Zifhang out of Santiago, Chile - who produced a couple of the beats on Copius' Blind Mans Maze LP - sent me his EP to check out and it's chock full of wicked jazzed up, blazed-out hip hop beats:

Pentium III 846Mhz EP (Coverless)(Single Downloads Available) by Zifhang

Grab the whole EP: Zifhang - Pentium III 846Mhz EP

Norman. & Nate provide some blissed out winter smoking session beats on a slightly wonky - but not too wonky - instrumental hip hop vybe...

Back Woods Beat Tape by Norman.

Tribe Called Red present 5 moombah reinterpretations of classic hip hop joints (including Eric B & Rakim, Public Enemy & more). Kind of like a much more digestable version of Jon Kwest's Moombah Marauders Native Tongues remix project which I couldn't actually get all the way through (love Native Tongues, nice idea, too much of it). Don't Sweat The Technique is my personal favourite.

DOWNLOAD: A Tribe Called Red - Moombah Hip Moombah Hop EP

Years in the making... my boy Copuis has finally dropped his solo LP (well OK, it was months ago now, but I've been sleeping on this) Blind Man's Maze, available for free download at Bandcamp... check it:

Blind Mans Maze by Copius

He's been taking his time putting this project together, honing his skills for the last 7 years, and he's wound up with something that sounds really well rounded & complete - mad respect to him for taking his time to produce a proper album, & not just taking the first ten tunes he made & putting them out there like so many hip hop mixtapes out there.

The album opens with a selection of straight boom bap excellence. Didn't ya know - just straight rhyming, showing off his quite nasal, monotone flow and matching it perfectly with the beat - tumbling over it each bar until the last beat which is strictly two syllables. Say wot is a highlight with it's Zifhang penned beat and playful flow.

Lyrically Copius is at his best talking about the simple things, like on Synical Sidewalk Talk - just a celebration of being alive in the city he lives in, oozing immense joy in the everyday. Here he reminds of Cat Empire, talking about stuff which is insignificant, personal, local but which gets at something universal to an extent which can't be reached if you try to go direct.

you can't understand what makes a person freak out? then you've never had without and that's my word no doubt

For everyone in my office chatting some Daily Mail shit earlier this morning

(via Semtex)

Incredible free EP here from Debian Blak. The hand-constructed feel of the beats recalls Burial, as of course do the future garage style vocals (especially the vocoded/timestretched voice TISW), but Blak's music comes from a much less bleak place than Burial. It's still pretty damn melancholy, don't get me wrong, but there's a bit more hope, a glimmer of sunshine in there too. I guess another obvious comparison is with man-of-a-few-moments-ago James Blake, but Debian Blak's offering here feels a lot more rounded and complete than a lot of Blake's stuff. My highlight of the EP What We Did puts the future garage cut up vocal style in a space which is dank & musty but simultaneously bright & expansive, sunrise shining in through the windows of a haunted house.

Check it out below, & download from Bandcamp: Debian Blak - A Hint of Menace

Documentary in the form of a mixtape, tracing the roots of some of the big players in the Arab hip hop world and how they and their music relate to - and in cases were catalysts of - the revolutionary goings on in the region earlier this year, how the lyrics move from the satirical to the serious as things become increasingly real. Really interesting stuff, the music itself is a mixed bag to be fair, but there are some wicked tunes on there from the likes of Omar Offendum, The Narcicyst, El General and more.

Check it:

(direct link, cos the embed seems a bit dodgy: Nomadic Wax - Thawra: Youth & Hip Hop in the Arab World)

