Put Some Meat Sauce In That Hip Hop
Phew, how does time pass so swiftly? Is it really the third month of 2010 already? Much of what I post on this blog lately reveals the connections I find between different kinds of music. I have a pretty wacky taste in music, which I attribute partly to the expansive forces of the Internet, and partly to my own multifarious personality. When I got to college in 2001, I really began to move away from the FM radio rock I was suckled on. That was thanks in part to the regular programming and evening shows on the Impact 89 FM, the college radio station at MSU.
My favorite show, “The Jazz Spectrum,” aired every Monday night from 8pm to midnight. Not only did it help me concentrate on homework, but it opened me up to the wonders of what some call America’s finest art form. But at some point after finishing my MA of journalism in 2008 (I went back to MSU after some time away), the Impact apparently canceled the show. Now their Monday evenings are occupied by “The Asian Invasion.” I only discovered this by accident, when attempting to listen to their online stream on a Monday not too long ago. I couldn’t find any explanation on their website, but I’m assuming that the host of the jazz program must have moved out of the area. To be honest, I was surprised at how long the show ran. I imagine the host might have started as a student, and then managed to stay in the Lansing area after graduation — which is a rare feat these days.
Anyway, I mention this now for a couple reasons, first and foremost as a sort of requiem to the program that first showed me John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Charles Mingus, Thelonius Monk, Art Blakey, Sun Ra, Freddie Hubbard, Dexter Gordon, and on, and on, and on. Of course, the Internet played a role in this as well. Even Allmusic.com was around back then, so I was able to look up the artists and order their used CDs on eBay for pretty cheap. But I miss the comforting feeling of listening to the Jazz Spectrum on a cold Monday evening in the dead of winter.
“Sleeping In A Jar” from Frank Zappa’s 1969 album Uncle Meat
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The other reason I bring up the jazz show is because, at the same time, I was starting to listen to many other styles of music, some of which were heavily influenced by jazz. One example is the experimental jazz fusion work of Frank Zappa, mostly contained in a trio of albums: Hot Rats, Waka/Jawaka, and The Grand Wazoo. Hot Rats — the first of the three, released in 1969 — is arguably the most impressive, but all three are wild auditory voyages of the mind.
Yet that same year Zappa released another one of his best known albums, Uncle Meat. The three mostly instrumental fusion albums held my attention thoroughly for many years, but eventually I had to explore more of Zappa’s discography. I kept hearing about Captain Beefheart and the Mothers of Invention, to the point that I could no longer hide from this other work. And Uncle Meat is weird, to say the least — so weird that I didn’t listen to Uncle Meat all the way through until late last fall. But when I got to the 30-second mark of “Sleeping In A Jar” (an oh-so-brief 49-second track), I knew instantly that it had been sampled by a modern artist.
As such, this was different than certain times I’ve become aware of a connection but couldn’t identify the other half (like when I noticed that DJ /rupture sampled the Beatles, for example). Since 2005 I’ve been a huge fan of MF Doom, the slimy yet coarse British MC who now goes by DOOM. It was the Danger Doom album The Mouse and the Mask — with vocals by DOOM and production work by Danger Mouse — that hooked me. (And I hadn’t even become a fan of Adult Swim yet!)
The song “Meat Grinder,” from the 2004 album Madvillainy
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DOOM records under a plethora of pseudonyms, a trait he shares with more electronic producers than rappers. One of his most heralded projects was Madvillain, wherein he partnered with Madlib for the 2004 album Madvillainy. This album isn’t as cartoon-y as the Danger Doom one, so its darker contours took longer to grow on me. Then about a year ago I realized that Madlib is an absolutely phenomenal producer. I had snagged a bunch of his Beat Konducta albums, plus I was listening to similar “stoner rap” (though I hate dislike that descriptor) producers like J Dilla and Flying Lotus. But the main realization happened sort of spontaneously, when I found a cheap copy of his 2003 LP Shades of Blue: Madlib Invades Blue Note at the Broadway location of Reckless Records, while visiting Chicago with my girlfriend.
Blue Note, if you’re not familiar with it, is a legendary jazz label. And thus I found out that Madlib is extremely diverse in both his sources of inspiration and the kind of music he produces. I intend to write feature essays on the influence of jazz on various genres today (think electronica, jam bands, hip hop, and experimental rock), but for now it’s enough to point out how f’ing cool it is that Madlib can go from an instrumental album of jazz reworkings, to his own Bean Konducta series of imaginary film soundtracks, to sampling Frank Zappa for a collaboration with DOOM — all while making it sound totally natural.
By the way, Madlib will very likely win my award for Most Prolific Artist of 2010 (Bibio was the winner in 2009), but that’s another story…
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