Straight from the Ghetto - News on HipHop, pt. 18

Hamburg-based HipHop-imprint Schmuf Hamburg are about to release their 2nd compilation named "die 2te.com" on december 14th featuring a whole lot of 17 tracks representing the finest of underground HipHop / Rap to be found in Germany's second biggest city. Artists like Bo Flower, Temmyton - watch out for her forthcoming album in '07 - , Schmiddlfinga, Instrumens plus many more serve a top notch mixture of bangin' party tunes - some of them clearly influenced by Ragga / Dancehall / Reggaeton -, conscious HipHop with a kinda oldskool'ish attitude and also a few more like battle-flavored tracks. No bling-bling shit in here, so this one aims at a more adult and advanced audience that still can relate to the early years and values of HipHop culture - if you're one of those you'll surely find some reminiscences to classic beats and samples. Especially watch out for the Schmuf Allstars track "Ooh" which is about to kill every dancefloor and transforms it into a heavily ravin' moshpit. Defo a track that simply begs for a reload - check the massive video + makin' of which are featured on the labels website and, if u happen to be in Hamburg at the date of release, the upcoming release bash takin' place at Prinzenbar featuring all performing artists appearing on this compilation plus a special crumping showcase of Lilith's Daughters which are as well featured in the the "Ooh"-video. If you're about to purchase just one essential HipHop/Rap-related record this month it undoubtedly has to be this one. Recommended.

A nice but neither essential nor necessary release on Eminem’s Shady Records is the 12” teaser for the forthcoming compilation “Eminem presents The Re-Up” which has been put on promo circuit recently. The best track “You Don’t Know” by Eminem ft. Lloyd Banks, 50 Cent and Cashis has been available on promo before and due to that is a waste of vinyl space; same goes – as far as I remember – for Stat Quo’s “Low Down” which is indeed one of his lower quality productions. The only brand new tune to be found is Akon’s “Smack That Remix” featuring Stat Quo & Bobby Creekwater which works well for the ladies but finally is only worth to be played out for warm up’s as full vocal version due to its cheese factor, but the booming 808-based beat instrumental is a proppa tool anyway.

Another release on promo circuit is Rishie Rich’s “Push It Up (Aaja Kuriek)” on TwoPoint Nine Records. A1 is the so-called “Banghraton Remix” which fuses – guess what – Bollywood and Reggaeton. And fails. Same for the Original Version. But surprisingly the Vibekingz Remix Instrumental is quite phat, leaving out most of the original elements but delivers booming, stripped down to the bone beat structures featuring a few bleepy sounds on top – basicly the same formula they used for their infamous “She’s Like The Wind” version. File last mentioned version under: functional for DJ abuse.