This week WWW.ALLBMOREHIPHOP.COM, a site put together by the folks at Architects Recording Studio, launched and they've got a whole bunch of free downloads of full-length albums and mixtapes by artists including Ogun, Skarr Akbar, Bossman, TestMe, Barnes, Huli Shallone, UnReal, D.O.G., ShellBe R.A.W., EJ, Rye Rye and many others. I think it's great that there's gonna be a site like this from now on, and from Ogun's told me they've got a lot more stuff planned.

Labels: ALLBMOREHIPHOP.COM, announcements, Architects, Barnes, Bossman, D.O.G., EJ, Huli Shallone, Ogun, Rye Rye, ShellBe RAW, Skarr Akbar, TestMe, UnReal

Wrapping up the first half now, we're really getting into back to back songs I straight up love. Once again, there's a totally unintentional theme with a lot of songs I posted in 2006 originally, which makes sense since that was probably the most exciting year for me personally, in the history of running this site:

51. UnReal f/ Sonny Brown - "Hell 2 Pay" (mp3) - September 9, 2006
52. Cutthroat - "If I Die" (mp3) - October 15, 2006
53. Tyree Colion - "My Projects" (mp3) - November 19th, 2006
54. Blaq Starr - "Stop" (mp3) - August 22, 2005
55. Brown F.I.S.H. - "45" (mp3) - December 22, 2006
56. 410 Pharaohs - "Watch Her Shake It (aka Hammer Dance)" (mp3) - July 29, 2006
57. ShellBe R.A.W. f/ XO - "Damn Shells" (mp3) - August 7, 2006
58. B.I.G. Status - "Line Up" (mp3) - January 10, 2006
59. Bossman - "Oh" (mp3) - June 9, 2005
60. Bigg Patch - "Supa Ugly" (mp3) - July 25, 2006

Labels: B.I.G. Status, Baltimore club, Bigg Patch, Blaq Starr, Brown F.I.S.H., Cutthroat, lists, mp3, Sonny Brown, Tyree Colion, UnReal

As per yesterday's announcement, I'll be doing this every day or thereabouts until I get to the top 10. I'm still listening to tracks and finalizing parts of the list, though, so if anyone has any artists/songs they wanna rep for and make sure I consider (if they're not in there already), feel free to say so in the comments. Or really, let me know if there are any songs I'm re-posting that you missed the first time and are really enjoying now:

81. King Tutt - "Let's Go" (mp3) - March 10, 2009
82. Dappa!!! Dan Midas f/ RapMan Ron G. - "Push Start" (mp3) - December 2, 2008
83. K.W. Griff - "Pork & Swift" (mp3) - January 13th, 2009
84. Tonio: From Da Top - "U Mad?!?" (mp3) - April 5, 2009
85. Blaq Starr - "Hands Up, Thumbs Down" (mp3) - June 29, 2006
86. Verb - "Get Em Verb" (mp3) - January 17, 2006
87. Nature's Problem - "Shake It Shorty" (mp3) - August 3, 2006
88. Dave Da Barber f/ Caddy Da Don, Tim Trees, XO, and Block Hugga - "Eastside Of Baltimore (Remix)" (mp3) - August 6, 2007
89. Wordsmith f/ The Profitt, Reggie Webb, Greenspan, Skarr Akbar, Soulstice, Pro & Reg, Sly Solomon, Steadfast, Tislam the Great & E-Major - "B-More Baritones" (mp3) - February 22, 2009
90. UnReal - "Luv Me" (mp3) - January 17, 2006

Labels: Baltimore club, Blaq Starr, King Tutt, KW Griff, lists, Midas, mp3, Ron G., Tha Profitt, Tim Trees, Tonio, UnReal, Verb, Wordsmith, XO

Labels: Ab Rock, Club Reality, flyer, Sonny Brown, UnReal

Labels: Bossman, flyer, Sonar, UnReal

This month on the City Paper's Noise blog, I interviewed DJ Frie (pictured above) for my Club Beat column, and reviewed the following shows: McCracken/Scholarman/Soulstice/Wordsmith @ Bedrock, Sonny Brown/UnReal/Kane/Midas/Labtekwon/Skarr Akbar/B.O.M.B. (and many others) @ The Baltimore Crown awards, the "Music & The Brain Salon (with Shodekeh) @ the American Visionary Art Museum, The Oranges Band/Gary B. & The Notions/Deleted Scenes @ The Ottobar, the Cameron Blake Band @ the 13th Floor and Mike Pursley/Neil Cotterill @ Frazier's.

