Tag Archives: Jay-Z

Reflection Eternal

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“I’m losing myself, I’m stuck in the moment
I look in the mirror, My only opponent“
Jay-Z, “Welcome to the Jungle”

“This beat deserves Hennessy, a bad bitch and a bag of weed the Holy Trinity
In the mirror where I see my only enemy“
Kanye West, “The Joy”

I’m not a music critic so I won’t get into what I thought about Jay-Z and Kanye West’s new album, Watch The Throne. Overall, I thought it was entertaining.

After listening to the album a few times, the two lines above fascinated me. I feel like they summarize where each artist is at in their lives and in their careers. It was even more interesting to me that the two lines appear on seperate songs. Who said their’s first and how did it influence the other?

Links for the Week of 2/14

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Links for January 21-22

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Well, doing the daily links became too much so I’m just going to do my top 10 links at the end of the week but here are a few from the last few days.

Links for January 14th

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2009: 15 Favorite Albums

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I had a tough time with the order of the top three.  At any given moment, any of them could be number one.  Again, I emphasize that these are in the order of my favorite albums of the year not the best.

15. Animal Collective – Merriweather Post Pavillion

14. Tanya Morgan – Brooklynati

13. Jay-Z – The Blueprint 3

12. The Swell Season – Strict Joy

11. St. Vincent – Actor

10. Raekwon – Only Built 4 Cuban Linx PT II

9. The Gossip – Music for Men

8. Dirty Projectors – Bitte Orca

7. Phoenix – Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix

6. The Temper Trap – Conditions

5. Me’Shell Ndegéocello – Devil’s Halo

4. Tegan and Sara – Sainthood

3. Grizzly Bear – Veckatimest

2. Yeah Yeah Yeahs – It’s Blitz!

1. Metric – Fantasies

Mixtape For No One #4 – Best of ’09 Part I

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Click here to listen

I’m going to revive the Mixtape For No One to showcase some of my favorite songs of 2009.  These are the hip-hop/R&B tracks.

  1. “Never Forget You”  by Noisettes (Wild Young Hearts)
  2. “The Power That Kisses Hold” by Eric Roberson (Music Fan First)
  3. “Cold” by Maxwell (BLACKsummersnight)
  4. “Fortune” by Little Dragon (Machine Dreams)
  5. “Successful” (Featuring Trey Songz And Lil’ Wayne) by Drake (So Far Gone)
  6. “Lola” by Me’Shell Ndegéocello (Devil’s Halo)
  7. “Kinda Like A Big Deal” (feat. Kanye West) by Clipse (Til The Casket Drops)
  8. “Casa Bey” by Mos Def (The Ecstatic)
  9. “House Of Flying Daggers” (feat. Inspectah Deck, Ghostface & Method Man) by Raekwon (Only Built 4 Cuban Linx PT II)
  10. “Maybach Music 2″ (feat. T-Pain, Lil Wayne & Kanye West) by Rick Ross (Deeper Than Rap)
  11. “Errbody Scream” (Featuring Keith Murray) by Method Man & Redman (Blackout! 2)
  12. “Tour Stories” by Souls Of Mischief (Montezuma’s Revenge)
  13. “So Damn Down” by Tanya Morgan (Brooklynati)
  14. “Thank You” by Jay-Z (The Blueprint 3)

My 50 Favorite Albums of the 00s

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This was much harder than the “My 50 Favorite Television Shows of the 00s” list. When I started the television list, I singled out 70 shows or so and cut it down to 50. It took me three days to come up with a first draft of albums and I ended up with 185! I was going to just do a list of 100 but I like consistency so I whittled the list down to 50.  The closer I got to 50, the sadder I got as I had to delete albums I loved off the list. After how depressing it ended up being bringing this list down to 50, a) I won’t even try to single out a top 10 (although I think “Kid A” would be my favorite album) and b) sorry, Karen, I won’t even attempt a 50 Favorite Singles list.

A couple of notes:

  • Just a reminder, I am not saying these are the 50 BEST albums in the last decade, these are the ones I am most fond of
  • Apparently my best years for music was 2000 and 2002 as nine albums from each year made the list.
  • Nothing released this year made the list and only two albums from 2008
  • Only Jay-Z and Radiohead have more than one album on the list (unless you count Jenny Lewis twice for her solo and Rilo Kiley)

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Melanism on Shuffle, Part I

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“Without a soundtrack, human interaction is meaningless.”
— Chuck Klosterman

The rules are simple. I’m going to put my iPod on shuffle and write about the first 10 songs that play.  Some of these will be really stupid or have nothing to do with the song but hey, who doesn’t like to hear me go off on a tangent. Continue reading →