Welcome To The Bronx

Beat, mixing and mastering by Tapehead
Remixed and Remastered

Vocals from 'Slaughtahouse Remix Acapella' by Masta Ace Incorporated

Instrumental: https://soundcloud.com/tapeheadloops/get-the-chills-instrumental
Visuals: https://youtu.be/v9WITrpsSZ8

Slaughtahouse by Masta Ace Incorporated is in my top 5 LPs of all time and is in my opinion the most criminally underrated 90s Hip Hop album. It did take a few listens to grow on me, but it has such a unique style that just hits ridiculously hard now, every time I play it I enjoy it more and get just as gassed off different lines and moments. I think it’s one of those albums where there’s no one song that you can listen to on it’s own, the whole thing hits so much harder when you listen to the album in full, which to me is what I go to music for as I love playing an album all the way through and hearing how one track leads into the next and builds on a theme etc. It sounds even crazier on tape, the drums knock so hard I don’t even understand it, and it was a huge influence on my production style when it comes to the focus on having layered, heavy hitting drums. I really focused on that in this remix, going crazy on the drum layering and trying to make the beat really rugged in a way that fits the style of this track. The original drop into Ace’s verse is so hard after the parody intro, which isn’t available on the acapella, so I just went straight into the hardcore style with bass heavy drums. The message and outlook of this track was so ahead of it’s time its crazy, and I’m in the process of getting the Masta Ace Acapella LP to do a full EP of remixes like this in the future, with that real rough and rugged hardcore sound that makes me love that album so much, it definitely deserves the tribute and respect.

Original uploads: 
https://soundcloud.com/tapeheadloops/suckas-get-the-chills
https://soundcloud.com/tapeheadloops/too-many

Get The Chills

like siempre lo traigo.
smooth, fresh and raw bumbap.
90´s jazzys.
2021 shet.

My People

Live To Regret

Beat, mixing and mastering by Tapehead
Vocals from ‘Shook Ones Part II Acapella’ by Mobb Deep

Visuals: https://youtu.be/zza4wbCAarY
Instrumental: https://soundcloud.com/tapeheadloops/my-mind-is-old-instrumental

I bugged out crazily when I first made this beat, I couldn’t believe the loop I flipped and was just vibing out, sending snippets to all my close friends who are into Hip Hop. Because of this I really really rushed mixing it, I just wanted to get it saved on my computer and in retrospect, I’ve always been really unhappy with how it sounded. The main problem for me was the high frequencies, which I thought were too loud and ruined the other parts of the mix, which was a shame. At the time I didn’t notice it too much but something definitely sounded off, but I’ve learnt a lot since then and I’ve been wanting to improve the mix on this beat for a while. There’s only so much you can do with a bad mix (I never actually saved the beat cause my MPC disk drive was broken back then) so it’s been pretty difficult to get this beat sounding how I would have liked it to, but I think it sounds a lot better than it did. 

Here’s the original for comparison: https://soundcloud.com/tapeheadloops/my-mind-is-old

Peace

My Mind Is Old (Remastered)

Instrumental for: https://soundcloud.com/tapeheadloops/my-mind-is-old-remastered

I bugged out crazily when I first made this beat, I couldn’t believe the loop I flipped and was just vibing out, sending snippets to all my close friends who are into Hip Hop. Because of this I really really rushed mixing it, I just wanted to get it saved on my computer and in retrospect, I’ve always been really unhappy with how it sounded. The main problem for me was the high frequencies, which I thought were too loud and ruined the other parts of the mix, which was a shame. At the time I didn’t notice it too much but something definitely sounded off, but I’ve learnt a lot since then and I’ve been wanting to improve the mix on this beat for a while. There’s only so much you can do with a bad mix (I never actually saved the beat cause my MPC disk drive was broken back then) so it’s been pretty difficult to get this beat sounding how I would have liked it to, but I think it sounds a lot better than it did.

