Sondre Lerche – Countdown (Beyonce Cover)
We all know the Beyonce hit “Countdown,” even if we don’t listen to the radio. Today, though, we’re being introduced to a new version of the song. Norwegian artist Sondre Lerche has provided us with his own rendition of “Countdown,” which is not only ear-catching, but also quite humorous as well.
(via PMA)
Friday At Five [Weeknd Music]
Typically, I reserve this feature for raucous, party jams for everybody to get down to after the whole Monday to Friday thang. But, today I’m gonna do something different. It’s more of a commemoration, really.
As most of the Internet knows by now, The Weeknd released the concluding mixtape to his trilogy earlier this week. If 2011 belonged to anybody, it was definitely Abel Tesfaye, the 21-year-old Canadian crooner that took the blogosphere by storm in March when Drake personally cosigned “Wicked Games” off his first tape, House of Balloons. Since then, it’s been a whirlwind of remixes, covers and two more mixtapes as Tesfaye has quickly ascended to the pinnacle of relevant music. So, in honor of the recent Echoes of Silence, I’m dedicating today’s Friday At Five to “Weeknd” music.
Believe me when I say that these were pretty fucking hard to choose. Good problems, right? In no particular order, here are 5 of my personally favs. What are yours?
P.S. Merry Christmahanakwanzika to everybody from Sunset. Enjoy some time off with fam, friends and of course, music.
1. “Coming Down”
The Weeknd – Coming Down by The_Weeknd
2. “Rolling Stone”
The Weeknd – Rolling Stone by The_Weeknd
3. “The Morning”
The Weeknd – The Morning by The_Weeknd
4. “Same Old Song”
The Weeknd – Same Old Song by The_Weeknd
5.”Wicked Games”
The Weeknd – Wicked Games by The_Weeknd
Holiday Sweepstakes! Autographed Shirts and Stickers!
In the spirit of the holidays, we’re doing a big sweepstakes! Seven winners will be chosen and they will receive a FREE Sunset t-shirt or sticker in the mail that is AUTOGRAPHED by one of the following artists:
- Hoodie Allen
- OnCue
- Sonny Shotz of The Dean’s List
- ANTHM
- Brenton Duvall
- G-Eazy
- Luck-One
[Mixtape + Review] Asher Roth – Pabst & Jazz
This dropped sometime last week and I’ve been holding off on posting it for a few reasons.
- Because of the music world we live in, mixtapes drop all the time. With the frequency of mixtapes that drop, I like to take my time and listen to the project to see if I like it and if its worthy of a post.
- I wanted to figure out what I wanted to say about this.
This mixtape was almost an EP, but instead, dropped it to the masses for free. The production and features are on point. This shows us why nobody has given up on Asher because of his ability to rap.
Asher Roth – More Cowbell
Asher Roth – Common Knowledge
And let’s not forget the features he’s got on here. With the likes of Pac Div, Chip Tha Ripper, GLC, Blu and a variety of people I’ve never heard of, as they provide the depth of the bench as Coach Asher gives each one of them a chance to shine. I will admit though, with some of the people I didn’t know, I would’ve much rather had more Asher.
Asher Roth ft. Pac Div – Useless
If you like chill hip hop/jazzy type ish, this is made for you. Fortunately for me, I love this kind of hip hop, but I’m not saying this is perfect. It’s 16 tracks and some are just ehhh. But nonetheless, still a good effort.
Mixtape Rating: 7.5/10 – When you need a break from The Weeknd’s “Echoes of Silence,” Asher is ready.
Download Asher Roth – Pabst & Jazz Mixtape
Follow @JDimerrr
Throwback Thursday – DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince
Always celebrate the solstices.
Today, this marvelous Thursday, is the winter solstice. The solstices have been celebrated for millennia, and for good reason. It may not be the dead of winter yet, but tomorrow the sun hangs around for a little bit longer. And, by golly, that should be something to drink to! There’s something earthy and magical about solstices. And I’ll be the first one to admit, I love shit that’s earthy and magical.
