I'ma Beast

Produced by Joe November & MC Till for Everybody's Hip-hop Label.
Join the movement at www.everybodyshiphop.com

Respect 8: A Tribute to Goodie Mob featuring A.C. The Entity

Produced by Joe November & MC Till for Everybody's Hip-hop Label

Join the team at www.everybodyshiphop.com

Respect 9: Tribute to Whodini

The year was 1999. June. Sunday morning. My (MC Till) birthday was just a few days away. Just a few hours away I would head out for a weeklong religious camp. I would not be encouraged to listen to music the entire week so that I could fully engage with the other participants. Essentially telling campers back then not to listen to their Discman would be today’s equivalent of taking away cell phones. It might sound evil, but really it is a spiritual discipline to remove something so intertwined to our daily lives in the attempt to highlight and inspire better person-to-person skills. I was excited about the challenge until…. 

Upon waking up that morning I was met with an early birthday present (since I would be away from home on my actual birthday that year). I open up the present and it is a CD of “Vol. 2” by Slum Village. I immediately rethink my feelings toward the no-music-challenge for the week. I was holding what would soon become my all time favorite produced Hip-hop alum. And I couldn’t listen to it for a week. It was a practice of discipline like never before! 

I did it. I left the CD at home and went off to camp. When I returned I ran straight to my room and began listening. Every beat was my favorite. The emcees, J Dilla, T3, & Baatin were unorthadoxed, but thoroughly enjoyable. Each beat hopped around with thumping baselines, head-cracking snares, and perfect sampling. The emcees didn’t detract, but added to the music providing another layer of vocal instrumentation. I often did not appreciate the lyrical content causing a kind of dissidence that made the listening experience truly human: flawed and beautiful at the same time. 

J Dilla was with us from 1974 until his early departure in 2006. Apart from producing “Vol 2” he produced music for my favorite artists: Common, De La Soul, A Tribe Called Quest, Pharcyde, Mood, The Roots, D’Angelo, and many more. His music became a constant soundtrack to my life providing me with decades of inspiration. 

So I took a few samples Dilla used on his instrumental classic, Donuts, and chopped them up over a Dilla esq drumbeat. I then threw on a bassline that I thought Dilla would appreciate and added some lyrics paying homage to the beat king. I call the song simply “dilla” and just as he never paid attention to convention I didn’t either. The beat comes on. I rap a kind of hook followed by an extended verse and end it it simply saying “dilla” as the beat rides out. No song structure. I made it just as it came. A method I imagine J Dilla utilized often during his amazing career. 

Here’s to Dilla: the greatest beat maker this world has ever experienced. Peace to his family, his mom, Ma Dukes, and all those who dearly miss his work and his presence. 

Dilla died February 10, 2006 due to a rare disease affecting the blood called TTP (Thrombotic Thrombocytopenic Purport). May he rest in peace. 

Want to join Everybody's Hip-Hop Label? You can do so at www.everybodyshiphop.com Join us as we honor Hip-hop's past by becoming a part of its future... together.

Respect 10: Dilla (Feat. MC Till)

the cypher

Produced by Till November for Everybody's Hip-hop Label

Join the team at www.everybodyshiphop.com

Respect 11: A Tribute to Snoop (Featuring ADDVantz

Some Niggaz Pt. 2 (Homage to Half-A-Mill)

TDC x ZVP presents All Praises Due

HENNESSY FLOW (Prod. By The Alchemist)

RIP J DILLA

Recorded @ Upper Deck Studios
Mixed by Yo Dot

Stay Healthy, Be Safe (Prod. J Dilla)

Mixed by Khamou El

[LYRICS]:
Yeah

Look

Listen

I'm the best among us, aura fire in a frozen tundra
Military hummers ready to put niggas under
I won't slumber, never wore balenciaga runners
I don't even want a pair
Just want a hunnid hunnids stuffed inside the underwear
I keep headphones on me like a good luck charm
I don't trust nobody but myself, that's wrong?
I never been athletic, I chose the rap aesthetic
I feel like the greatest rapper since the pyramids was built
Imma talk my shit, a lot of knowledge gettin’ spilt, uh
Young Kilta flowin’ like the water's full of silt
Make ‘em take a swim, they lovin’ on the sonics like it's silk, uh
So much on my plate for goodness sakes
When that sunlight hit my face, I feel amazin’
Never say my grace or prayers to no savior other than the one that my parents created
I always metamorph the chaos to pure greatness
I'm walkin’ on light like the Matrix
They wanna ride the wave like Point Break
Ya drown, I won't save ya
Makin’ ya joints ache
Stretch it out like the last bit of the weed
You niggas soundin’ hella extra to me
You a bitch, you ain't protectin’ ya seeds
I wake up, break a record, then I recollect needs
I do it regularly
World fucked up, due to reflections of greed
I keep a blade tucked, ‘case these niggas try to sweat me
I'll fuck ya face up, starin’ at me with ya envy
I need the pay cuts, I got places I wanna see
Bitch.

I’m just rollin’ my weed
I’m just rollin’ my weed, yeah
I’m just rollin’ my weed
I’m just...

I need somethin’ new, tired of the same saga
Libations to the most high Godfather, which is I
Limited in body, but not limited in mind
Gotta turn the journey up a notch, cooler ride
Rollercoaster time
In this amusement park called life
I been up in the dark night all night with my thoughts manifested
I talk to spirits, no church for confessions 
I rap these lyrics, I guess that's a transgression
They want me to choose a different profession, but that's not in my element
I seek perfection, but I'm still the illest with blemishes
Chaotic & I'm conscious, some may call me degenerate
But really I'm the general
Can't move in retrograde, I'll miss my interview
Progress is principle
In a different pocket, now my nonsense is sensical
I done found a rocket to blast off the residue that at first, wasn't sensible
But at birth, I was tested with the various temperatures of Earth
Found the pencil and I grew enough to realize the dirt
Surface layers that you scratch until you see all the hurt 
Lot of pain, tantrums, madness
Can't be contained like the blue of the atlas
The hue of the atmosphere
The gloom & the sadness
Until a happy heaven where we'll all be dancin’
I often hear the people say that that's what happens
Hope it's true, if not, I don't know what I'd do 
But I can feel it in my heart, is it the same for you?
I been starvin’, not for food, but for knowledge & truth
I seek freedom so that's why I chose the scholar at youth
Not a novice with the words, I keep the practice on loop
Imma artist, never needed glue to stick my roots
Mother Nature in the bed, I'm tryna knock off her boots
Wait, uh
And put a bullet in Father Time
Tryna waste mine, but I can read through the solid lines
Went days without a dime, but steady thinkin’ of silent rhymes
Breakin’ out the prism, can't continue to bottle shine. 

I’m just rollin’ my weed
I’m just rollin’ my...yeah

I snapped on what?

Good lookin’.

I'ma Beast

Danny Zuko

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