WHHAT: Hello World
Hello world!
We've got music, art, and technology today. Let's get into it!
Music
"Luv Like" by Nia Archives — song.link
This is one of my favorite songs of 2022. It's upbeat, fast-paced, full of bass, yet super chill. It's from "Forbidden Feelingz - EP", a project I found after hearing a Columbo sample on its lead single and reading this background from Nia Archives:
I sampled Columbo in the intro because me and my Grandma Liz used to watch it when I was a kid. I wanted to sample it just to put a bit of me with her forever in the music.
How could I not love a Columbo sample!
"Love I Need" by Moonchild & Rapsody — song.link
I heard this thanks to Rapsody's dope feature; I'll checkout anything Rap raps on. This song is part of an amazing album, an awesome vinyl, and a fun lyric video.
It's tough to describe this song's genre, which makes sense since Wikipedia lists Moonchild's genres as including: "Jazz, Neo soul, R&B/Soul, Alternative R&B, Alternative/Indie, Dance/Electronic, Hip-Hop/Rap, UK Rap". Wow!
Art
The Guru BMBOX — www.instagram.com
Checkout this very dope (and very limited) boombox from Greek creator Elena Kazi. It's hand-painted and inspired by hip-hop legend Guru's second album, "Jazzmatazz, Vol II". If the colors look different than you expect it may be because it's based on the European version of the album cover; fun details on that here.
DRILL MUSIC IN ZION — twitter.com
Photography courtesy of @dlbryantart aka Miss Luna, click the photo for more angles.
These are some great shots of the transparent yellow vinyl edition of Lupe Fiasco's excellent "DRILL MUSIC IN ZION", released earlier this summer.
I wasn't a big fan of transparent vinyl until these photos. Since I think of vinyl as more art than media (more on that in the future), appreciating them in unique ways like this really intrigues me.
This yellow version of the vinyl was specifically made for fans with Lupe Fiasco's NFT, LFT.
Again, more on this in the future, but LFT is a "utility NFT" which is way more interesting to me than the NFT's you've likely heard of before.
Articles
How Rappers Are Trying To Lead Innovative Ways Of Distributing Music — www.okayplayer.com
Speaking of NFT's being used to access music, this awesome Okayplayer article covers some of the most interesting ways artists are distributing music, including podcasts (Mos Def & Talib Kweli), hardware (Kanye West’s STEM player), and even video games (Dr. Dre's Grand Theft Auto EP).
Meta
In addition to sharing songs in this newsletter and on Twitter, I'll also be adding them to a playlist on Apple Music and Spotify.
More info on alej.hiphop if you're interested!
Wrap Up
And finally, a random personal thought!
I often find myself starting tweets and posts with “Hello World”.
I know that one reason I do this is because of the popular beginner's computer science program “Hello, World!”.
However I've recently realized that another reason I love and identify with this phrase, is the ethos that Lil Wayne puts into it, sometimes verbatim, other times just in spirit. Specifically I love the theme of embracing being different, even to the point of "alien"!
Anyways, Hello World again! Goodbye!