Enough of that. I was cruising around reddit today, and I came across this holiday reunion photo of The Fresh Prince of Bel Air cast.
I was a little too young to watch it when it first aired, but I used to watch Fresh Prince re-runs a lllll the time on Nick at Nite. Loved it. One thing lead to another, and I ended up getting a greatest hits collection of of Dj Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince on eBay a bunch of years back. And if you’ll remember, Will Smith was Fresh Prince the rapper before he was the Fresh Prince of Bel Air. His music with DJ Jazzy Jeff has a super old school feel to it, but it can be really refreshing or, at the very least, put a happy smirk on my face. “Summertime” (1991) was one of the greatest hits, and it still feels awesome to play in the dead heat of summer (and the winter solstice, perhaps…):
MP3: “Summertime” – DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince
Other awesome ones (ya gotta see the music videos too):
MP3: “Girl’s Ain’t Nothin But Trouble” – DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince
MP3: “Parent’s Just Don’t Understand” – DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince
Finally, in the spirit of the new Men in Black movie about to come out, this video is hilarious. Will Smith in some German TV interview, busting out the MIB rap from the top of his head like 10 years after the original movie was made. Skip to 0:40 if you’re in a hurry:
MP3: “Men in Black” – Will Smith
patrick
[Mixtape] The Weeknd – Echoes of Silence
Rumors have been buzzing around lately. There were whispers claiming that we would get our hands on the final piece of The Weeknd‘s trilogy, Echoes of Silence, sometime this week. Earlier tonight, Abel Tesfaye confirmed this himself when he tweeted, “please stay tuned.” When he finally posted a link to his site, the servers quickly crashed. Thankfully, he tweeted out the Hulkshare link a few minutes later. I’ll post an update with some tracks when I run through the tape a couple times. Until then…
DOWNLOAD: “ECHOES OF SILENCE” – THE WEEKND
UPDATE: Holy fuck. I’ve only listened to the first track so far, but The Weeknd may have just cemented himself as the best Canadian crooner right now (sorry Drizzy, Bieber) with this cover of “Dirty Diana.” I’d say it’s pretty damn hard to sonically fill the King of Pop’s shoes, but this ode to the late great Michael Jackson is spot on.
UPDATE 2: After my first run through of the tape, here’s a couple standouts from EOS.
Well baby I’ve been alone for almost all my life, /
what makes you think that you could ever do me right? /
You’re the same old song
Guy Singing “Niggas In Paris” on NYC Subway
I’m at a loss for words. Mostly because my words have been sucked up by my laughter. Is it healthy that within 24 hours I’ve watched this at least 15 times? I just had to share it.
Some specific time frames for laughter: 37 seconds, 1:08, 1:20, 1:48, 2:15, and the very last second.
Rich Kid Sound System – I Want It All
Thank god. Literally just last week I hit up these guys askin’ when we were gonna get new music and their response was “it’s comin! it’s comin!” Well, it has come. New catchy tune from RKSS called I Want It All. I’m hoping this means a mixtape in the future!
Rich Kid Sound System – “I Want It All”
Timeflies – Christmas
“With Christmas coming up we had to jump on a holiday classic for you to throw on at your holiday rager. Eggnog and strobe lights encouraged.”
Timeflies with another edition!
[Album Review] Common – The Dreamer/The Believer
What I’m about to say might be a little embarrassing, but please, don’t judge. Back when Common’s Universal Mind Control came out back in 2008, I would sit in my room, listening to it while playing Pokemon Fire Red on my computer using a gameboy advance emulator. I was 15-16 years of age around then. You’re probably wondering: what in the hell is this kid doing playing Pokemon and what does it have to do with Common’s The Dreamer/The Believer? To be honest, it has nothing to do with it. I just like Pokemon. Who doesn’t want a Pikachu?
To sum up The Dreamer/The Believer in one sentence, it’s an album filled with classic Common with a hint of him experimenting with different sounds.
Universal Mind Control was considered a bust. Like a Kwame Brown (NBA player, for those who are unaware) type bust. Drafted really high with potential to be awesome, and turns out to be a role player for sub par teams. That was what UMC was. It was a sub par album that I wanted to be good, but it was just okay. Nothing special. He pushed his limits, and he learned from his mistakes.
When I say The Dreamer/The Believer is filled with classic Common with a hint of experimentation, I truly mean it. The hip-hop/soul that Common is so good at crafting is strongly felt as he teams up with long time friend No I.D. to bring us this project. At the same time, he pushes his limits with tracks like “Sweet” & “Ghetto Dreams.” On the ironically named “Sweet,” Common is a mad motherfucker and takes shots at Drake (can’t help but laugh at the lines). “Singing all around me man, la la la. You ain’t mothafucking Frank Sinatra. Uh, lil bitch.” On “Ghetto Dreams,” he teams up with Nas to give us a track for the streets.
One of the most important tracks, however, is the opening song, “The Dreamer,” featuring Maya Angelou. Common said in an interview that his view on an opener is that it’s important because it sets the stage for the rest of the album. As a result, Common put in that extra effort on this opener. Check it out for yourself.
Common ft. Maya Angelou – “The Dreamer”
Old Common is back. Fans rejoice. Hip hip hooray!
Album Rating: 8/10. And that’s being a hard critic. Could easily grow.
To end this on a good note so you don’t think i’m some loser who plays Pokemon, come get drunk with me on New Year’s, and we will celebrate the new year!
Tape Tuesday: The End of the World
I think it was last year. I don’t even know because clearly I’ve repressed the memory. I humiliated myself. I don’t want to talk about what I did, but it was just a disaster. I felt like it was the end of the world. Instead of dealing with the problem at hand, I ignored it and buried it in the depths of my memory, while I worked on other things, trying to keep my mind off of the situation. It’s kind of what I do. I started a music blog, and one of the mixes I made on it was called nostalgia, ULTRA, named after Frank Ocean’s awesome mixtape. Anyway, I looked back on my iTunes and dug up some of the songs from that and stuck them on this mix. THE END OF THE WORLD is a rehashing of an embarrassing moment in my life. It contains both old and new songs and is super personal and dear to me. Be sure to download it and play it one year from tomorrow. Honestly, that was just a coincidence.
DOWNLOAD ‘THE END OF THE WORLD’
- Passion Pit – Tonight, Tonight (Smashing Pumpkins Cover)
- Don Trip – Cheers (jj’s Save Our Souls Remix)
- Dan Mangan – The Indie Queens Are Waiting
- Oliver Tank – Beautiful (Snoop Dogg Cover) (ft. Fawn Myers)
- Common – The Believer (ft. John Legend)
- Shy Girls – Gonna Get My Name Back
- Jai Paul – BTSTU (Edit)
- recess – love in the streets of bklyn.
- Michael Cera’s Interlude
- Ed Sheeran – You Need Me
- The Killers – Mr. Brightside (Cry Wolf Remix)
- Moby – The Day (Yeasayer Remix)
- Foster the People – Miss You
- Electric Guest – Troubleman
- Grouplove – Tongue Tied
- Skizzy Mars – Shangri-La
- Fibes, Oh Fibes! – Cerahtonia
- 2AM Club – Tell Her Hi
- Macklemore and Ryan Lewis – The End
- Youth Lagoon – Goodbye Again (John Denver Cover)
- The Tallest Man On Earth – The Drying of the Lawns
- Wintersleep – Weighty Ghost
DOWNLOAD ‘THE END OF THE WORLD’
You whispered, “Don’t you love music? It’s such a gift, and I’ll give it to ya. But you gotta use it.”
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