Labels: 5 Seasons, B.O.M.B., Baltimore City Paper, Baltimore club, Bedrock, Kane, Labtekwon, Midas, Minlus McCracken, Noise, Ottobar, Shodekeh, Skarr Akbar, Sonny Brown, UnReal, Wordsmith

Ms. Stress - Flipside (Arsonists Camp)

You may know Ms. Stress as the Madame of Murdaland and just generally one of the best, most aggressive female MCs in Baltimore, and her new album, her first since she joined up with Arsonists Camp, is a definite improvement over her first album. I still think that in some ways she's better as a raw live performer than as a recording artist, and sometimes her voice sounds strained on these songs, but there are a few tracks where I think she really realizes her potential. The beats are by The Banga Donz, G-Major, D.Fos and 1st In Time Productions, and there are guest appearances by Midas, UnReal, and Tufflon Donna, among others.

Ms. Stress - "P's & Q's" (mp3)
This track is a lot of fun, dope hook and sample, good flow.

Labels: Midas, mixtape/album review, mp3, Ms. Stress, UnReal

Next Friday the 2nd annual Baltimore Crown event is taking place at the 5 Seasons, and there's a lot of performances scheduled as well as an MC battle, which will be judged by the crowd, and a producer battle, for which I've been asked to serve as one of the judges. This year there's also going to be awards voted on by the public for various categories, and info on voting is here (there's a "Best Blog and/or Website" category, hint hint).

Labels: 5 Seasons, A-Class, announcements, B-Fly, battle, Dirt Platoon, flyer, Kane, Minlus McCracken, Ogun, Sean Toure, Shaka Pitts, Sonny Brown, Symantyx, UnReal

UnReal - "Politics As Usual" (mp3)
I don't jump to post every topical or political record that comes my way, or every Obama record even though that's how I'm voting, but this is a pretty good song. Good to hear something new from UnReal, UnReal, I know he's got a lot of unreleased music stockpiled up right now that I think people are really gonna feel whenever it comes out.

Labels: mp3, UnReal

Labels: flyer, Sonar, Sonny Brown, UnReal

Kane f/ UnReal - "Turntables" (mp3)
A couple months ago at the benefit for Sonny Brown, I was on the corner outside the club bullshitting with Ogun and a few other dudes after the show. And one of them was this guy Kane who I'd never met before and was just a hysterical, quick-witted guy, and I was like shit, if this guy raps half as slick as he talks, his music's gotta be worth checking out. I mean, let's face it, even some great rappers haven't, shall we say, mastered the art of conversation. His MySpace blog has some pretty thought-provoking stuff on it, too. I haven't really heard anything yet by him besides the songs on his MySpace page, but my favorite of those is the one with UnReal. Kane is a part of this new label that Midas and a few other people are putting together and I'm pretty interested to see what comes of that. And UnReal invited me over a while back to listen to this new mixtape he's getting ready to release that I think might be his best work yet, so hopefully there'll be a lot more to hear from both of these guys in the near future.

Labels: mp3, UnReal

various artists - B-More Vibe Magazine presents Watch This! (mixed by Musse' Mus)

The timing of this post is pretty unfortunate, because a couple months ago B-More Vibe Magazine released its first mixtape, and put on a great release party show for the occasion, but I'm now getting around to writing about the CD here just a few days after it was announced that B-More Vibe is no more. You can read the full announcement here, so all I'll say is that I have a lot of respect for what Rogue and Me'Aze Millioni tried to do with the mag, but knowing what the market is like for print publications these days, I totally understand their decision. I only contributed to B-More Vibe a little bit and always wished I did more, but it is what it is. Let's talk about what they did accomplish, though, because this CD is pretty dope, with new material from D.O.G., UnReal, Ms. Stress, Tha Profitt, B.O.M.B, PenDragon, and even Rogue herself. I was impressed that they got virtually every artist on the mixtape to perform at the release party, too.

