Labtekwon - "King Very Vicious" (mp3)
It seems kind of ironic to me that Lab, a guy who's been rapping Baltimore longer than almost anybody and has been somewhat critical of Bmore's current careerist hip hop movement and is on a more arty/conscious tip, beat everyone else to getting 2 videos in rotation on BET Uncut, first "Uhnnn Huhnnn" and more recently "King Very Vicious," both off last year's Ghetto Dai Lai Llama album. It's a catchy song, though, and still kind of in his spacy weird style, the usual Uncut strippers and camcorders look with a quick shot of Mondawmin Mall.

B. Rich - "We All Doin' Time"
Born Rich is dropping on January 31st now, and this song has started get some radio play and I'm really feeling it. The beat sounds like a lot of Southern beats right now, but lyrically it's really serious and political, definitely a promising change from the stuff on his first album. You can hear it on his website.

Huli Shallone - "For My Shorty"
This has been getting heavy rotation on 92Q for a couple months now, I've gotten some requests for a copy but I haven't found one, anyone have it? This is like Huli's 2nd big radio hit that hasn't been on his last album, I wonder if he's got a new album or at least a mixtape coming. It's an alright song, not that different from some of the R&B flavored tracks on It's My Turn. It's one of the first rap songs with a sped up vocal sample that I've ever heard that really reminds me of Prince's weird 'Camille' voice on songs like "If I Was Your Girlfriend," that's kinda cool.

Young Leek - "Check"
This is definitely more of a serious hip hop song than "Shake It And Jiggle It," although still on kind of a trendy Southern tip with the Nextel Chirp sounds and all that, but I'm feelin' it. If he can turn out more jams like this he might be able to do something respectable with Def Jam.

Labels: B. Rich, Huli Shallone, Labtekwon, mp3, Young Leek