Above you’ll find a 2-part interview that Okayplayer did with NC’s Kooley High, and below you can check out a Napoleon Wright III produced cut from the group/crew. I digs. Kooley High is Tab-One, Charlie Smarts, Foolery, Ill Digitz, The Sinopsis, and Rapsody.
Video by B. “Streets” Riley.
Above is a new video from one of the illest out of NC. Charlie Smarts‘ previous LowBottomMe is available now, and I bumped the hell out of it when it dropped a year or so ago. Track produced by Marshal Law.
Detroit’s Clear Soul Forces and North Carolina’s Kooley High have teamed up to form the group Freq Freq, and this is the first song off of the two groups collaboration. Checky.
Directed by Kent Willard of Depth of Sound Productions.
Here’s a video from Kooley High‘s previous David Thompson release. You can check that project out here if you’re still in the dark.
Here’s a track off of from Sinopsis‘ remix album titled The Skywalker. You can still grab Kooley High‘s David Thompson if you haven’t yet.
Here’s an interview with Charlie Smarts and DJ Ill Digitz of Kooley High. If you haven’t grabbed their David Thompson album yet, you can still grab that on iTunes. Oh, and stream it below.
According to the email I got from Charlie Smarts, Kooley High producer Sinopsis has a project getting ready to drop. Here’s a track from it. Bong.
Mediafire
We decided a few weeks ago to put together a list of our favorite projects this year. Locally, globally, hip hop, eclectic, and instrumental wise. We also want to state that this is by no means a “best of” list, just the projects that Jay Diff and myself were bumping and/or feeling the most. We each chose 25 hip hop releases, 10 eclectic and/or instrumental releases, and came together and chose a few local projects. We suggest you check out anything we post, but being said, we REALLY suggest checking out these projects:
‡ = we both selected it
g = seangevity chose it
d = jay diff chose it
Favorite Hip Hop Releases:
Action Bronson – Well Done (‡) [Buy]
Big K.R.I.T. – Return of Forever (‡) [Free]
Common – The Dreamer, The Believer (‡) [Buy]
Danny Brown – XXX (‡) [Free]
Grumpy Old Men – Sunday Skool (‡) [Free]
Kendrick Lamar – Section 80 (‡) [Buy]
Mighty High Coup – Boom Rap (‡) [Buy]
Pac Div – The Div (‡) [Buy]
Pharoahe Monch – W.A.R. (‡) [Buy]
Phonte – Charity Starts at Home (‡) [Buy]
Random Axe – Random Axe (‡) [Buy]
Skyzoo – The Great Debater (‡) [Free]
The Roots – undun (‡) [Buy]
Torae – For The Record (‡) [Buy]
9th Wonder – The Wonder Years (d) [Buy]
Astronote – Weapon of the Future (g) [Free]
Charlie Smarts – LowBottomMe (g) [Free]
Co$$ – Before I Awoke (g) [Buy]
DTMD – Makin Dollas (g) [Buy]
Elzhi – Elmatic (d) [Buy]
Evidence – Cats & Dogs (g) [Buy]
Exile – 4trk Mind (g) [Buy]
Fabolous – The S.O.U.L. Tape (d) [Free]
Game – The R.E.D. Album (d) [Buy]
J. Cole – Cole World: The Sideline Story (d) [Buy]
Jay-Z & Kanye West – Watch The Throne (d) [Buy]
Laws – Yesterday’s Future (g) [Free]
Local Nobodies (Sulaiman & Mathien) – One (g) [Free]
Luckyiam – I Love Haters (g) [Buy]
Meek Mill – Dreamchasers (d) [Free]
Rapsody – For Everything (d) [Free]
Saigon – Greatest Story Never Told (d) [Buy]
Statik Selektah – Population Control (g) [Buy]
TiRon & Ayomari – A Sucker For Pumps (d) [Buy]
Thurz – LA Riots (g) [Buy]
Wale – Eleven One Eleven Theory (d) [Free]
Favorite Eclectic/Instrumental/Other Releases (Not Hip Hop):
Iman Omari – Energy (‡) [Free]
Mayer Hawthorne – How Do You Do (‡) [Buy]
14KT – 14 Killa Tape (g) [Free]
Apollo Brown – Clouds (g) [Stream/Buy]
Eric Lau – Quadrivium (g) [Stream/Buy]
Eric Roberson – Mister Nice Guy (d) [Buy]
flaKo – Carving Away The Clay (d) [Stream/Buy]
Frank Ocean – Ultra Nostalgia (d) [Free]
Hawthorne Headhunters – Myriad of Now (g) [Stream/Buy]
J*DaVeY – New Designer Drug (g) [Buy]
Jhene Aiko – Sailing Sounds (d) [Free]
Nicolay & The Hot at Nights – Shibuya Sessions EP (d) [Stream/Buy]
Nikkiya – Speakher (d) [Free]
Mecca:83 – Life Scetches (Volume 1 & 2) (g) [Stream/Buy]
Radio Galaxy – We Come In Peace (d) [Stream/Buy]
Sunclef – The Tesseract (g) [Free]
The Weeknd – House of Balloons (d) [Free]
Vlooper – COPYCAT (a Dilla Tribute) (g) [Free]
Favorite Local Hip Hop Releases:
alpha.live – Soul Cinema [Free]
Blake Allee – My Best Friends Are Machines [Free]
Future5ive – Somewhere in August [Free]
J.Brookinz & Grey Granite – Gateway 2 [Free]
Hinx Jones – Frozen Liquor [Stream/Buy/Free]
Mr. Kinetik – Sounds of Soul [Stream/Buy]
Mr. Kinetik & Rusty Redenbacher – The Professor & The Hustler [Free]
Roskoh Deyvis – Welcome to the Wiz [Stream]
Scoot Dubbs – The Time Has Come EP [Free]
Skittz – Rhymestrong [Stream/Buy]
The Proforms – Atavism [Buy]
Tony Styxx – It’s Bigger Than Me [Stream/Buy/Free]
Well, it’s that time of year again. Here are some of my favorite B-Side joints from this last year. Obviously, there are a lot more I would have liked to add, but give this a listen and get up on some cats you may have been sleeping on! If you missed last years, it’s still available here. Enjoy, and happy holidays to all.
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