9.18 – TNN



Juicy J’s new tape is out, hosted by Taylor Gang. If you’re a Three 6 Mafia fan, you already know what to expect – hilarious, over-the-top rap songs, simple and plain. Here are three more new songs we’re jamming:

“On Hold” was already our favorite song off of I See You, The xx’s album from last winter. That Hall & Oates sample over Arthur Baker sound-alike 808 drums just gets stuck in your head! And the video brings to mind nothing if not Dazed & Confused, brilliantly channeling that tension between heartbreak and ecstasy in a small town Texas high school. And so this new Jamie xx Remix takes both vocals and sample from the original and builds up a beautiful deep house record, translating it perfectly for the club. Alasdair McLellan, the photographer who is responsible for a handful of xx videos, remixed his OG video, speeding up the edits to fit Jamie’s vocal chops – pretty clever!

Yes we talked about Syd last week, deal with it! The Cool Kids are back after a six year hiatus, and their new record features Jeremih, A-Trak, Smoke DZA, and a whole host of underground Chicago rappers. The vibe is kind of timeless hip-hop – breakbeats, samples and lyrics never go out of style.

LA’s Nosaj Thing (pr. “no such thing”) really thrives as a producer of full length albums, and he just released a new one on Innovative Leisure entitled Parallels. We always vibe to his LPs, which are more for the headphones than for the club, though there are a few uptempo tracks here and there. It’s mostly beautiful instrumentals, but all three vocal features are terrific – Steve Spacek, Zuri Marley and Kazu Makino. This is Nosaj Thing’s second collaboration with Kazu (vocalist for Blonde Redhead), after 2012’s “Eclipse/Blue.”