Remstarr - "Know Me" (mp3)
I have to admit that the real reason I'm posting this song is that about 28 seconds into the track, Musse' Mus says "Government Names dot Blogspot dot com." I've heard my government name shouted out on mixtapes a couple times now, but this is the first time I've heard Government Names itself shouted out, which is pretty cool. The song is good, too, though, I've never posted anything by Remstarr before but I see dude all over MySpace all the time.

Labels: B.O.M.B., Bosslady, D.O.G., magazines/newspapers, mixtape/album review, mp3, Ms. Stress, Musse' Mus', Tha Profitt, UnReal

This month on http://noise.citypaper.com, I posted a couple more last gasps of best of 2007 lists, my top 10 shows of the year (including Kix, Avec, Skarr Akbar, Bossman, Mullyman, Barnes, Huli Shallone, Comp, B.O.M.B., ShellBe R.A.W., Jade Fox, B-Fly and G.E.M. among others) and a big year-end Club Beat column with my top 10 Baltimore club tracks of the year (including K.W. Griff, Blaq Starr, Rod Lee, Say Wut and Scottie B. among others) in addition to the top Baltimore albums of '07 list I posted last month. And my first concert reviews of the new year were of the MacGregor Burns Band/Good Guise/Mason-Dixon @ The Ottobar, Paloma/Flying Eyes/Dog Day Afternoon/Watershed/Icarus Rising @ the 8x10, and Ogun/B.O.M.B./PX/First Family/E Major/A-Class/UnReal/Ab-Rock @ the Turntable Club's benefit for Sonny Brown. Plus, of course, other people all over Noise posting Baltimore music news.

Labels: B.O.M.B., Baltimore City Paper, Baltimore club, Barnes, Blaq Starr, E Major, Huli Shallone, KW Griff, Noise, NSW (Say What), Ogun, PX, Rod Lee, Scottie B., Skarr Akbar, Turntable Club, UnReal

Labels: B.O.M.B., E Major, flyer, Ogun, PX, Sonny Brown, Turntable Club, Under Sound Music, UnReal

About a year ago, I started making use of Blogger's posting labels, and tagging pretty much every post on Gov't Names to denote what kind of post it is (usually either a flyer for a show, or a review of a mixtape or album with an mp3), or what artists are involved. And I thought it'd be interesting, at the end of the year, to figure out what tags I used the most in 2007. The first number in parantheses is how many posts used that tag in 2007, and the second number is for the entire history of Gov't Names:

1. flyer (361/704)
2. mp3 (103/225)
3. 5 Seasons (102/202)
4. mixtape/album review (80/161)
5. Baltimore club music (76/144)
6. Sonny Brown (60/115)
7. Turntable Club (53/63)
8. Hip Hop 101 (48/84)
9. Bossman (42/110)
10. Ogun (40/81)
11. Sonar (39/64)
12./13. (tie) Comp (38/83) / DJ Booman (38/50)
14./15. (tie) Mullyman (36/92) / Baltimore City Paper (36/86)
16. Skarr Akbar (35/81)
17. Team Fifty (34/76)
18. magazines/newspapers (29/78)
19. Jade Fox (27/29)
20. B.O.M.B. (24/27)
21./22./23. (tie) Say Wut (23/27) / UnReal (23/44) / Ray Lugar (23/34)
24./25. (tie) Blaq Starr (21/40) / Tim Trees (21/45)

That includes 11 rappers, 3 Baltimore club producers, and 3 venues, among other things. Obviously I post about whatever and whoever I want, and I pay closer attention to some artists than others, and don't have tags for many artists I don't post about as often. But I only really post when they're something noteworthy, and each of those numbers represents a time that that artist played a show, or was on a mixtape, or appeared in the press or something. And Sonny Brown is the highest artist on the list mainly because of how many shows he hosted and organized, although hopefully this year he'll have more music to post about. So if you really want to know who grinded hardest in 2007, I'd say this list gives you a pretty good idea of that. And if you feel like I missed you or somebody by not posting about them enough, obviously you just need to make sure I get all your flyers and mixtapes in 2008. Happy new year.