Tracklist:
1. Intro by Krs One*
2. 25 January by Ali-Loka (Tunisia) *
3. Démoralisé by G.O. Man XtraZik (Tunisia)*
4. Prisoner by Arabian Knightz (Egypt) (Prod. by DJ Caz)
5. Head of State by El General (Tunisia)
6. #Jan25 by Various Artists. Featuring Omar Offendum (Syria/USA), The Narcicyst (Iraq/Canada), Ayah, Sami Mater, and Others.*
7. Rebel by Arabian Knightz (Egypt) (Prod. by Iron Curtain)
8. On Vise Plus Haut by Mr. T & Limbra (Tunisia)*
9. Ego Trip J Represente by Mr. Mustapha & G.O. Man XtraZik (Tunisia)*
10. Egypt 25 by El Far3i (Jordan)
11. Revolution by Rah Zemos (Lebanon/Canada)
12. Where I’m from by Nomadic Massive (Canada/Algeria) ft. The Narcicyst (Iraq/Canada)
13. (Background Instrumental) Shukran by Dj Nio (Italy)
14. Rasallah by Hagage ‘AJ’ Masaed (Yemen)
15. (Background Instrumental) From Rebel to Basement Sad Ins Demoralize pt. 2 by Dj Killa (Tunisia)*
16. Superhero by Omar Offendum (Syria/USA)
17. I am Searching by Alfaress (Morocco) ft. Tameeka Jones

Extra Instrumental Track:
“Africans Don’t Wanna Understand” – Ben Herson and Dan Cantor (Originally part of African Underground Vol.)

*KRS One recorded by Nio @ Trinity International Hip-Hop Festvial, 2010.

Ok so these guys have nothing to do with each other except the fact that they have numbers in their names, but they're two of my favourite producers right now & here's some fresh fyah from each of them..!

This is purely nuts from den5hion, 3bal, moombah, dubstep, drumstep all in one tune

Insomnia by den5hion

& some wonky bass-hop from 4bstr4ck3 feat. Daman & Kesy

Cambodian wonk [feat. Daman & Kesy] by 4bstr4ck3r

Check this dope new EP from half-Mauritian percussionist & singer Mo Kolours with a wonky, spacey, soulful electronica feel, drawing (apparently - I've never knowingly heard any before) on the traditional Sega music of his island roots.

The rhythms lead the way here, whether the straight percussive workout of Drum Talking or the crafty vocal manipulation that drives the low-slung bump of Biddies, a song that traces an imaginary line between Theo Parrish and Gonjasufi. Dead of Night mines the symbolism of The Beatles’ outwardly chirpy Blackbird while his own Bakiraq (like Burt, the songwriter) resembles a soul classic pieced together from fragments around the flickering light of a fire.

Biddies was the tune that sold the EP to me, a wonderful slice of wonkysoul which really ties the collection together, based around a cut up vocal loop recorded with the papery, home-movie quality which runs throughout the EP and gives it an incredibly intimate feel. Dead of Night is another highlight, a posthedonistic soundtrack to a vary late, very weird night. Check the whole EP out on bandcamp, and download a couple for free:

Mo Kolours - Drum Talking

Out next month on Dented Records... DJ Solo's "Who is Wriggly Scott?" EP:

"Who is Wriggly Scott?" is a tightly produced collection of 8 Hip Hop tracks from DJ Solo, a British-born DJ and producer who has been an integral part of the Middle Eastern Hip Hop scene for the past 7 years. The release sees the producer pay homage to the lush sounds of classic Hip Hop, while collaborating with emerging MCs from around the world. In this debut release, DJ Solo has constructed an EP that is global in its approach, featuring guest spots by artists from Sudan, Syria, Iraq, Sri-Lanka, Palestine, USA and the UK bridging the gap in what has been called: "the first truly underground Hip Hop release from the Middle Eastern region".

If I'm honest I find that last something of a bizarre claim (it even manages to ignore the previous output of the rappers featured), but no matter, as is often the case it's best to ignore to PR hyperbole and just check out the music, which in this case is awesome. Hip hop in the late 90s mould, which as I believe I've said before has still not been improved upon... Beats & rhymes both confident but unassuming, each existing to carry the other but combining into something much more than the sum of the two - this is pretty much the definition of great hip hop for me. I don't think you'd know that the MCs featured were from the Middle East from listening to the EP, the vocals are all in English and the accents pretty much all sound like they're UK or US. Not that it matters.

The EP features vocals from Orifice Vulgatron (from Foreign Beggars), The Narcicyst, Omar Offendum and more but the stand out track for me is Parts Unknown with J-Live on microphone duties spitting effortlessly over a sun drenched beat, one to bump in the car as the evenings get longer... check it:

Parts Unknown ft. J-Live by DJ Solo/Wriggly Scott

Grab a free remix of a tune from the EP here:

Cop the EP from May 2nd on Dented Records