Here’s the original for comparison: https://soundcloud.com/tapeheadloops/my-mind-is-old

Peace

My Mind Is Old (Instrumental)

Instrumental: https://soundcloud.com/tapeheadloops/gettin-mines-instrumental

Beat, mixing and mastering by Tapehead
Vocals from ‘Raid Acapella’ by M.E.D and MF DOOM

Visuals: https://youtu.be/QpNRJ8FqVyg

I’ve been feeling particularly motivated recently, and this verse from M.E.D. off Raid really resonated with me. I was originally trying to put a DOOM acapella over this beat but couldn’t get anything to work, and while I was tryna flip DOOM’s verse on the Raid acapella I thought I’d see how M.E.D.’s verse sounded. I’ve definitely always overlooked this verse because it’s crazy, so to the point and the imagery in his lyrics is mad effective to me (I tried to pick out my favourite examples of that in the visuals for this one). The general outlook of the verse is crazy inspiring, it gives off such a raw energy of focusing on yourself and what you love, no matter what might be around you tryna drag you down or throw you off that path. I was gassed with how this came out, and would definitely like to add a DOOM verse to this in the future, so I left that intro from his Raid vocal so I don’t forget (I’ve got plans to absolutely do something with that on the DOOM album I’m working on, at the moment I’m thinking of doing a beat switch into some hard hitting beat where DOOM just goes crazy hitting all the kicks or something). 

Here's the original mix I had of this beat for anyone interested: https://soundcloud.com/tapeheadloops/flavs-bout-to-drop 
I still like how the Biggie verse flows over the beat so I wanted to do something different here (not just re do that mix), and thought the mix of the beat itself could be a lot better, particularly the low end, and the resonance on the snare.

Thank you for listening, I really appreciate all the feedback and support. Peace!

Gettin' Mines

Old Memory

Beat, mixing and mastering by Tapehead
Vocals from ‘Nowhere To Run, Nowhere To Hide Acapella’ by Gravediggaz

Visuals: https://youtu.be/Jf33L2Lxoas

So many people picked up on the Halloween vibes of this beat when I dropped the instrumental, so since then I’ve been working on a Gravediggaz remix to drop before the 31st, cause their style just fits that perfectly. I didn’t have this acapella record when I first made the beat so I never thought to use it, and I’m definitely glad to have it now. There aren’t many acapellas out there from their first album (this might be the only one) and to me that’s their best horrorcore sounding album lyrically, they were in their own zone making that one for sure, and I always play it loads this time of year. To be honest my favourite track off the album is ‘Graveyard Chamber’, it’s just got that underground hardcore vibe on lock, and that’s exactly the kind of Hip Hop that I was tapping into when I made this beat. Also I’d argue that the album has one of, if not the best outro from a 90s Hip Hop album, it’s just ridiculous and I’m always looking forward to it when I hear the album, and then once it’s over it just makes me want to replay the whole album again.

Original remix: https://soundcloud.com/tapeheadloops/sparkin-on-the-mic

I made this beat 2 years ago now in late October 2019. I'd picked up a generic record compilation of music from films at a charity shop for 50p on the off chance that there would be something dope on there. Most of the record had nothing that stood out to me and was really hectic classic music with no sampling potential, and it was a bit frustrating, because I'd spent a few hours listening to records for samples. Then for a brief moment there was a pause in this rhapsody, and these really dark and menacing bass notes played for a few seconds as a bridge, and they instantly stood out to me so I sampled them into the MPC2000. I guess being frustrated with not finding a sample brought out an aggressive nature in this beat, it made me think of the soundtrack to Jaws or something in how sinister and angry the beat sounded. It was late October too so maybe it being near Halloween inspired the evil sound of the beat too. I was happy with the loop of the bass heavy string notes, and I layered the best piano notes from the rhapsody ontop, which added a lot to the beat and made it a lot more engaging.

Overall this is one of those beats that was born out of frustration, but once I actually had the samples on the MPC it was very simple to make, and it didn't take long to get to the finished product, which I was very happy with as it's always fun to make a really grimey hardcore sounding beat. I still do rate what I was going for the remix of Mad Izm over this beat, but I’ve learned a lot about mixing since then, and I think this remix is mixed a lot better, as well as Gravediggaz making more logical sense over the beat. I layered more drums here and layered the sample to give it more bass, I just wanted the melody to hit as hard as possible without clipping, which was actually difficult cause of all the different tracks. I do think the mix is a lot better now, it’s nice to improve more recent beats because there’s normally only a few things that need touching up, and with this one I feel like I’ve got a convincing remix here that does the sample justice and feels like something Gravediggaz might have hopped on. Also when I loaded this beat up on the MPC to rerecord the sample, I found a different flip of the piano I chopped from the rhapsody which I completely forgot about and never ended up using, so I decided to use it here as a little switchup at the end for RZA’s bonus verse.

Hope people enjoy this one in time for Halloween, next week’s upload on the 31st is going to be a tribute and celebration of MF DOOM. I rarely know what I’m uploading that far in advance, but I’ve been planning this one for a while now. Until then, peace!!

Nowhere To Run

DAM95, Prod. By Outtake - Everyday

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