Labels: B.O.M.B., Blaq Starr, Bossman, Comp, DJ Booman, Jade Fox, lists, Mullyman, NSW (Say What), Ogun, Ray Lugar, Skarr Akbar, Sonny Brown, Team Fifty, Tim Trees, UnReal

D.O.G. - The Feeling - Bring It Back (Clinton Sparks/Invisible Set Entertainment)

It's been over a year since D.O.G. signed with Universal Records, and for a while there was that depressing lull that tends to happen after cats sign with a major, where you don't really hear anything out of their camp for a while and you wonder if anything's really gonna happen. But slowly he's been making noise again with a new official website and this new mixtape in the last few months. And his MySpace page says he's got a new project dropping December 21st called G-Pack Music, I think that's a group with his brother, Jon Boe, so he's definitely still grinding. There's a lot of dope guest appearances on this tape, including UnReal, J-Funk, Nik Stylz, Roxi from G.E.M. and ShellBe R.A.W. Plus there's a couple old bonus cuts, the "Ryda Gyrl" remix with Yung Joc and Blaq Starr, and Skarr Akbar's "I'm So Fly" remix with Bossman and Barnes and Heavy Gold.

D.O.G. f/ Huli Shallone and Los - "Get Money" (mp3)
This is really one of the dopest Baltimore posse cuts I've heard all year that wasn't a remix of someone's solo song, 3 dudes who are each individually well known in the city but represent their own seperate movements, dope beat and hook sampled from "Throw Some D's." They all sound good on this beat but Los's verse really kills it. Supposedly Los just dropped a new mixtape of his own over Thanksgiving, I still need to get a copy of that somehow.

Labels: Barnes, Blaq Starr, Bossman, D.O.G., G.E.M./Tha Plague, Heavy Gold, Huli Shallone, Los, mixtape/album review, mp3, ShellBe RAW, Skarr Akbar, UnReal

This month on http://noise.citypaper.com, I interviewed DJ Mic Marvelous for my Baltimore club column. And earlier this month, I reviewed a whole mess of local hip hop shows: Tonio, Shadina, TestMe, Skarr Akbar and Jade Fox @ the Latin Palace, the first night of the "Show Me What You Got" MC competition @ Sonar (whose winner, Only, is opening for Redman at Sonar tomorrow), the Elements Party Street Level Podcast release party @ Turntable Club w/ E Major, Soulstice, Bishop, Ogun, Unstoppable Nuklehidz, Jade Fox (again), A6 and Sonny Redds, the Orange & Black Tour @ Fletcher's w/ Bossman, Skarr Akbar (again), Heavy Gold, TestMe (again), Caddy Da Don, Pikesvillain, Mind, ESQ Locution, Unstoppable Nuklehidz (again) and Jade Fox (again and again) @ the Local Highrise, and the Bmore Vibe magazine/mixtape release party @ 5 Seasons with Rogue, Amotion, UnReal, Tha Profitt, B.O.M.B., Ms. Stress, and others.

Labels: 5 Seasons, B.O.M.B., Baltimore City Paper, Baltimore club, Bossman, Heavy Gold, Jade Fox, Ms. Stress, Noise, Ogun, Skarr Akbar, Sonar, Turntable Club, UnReal

So the folks at Hip Hop 101 decided to start this thing called the Blammy Awards for the Baltimore hip hop community, and they're letting the public decides who should win. I wish them all the best in getting a great turnout, I have pretty mixed feelings about the polls I've tried to do on this site in the past and haven't really decided if I want to do one at all this year. But the nominees and all the information on voting and deadlines from Sonny Brown are listed below. I bolded the names of the people I'm voting for, just to let you know what I think and who I endorse if you're having trouble deciding (don't be mad at me for any of my opinions, I'm just being honest!), but obviously I'm biased about the "best media award," where Government Names is a nominee. Email your ballots to CASTITNOW@gmail.com

