av Noz sin merkelige smak. (Den besto forøvrig av Turf Talk, BOB, Jay Electronica, Bohagon, Guilty Simpson, Fabo, Wale, Plies, Rich Boy, Shawty Lo og Bishop Lamont.)
Hva man legger i tittelen “Leaders of the new school”, er altså litt subjektivt, men for undertegnede er det en god beskrivelse på relativt unge artister som er på vei til et kommersielt gjennombrudd av en viss grad og som kvalitativt vil prege hiphopen de nærmeste årene. Kvinner og menn; her har dere de to første artistene i avsløringen av de ti virkelige store håpene i hiphopverden.

1 og 2: Bishop Lamont og Black Milk



California-rapperen Bishop Lamont og Black Milk fra Detroit virker kanskje ikke som den mest naturlige duoen, men disse gutta slo oss på slutten av fjoråret plutselig i hodet med den fantastiske mixtapen ”Caltroit”. Last den ned her!

Bishop Lamont og Black Milk feat. Tash og Ras Kass – “I Need It”


Bishop Lamont ble signet til Dr. Dres Aftermath i 2005. Dette etter at han i 2004 hadde sneket seg inn på videoinnspillingen til The Games ”Dream”, ventet utenfor på doktoren i 8 timer og til slutt fått gitt ham en demo. Now that’s a hustle! Han kommer vel mest sannsynlig til å bli droppet fra Aftermath så snart ”Detox” er ferdig, men ikke la det hindre deg fra å holde et øye med denne gutten! Han er en fantastisk miks av vestkystens ulike stiler, oppegående (som jo ikke alltids er tilfellet når det kommer til rappere) og han er sulten. Et intervju fra i fjor sommer kan leses her: http://www.xxlmag.com/online/?p=10322

Fra 2006: ”’Detox’ kommer i september 2007 og Lamonts ’The Reformation’ på sommeren i 2007.” Jaja, nuvel… Vi får håpe at de egentlig mente 2008!

Fra innspillinga av “Caltroit”:


Black Milk hadde jeg den glede av å møte under Quart-festivalen. Her er intervjuet jeg gjorde med han den gangen. ikke spør meg hvorfor det er på engelsk...

The new Detroit funk.
By Audun Kjus Aahlin

Curtis Cross grew up under J Dilla, worked under J Dilla, was heavily influenced by J Dilla, and represented the same city and sound as J Dilla. So when Jay Dee passed away and Black Milk emerged from the Detroit underground scene there was no surprises tied to dubbings like the “new J Dilla”. Simplified comparison or not; the producer/rapper is already carrying the torch for the Motor City.

I hooked up with Black Milk before a show with Detroit-followers Frank N’ Dank on the Norwegian Quart-festival. Same click, legacy, or whatever, but with pretty much the most different personalities you can imagine. While Frank N’ Dank is working their jaws, doing their best to make this interview into their own comedy show, Black Milk is mostly keeping it quiet outside the spotlight. Nodding his head to the somewhat amusing accusation of yours truly physical likeliness to the legendary Beastie Boys. Which can only mean two things; either the fact that all white people look the same, or that my 23 year old life has been hard enough too grown the looks of 40+ washed up music legends. In this case it’s probably the first hypothesis. Anyhow, after all this and some rightfully moony tales about this festival complete lack of hashish is it finally a minute to focus on Milk. Being that he his about to make history, yes history, as a part of what most come close to be the backpacker’s wettest dream - The triple threat featuring Sean Price on one mic, Guilty Simpson on another and then, of course, Black Milk as the producer. “Yeah, album is coming soon. I’m doing all the production. Well, I’m doing the majority of the production since we got a couple of others producers on the joint. Hopefully that shit will be dropping first quarter of next year. We already like ten to twelve songs deep. Is that Detroit funk…”

Black Milk was first discovered by Slum Village, and his first noteworthy work is on the group 2002-mixtape Dirty District. It was about the same time Milk hooked up with another producer, named Young RJ, and established BR Gunna. The production duo made Dirty District Vol. 2 and 11 of 13 songs on Slum Village critical acclaimed Detroit Deli. Since then Milk has been standing on his own feet, released Sound of the City and Popular Demand and also produced tracks for many Detroit-emcees, Lloyd Banks, Canibus and Pharaohe Monch. But it is of course still hard to do an interview with Black Milk without touching the legacy of J-Dilla: “He changed a lot of people’s life, everybody in the crew got their life changed because of him. He built our career. Just imagine what hiphop would have been without him. Motor city all day. Now I got to run on stage, holla!”
And so he did - Impressing the small crowd, even adding a couple of CD’s to the tear worthy 5000+ sales of the album Popular Demand. But don’t get depressed over the unfair fact that quantity of shipments never will match up with the quality of the product, ‘cause there is more than enough comfort in the musical future of Black Milk.


“Sound the Alarm” feat. Guilty Simpson: