Music, hip-hop

Master Shortie - ADHD

Adopting a grassroots approach to music, taking control of his own marketing and distribution shows this 19-year-old Londoner is determined to be master of his own musical destiny. What he presents is a diverse blend of hip hop, grime infused with…

Busdriver: Jhelli Beam

Regan ‘Busdriver’ Farquhar’s natural verbosity has won him as many badmouths as it has plaudits in the past, and for album number eight, he seems perfectly content to continue letting his mouth run off. His supreme ability to over-egg the lyrical…

Various: Beatdown mixed by Scratch Perverts

Those most nimble of fingers ever to molest a turntable in the name of high hip hop art, the collective better known as the Scratch Perverts (who enjoy in their number Edinburgh’s own Plus One) spread their wings here for our musical delight. Using…

Sonar 2009, Barcelona, Thu 18 to Sat 20 Jun

After months of agonising waiting it was finally upon us – Sonar 2009! Arriving at Barcelona’s supercool Sonar Village in the complex of Centre de Culture Contemporanea de Barcelona (CCCB) near Las Ramblas on Friday afternoon, we were like kids on…

Michael Franti

Political songwriters can fall into the trap of being preachy, but not Michael Franti. In a career spanning over 20 years, the former frontman of The Beatnigs, Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy and latterly Spearhead, has always struck the right balance…

Ancient Astronauts - We Are To Answer

(ESL) This is an album that is very much a sum of its parts as Cologne duo Dogu and Kabanjak lay down some expansive instrumental head nodders and invite a host of collaborators to come throw in some general good vibery. Whether its hip hop legends…

De La Soul

De La Soul got stung. For much of the two decades since the release of seminal hip hopera 3 Feet High And Rising, Plugs One, Two and Three have been at pains to put a significant margin between themselves and the care-free, cartoon mishmash of crunchy…

Eminem: Relapse

Eminem’s sixth album, isn’t his jump the shark moment: it’s the continuation of a long leap that started with his previous album Encore. As a rapper, he remains an unstoppable force, but topically, he’s running on empty. Relapse is Marshall’s rehab…

Hip hop in Scotland - Taking the mic

MC SOOM T Combining fierce vocal ability with commercial versatility, fast-rapping Glaswegian Sumati Bhardwaj has opened for Basement Jaxx and Aphex Twin, and performed diverse styles such as reggae with Mungo’s Hi-Fi and folk alongside The Burns…

Graffiti in Scotland - Creative writing

From Loanhead to Glasgow there’s a rich heritage of graffiti art in Scotland. We speak to two of the key figures on the scene Elph and Derm

Mad Decent records

‘We look for people who are trying different things,’ says Jasper Goggins, New York-based manager of the Mad Decent label, ‘and who aren’t afraid to be a bit experimental with their sound. But more than that everyone on the label is friends, there’s…

Theophilus London

Midway through Hinterland festival’s first evening, the indie kids of Glasgow scuttle from one bunch of guitar-twangers to another. Leaning against the building site fence next to the Sub Club, a pair of Brooklynites in retro shades, skinny jeans and…

Ojos De Brujo

If flamenco isn’t really your thing, then you should probably turn away now. But come on, everyone needs a bit of flamenco in their life. Hip hop is also here in abundance too, consummating with each other to produce an exotically interesting mix.

DOOM - Born Like This

HIP HOP So the MF is gone and underground hip hop’s most malcontent son insists on uppercase only for his moniker, but other than that it’s business as usual for DOOM who follows his 2005 Dangerdoom collaboration with Gorillaz and Gnarls Barkely…

Tricky

Tricky is difficult and moody, right? That’s the perception of the Bristol-born rapper that still persists, 14 years after he was launched into the nation’s musical consciousness with his startling, groundbreaking and bestselling debut…

Common - Universal Mind Control

HIP HOP SOUL Common has been around long enough to reinvent himself a couple of times already but his social conscious that extended beyond the dime bags and low riders always set him apart from the gangsta shit. For this, his eighth album he enlists…

Kanye West - 808s and Heartbreak

POP Of the great break up albums in music lore – Marvin Gaye’s Here, My Dear, Dylan’s Blood on the Tracks or even Beck’s Sea Change – few have coincided with a musical watershed such as the Matt Damon of hip hop’s fourth album. More than just a…

Social networker

How many times have you heard some over the hill rap star attempt to dismiss any attempts at innovation and excuse creative treading water by claiming their doing it ‘old school’? I still hear it a lot. This rosy, Ray Ban-ed view, which in actuality was…

Hydro

Straight outta Bellshill, Hydro grew up listening to his dad’s hip hop collection, split into ‘kid friendly’ and ‘non-kid friendly’ categories. He soon skipped the De La Soul and Tribe Called Quest and broke out the NWA and the Public Enemy. Moving to…

Armand Van Helden – New York: A Mix Odyssey Two

Vanity project or something of merit from a DJ who, having found chart success, is taking a considered look at his inspirational roots? The packaging captures the African-influenced look of the late 80s we’re revisiting here while the mix itself serves…

The Streets - Everything is Borrowed

Mike Skinner might be one of the finest pop artists of our generation, but there’s no escaping the fact that his fourth album is a real disappointment. Certain passages of it might well grow over time, yet the suspicion is that it’s just too damn…

Underling - Underling

Based in Dunfermline, Underling pull off the hitherto impossible trick of making the Kingdom of Fife sound like a district of Brooklyn. Their music is played live, a light but spirited bed of intently grooving jazz, through which Aron Moorhouse’s raps…