I wrote on the Baltimore City Paper site about how R&B singer CJ Hilton, who I interviewed a few years ago, released the independent album This Is Me in August and has released an additional 20-something other new songs on Soundcloud in the weeks since then.

Labels: Baltimore City Paper, CJ Hilton, Noise

I wrote a post on the City Paper's Noise blog about the new song featuring Nas by CJ Hilton, who I profiled in the paper last year.

Labels: Baltimore City Paper, CJ Hilton, Noise

The Baltimore City Paper’s annual Best Of Baltimore issue hit the streets today, and as usual I helped pick some of the best-ofs for the Arts and Entertainment section and wrote a few blurbs that appear in the issue:

Best Male MC: Los
Best Female MC: Si-Notes
Best Hip-Hop DJ: DJ Jabril
Best Live Band: Soul Cannon
Best Summer Jam: CJ Hilton - “We Can Get It In”
Best Solo Artist: Reina Williams
Best Radio Show For Local Music: Strictly Hip Hop

Some of the other music winners I'm happy about included Mobtown Studios, Labtekwon, Mania Music Group's producers, Supa DJ Big L, Murder Mark, and DJ Pierre, and in the readers poll, the Best Hip-Hop Act winners included the Get 'Em Mamis, A Cool Stick (who?), Rapdragons and Height With Friends, and some other hip hop winners and runner-ups include Shodekeh and 92Q.

(Si-Notes photo by Rarah)

Labels: 92Q, Baltimore City Paper, CJ Hilton, DJ Jabril, DJ Pierre, G.E.M./Tha Plague, Labtekwon, Los, magazines/newspapers, Mobtown Studios, Shodekeh, Si-Notes, Soul Cannon, Strictly Hip Hop

CJ Hilton - "We Can Get It In" (mp3)
I actually already posted this Don Cannon-produced track off The Package Mixtape back in March, but I thought it'd be a good time to post it again since CJ Hilton was just on the BET Awards last night performing this song, as part of the "Music Matters" showcase of new artists. I had no idea he was gonna be on there last night until he was listed in the opening credits, so that was a cool surprise, very proud of the dude. You can read my City Paper feature on CJ that I wrote a few months ago here.

Labels: CJ Hilton, mp3

CJ - The Package Mixtape (DJ Driis/SalaamRemi.com)

CJ is the Baltimore-based R&B singer that I wrote a City Paper feature about a few weeks ago, and this is the mixtape I mentioned in the article that's hosted by Idris Elba from The Wire, and features production by Salaam Remi, Don Cannon, Bink and CJ himself. It's a really solid, short 30-minute preview of what he's capable of, and really has me looking forward to his album on J Records later this year. You can download The Package Mixtape here.

CJ - "We Can Get It In" (mp3)
This is the track produced by Don Cannon, who's really one of my favorite mainstream producers these days, really good song.

Labels: CJ Hilton, mixtape/album review, mp3, The Wire

This week in the City Paper I have a feature about CJ, the Baltimore R&B singer who got a Grammy nomination last year for his song with Raphael Saadiq and Stevie Wonder, and is working on a solo album for J Records. The above video is for "It Ain't Easy" off of his recent mixtape, and J is getting ready to release his official single soon.

Labels: Baltimore City Paper, CJ Hilton, RnB, video

Man, I'm loving that most of the mp3s I've been throwing out for this series of posts have been getting like 30 downloads or more, makes me wonder how many people are actually grabbing every single song they don't already have, which I think would be really awesome. Maybe after it's all over next week people can start leaving comments with what their favorite songs are, which I'd like to see a lot:

31. Diablo - "Round My Hood" (mp3) - March 11, 2006
32. Debonair Samir - "Throw It Up" (mp3) - March 28, 2006
33. Little Clayway - "B-More Hip Hop" (mp3) - April 2, 2006
34. E-Nahledge - "F.W.Y.B." (mp3) - January 23, 2007
35. Paula Campbell f/ Rod Lee and Tim Trees - "How Does It Feel" (mp3) - March 31, 2005
36. Mullyman - "Party Walk" (mp3) - April 26, 2008
37. Raphael Saadiq f/ C.J. Hilton and Stevie Wonder - "Never Give You Up" (mp3) - October 7, 2008
38. N.E.K. - "Face Down (Remix)" (mp3) - June 17, 2005
39. Ogun f/ Jitter B.U.G. and EJ - "Bmore (Remix)" (mp3) - December 24, 2005
40. Born King - "Blue Lights" (mp3) - May 19, 2006

Labels: Baltimore club, Born King, CJ Hilton, Debonair Samir, Diablo, lists, Little Clayway, mp3, Mullyman, Ogun, Paula Campbell, Rod Lee, Tim Trees

Some quick news items:

- Amotion and Deep Flow Studios landed on the cover of B with a feature by Timothy Cooper earlier this week.

- Say Wut is featured in the current issue of XLR8R with an article by Michael Byrne.

- Here's a YouTube video of Swizz Beatz co-signing Mullyman.

- NOE is featured on a new song from the Jim Jones record called "Swagga From Us" with Lil Wayne and Twista. NOE is talented and he did his thing on that Byrd Gang album, but if he's gonna let Dirty Angel Jimmy keep using him on songs that are mainly about dissing or one-upping Jay-Z, honestly dude is gonna stay losing.

- In other Bmore-cats-getting-shine-on-some-Dipset-bullshit news, producer Street Heat did a beat for their new Bad Santa mixtape.

- If you've heard Lil Wayne's Dedication 3, DJ Drama gives a quick "rest in peace" shout out to DJ K-Swift on track 11, "She's A Ryder," so big respect to him for that.

- I should also say thanks to PenDragon for putting me up on those last 2 items, and mention that he's been really putting his music out there online lately and getting featured on sites like On Smash, illRoots and Limited Hype.

- EDIT@2pm: I forgot to include this when I first put the post up, but the Grammy nominations were announced last night, and a song I posted here a few weeks ago, "Never Give You Up" by Raphael Saadiq with Stevie Wonder and Baltimore singer CJ Hilton, was nominated for Best R&B Performance By A Duo Or Group With Vocals. Congrats to him, it's a great song and really deserves it, I hope he gets to perform it at the Lyric next week when Saadiq opens for John Legend. On a side note, CJ's sister told me she'd help me get in touch with him for an interview, but she hasn't responded to my e-mails lately so I'm still trying to reach him if anyone can help.

Labels: Baltimore club, CJ Hilton, Deep Flow, K-Swift, magazines/newspapers, Mullyman, NOE, NSW (Say What), PenDragon, video

Raphael Saadiq f/ Stevie Wonder and CJ Hilton - "Never Give You Up" (mp3)
Back over the summer, I was on Raphael Saadiq's MySpace page, looking into the new album he was getting ready to release, when I heard an impressive song on his page by someone named CJ with a voice that was strongly reminiscent of Marvin Gaye. So I clicked over to CJ's MySpace page, and realized that he was this amazingly talented teenager from Baltimore signed to Capitol Records who I'd somehow never heard of. Then, Saadiq's album, The Way I See It came out in September and it's pretty fantastic, one of the best R&B albums of the year, and CJ is featured on one of the best tracks, singing lead on half the song and playing drums and piano on "Never Give You Up," which also features Stevie Wonder on harmonica. I haven't been able to find much more info on the dude, but this 2006 article from The Urbanite says that he was 17 at the time, and was signed to Capitol Records in '05, so he's probably 19 now, which is still really amazingly young for someone with his kind of talent, who gets to record with people like Stevie Wonder. I sent him a MySpace message months ago requesting an interview and never heard back, so if anyone knows him and can let him know I wanna do a feature for the Baltimore City Paper on him or something, let me know how I can get in touch.

Labels: CJ Hilton, mp3