11 knowsum instrumentals that were inspired by the sound of 80s library productions.

limited to 300 copies
12inch Release via saasfee*records

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www.saasfee.de/soundpark/order.html

knowsum - masquerades snippet (LP out now)

jade

Instrumental: https://soundcloud.com/tapeheadloops/ojays-crooklyn-instrumental

Beat, mixing and mastering by Tapehead
Vocals and scratches from ‘Crooklyn Acapella’ by The Crooklyn Dodgers (Special Ed, Buckshot, Masta Ace)

Visuals: https://youtu.be/XfAU77At4aw

This is a rework of the first beat I ever made back in 2016. I made it the day I got my hands on an MPC2000, which I had to collect from Angel tube station in London. I remember sitting on the train with the MPC on my lap, getting looks from strangers, and just being so excited to even own one. I was a month away from starting university, and wanted to learn how to produce in my free time whilst away from home. For the past 5 years I had completely immersed myself in old school hip hop (particularly east coast), listening to every artist I could find, educating myself with Stretch and Bobbito shows I found on tape and youtube, and my heart was completely set on learning how to make beats in this style.

I'd prepared myself for weeks by watching hours and hours of MPC2000 tutorial videos on youtube, so I knew exactly how to use its basic functions to chop samples and sequence them. I knew that hip hop beats were made by sampling genres like jazz and soul, so in the weeks before actually buying an MPC, I went around charity shops looking for records from these genres, and found a few, but none stood out to me. My Nan was kind enough to lend me some of her old soul 45s, which was such a blessing. It was her copy of 'A Prayer' by the O'Jays that I ended up using for my first beat: I made the whole thing using this one record, I didn’t know much about breaks records back then, and manged to find drums in this song that I chopped to sequence myself. 

I remember how much I enjoyed the whole experience, from the excitement and anticipation of chopping up the sample, to the creative joy of actually sequencing it all and putting the beat together. It really was different and I'd never enjoyed anything as much before in my life, and at the time I was just excited to keep doing it, and to keep progressing.

Im too excited to finally have reworked this beat, I’ve tried doing it a few times but was never happy with the new drums I added, but this week I had another go and finally had something I was happy with. I was always happy with how the Crooklyn acapella flowed over the beat, so I kept that mostly the same, and just focused on mixing and mastering it better. 

Hope people enjoy this one, the beat means a lot to me and I’m glad to finally share an improved version. Peace!

Original upload: https://soundcloud.com/tapeheadloops/crooklyn-kids

Brooklyn's The Borough

0801 (Prod. By AJ_MastaBeatz

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/track/6jtKz359ctl8zxPaiQFCGW?si=828111c60d2a4eef
Apple Music: https://music.apple.com/us/album/freestyle-instrumental/1608496068?i=1608496069
Bandcamp: https://tapehead.bandcamp.com/track/freestyle-instrumental

Instrumental for: https://soundcloud.com/tapeheadloops/freestyle

Both these piano melodies are flipped from the same sample. The first one is only 2 bars long: it's pretty rare that a beat is that short but when it is it's always got a super infectious vibe, cause it's gotta be crazy if it's getting looped that often. I wanted to layer that with the longer 4 bar loop to give the beat more depth, which actually ended up being really long to do, a lot of the frequencies and notes were clashing with each other, so I had to do a lot of EQing and filtering to get them to sit together.

Overall these beats both feel like ‘freestyle’ beats to me, by that I mean they’re beats which aren’t too focused on one specific emotion, and are more just about capturing that East Coast Hip Hop vibe. I remember when I flipped them I was bugging out just freestyling over them for ages, any piano beat with a hardcore edge will get me going for sure. To anyone who freestyles I hope these beats inspire some flows and ideas off the top: Peace!

Freestyle (Instrumental)

Beat, mixing and mastering by Tapehead
Vocals from ‘One Mic Acapella’ by Nas

Visuals: https://youtu.be/H3ITC_LUFYI

This year I’ve been making sure I release a brand new beat every 2 weeks. I always have Wednesday off work so the way I’ve been doing this is I make the beat Wednesday, mix it the Wednesday after, and release it the week after that, making the next new beat the week I release the last new beat I made. I spend the 2 weeks between making new beats digging through samples to prepare and get an idea of what I might be making for the next one, and for this one I worked it out instantly. I was actually really struggling with what I was going to do because I hadn’t really found anything that was properly inspiring me, and I’d been pretty busy so I hadn’t had as much time to properly go through my unlistened records to see what I could find. On the Tuesday evening on the way home from work I put on a compilation of Jazz greats, and luckily there was a lot of traffic so I ended up listening to the whole thing. This sample was the 2nd last track, and as soon as I heard it I was gassed and after a few listens I’d worked out the rough areas I was going to chop up, and also immediately thought of putting ‘One Mic’ over it, cause I was hearing how I could layer and build up the sample in a way that would match what Nas does with his vocals on that track. This got me so motivated and the next day I was just set on making the idea a reality, and I couldn’t have been happier with how it turned out. This really feels like the beat was made for the vocals to me, and I guess in essence it was, because all the time when I was making it I was thinking about this acapella and how it would flow over it. A lot of the time it’s difficult to know what acapella would work for a remix straight away, so times like this are dope for creating something really convincing and concise. 
I also thought it was funny how I sampled from a song about ‘Mrs Jones’ with the intention of remixing One Mic, seeing as Jones is Nas’ real surname, I only just realised that now, maybe that subconsciously made me think of Nas acapellas straight away when I was listening to the sample.

I really hope people enjoy this one, I’ve been really excited to share it, and I’m way too excited about the next one which I made this week – Peace!!

One Mic (Tapehead Remix)

Stream 'gonzo' now: https://listen.hipdozer.com/gonzo

Wun Two is a famous German lo-fi music producer. Having garnered more than 340 million streams with his numerous projects, Wun Two has become a remarkable figure of the lo-fi music scene with a community of over a million listeners. He is back with a brand new single called ‘gonzo’, made of chill beats and almost alien-like synth notes, that sounds perfect for chill nights, dreaming or simply study sessions.

fruta dorada

gonzo

Wun Two - gonzo

Overdub instrument at Home Recording - 4/23/2024
Performed on Yamaha DTXtreme III Drum Kit with a Yamaha M12 Percussion Drum Pad

My One Night Stand  -  Vocal n Drums.wav

all the tracks i made today

https://bastrrrd.bandcamp.com/album/sick-01-01-18
https://bastrrrd.bandcamp.com/album/sick-01-01-18
https://bastrrrd.bandcamp.com/album/sick-01-01-18
https://bastrrrd.bandcamp.com/album/sick-01-01-18

sick (01 01 18)

sick

cal [89]

Precise Timing

Beatmaker / Emcee
Contact: tapeheadloops@gmail.com

<--MPC2000 Classic                     

Underground Airplay

Trying to give something back to Hip Hop - really appreciate any comments or feedback.

Peace

Brooklyn's The Borough

Tapehead

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