DECEMBER 3rd HIPHOP 101 BLAMMY AWARDS

THESE ARE THE NOMINEES.. VOTE ONE TIME FOR EACH CATAGORY. THE POLLS WILL BE THRU EMAIL, ACTUAL POLLS THAT ARE BEING WORKED ON NOW THAT WILL BE PLACED ON MY PAGE AS WELL AS SHAKA PITTS PAGE. I WILL ALSO HAVE SOMETHING SET UP AT HIPHOP 101 EVERY WEEK . VOTING DEADLINE ENDS NOVEMBER 30TH.. THE BLAMMY NOMINATIONS ARE AS FOLLOWS:

BEST EMCEE MALE
SKARR AKBAR
CADDY THE DON
BACKLAND
OGUN
VISION

BEST EMCEE FEMALE
MS STRESS
NIK STYLES
CREAM
TUFFLON DONNA
SYMANTEX

BEST GROUP
G.E.M.
1ST FAMILY
RAW DOC
KARTEL
DIRT PLATOON
TRIUMPHANT MUSIC GROUP

BEST RNB MALE
CHE RAY
MYKEE
BRANDON

BEST RNB FEMALE
TYREIKA
KIA CALLAWAY
KIESHA STARR
LYNEE MICHELLE

BEST MIXTAPE
BACKLAND-THIS IS ME
OGUN-BMORE HERO
CADDY DA DON- 2.5
VISION- DONT GET IT MIXED UP
UNREAL - THE FUCK ELSE YOU WANT FOR FREE
COMP-THE MAN WITH THE HAND

ROOKIE OF THE YEAR
JBROWN
CADDY THE DON
KG
TY-GUDDA
YOUNG SAC
ONLY
TRIGGA

BEST MIXTAPE DJ
DJ BOOMAN
DJ JABRIL
DJ BIG REL
DNA
DJ ME'AZE MILLIONI

BEST LIVE SHOW
COMP
KG
CADDY THE DON
OGUN
DIRT PLATOON

BEST BEATMAN
AKIRA
D-BANKS
JFUNK
SPEILBERG
EWATTS
GMAJOR
REINA WILLIAMS
KANG KONG

SPIT FIRE AWARD
SAVAGE
TRIGGA
VERB
MANIAC DRE
MS STRESS

NEXT 2 BLOW AWARD
MULLYMAN
BOSSMAN
TIM TREES
HULI SHALLONE
D.O.G.
B.O.M.B
SKARR AKBAR

BEST MEDIA AWARD
STRICTLY HIPHOP 88.9
MUSIC MONTHLY
GOVERNMENT NAMES
REALTALK WITH SPITTS MCMAN
BMOREVIBE
DEEPFLOW TV/RADIO
STREETZ MAGAZINE
BMOREHH.COM / J5
MALDOTCOM

HIPHOP 101 AWARD-SQUIRRAL WYDE

Labels: B.O.M.B., Backland, Bosslady, Bossman, Comp, D.O.G., DJ Booman, DNA, G.E.M./Tha Plague, Hip Hop 101, Huli Shallone, Kartel, Ms. Stress, Mullyman, Ogun, Skarr Akbar, Sonny Brown, Tim Trees, UnReal

Labels: 5 Seasons, B.O.M.B., Bosslady, D.O.G., flyer, magazines/newspapers, Ms. Stress, UnReal

Architects Recording Studio presents ARS Re-Loaded (DJ Radio/A.R.S. Entertainment)

It's been over a year since the last installment of the old ARS mixtape series with DJ Radio, Street Radio, but it looks like they're rebooting with a whole new series to go along with their new building that Architects moved into earlier this year. Ogun's now on their team on the behind the scenes side, as well as being an artist on their roster, which is a good look, and he's got a new song here along with that "I Get Money" remix. There really haven't been a lot of various artist mixtapes in Baltimore rap this year, and it's good to get a really high quality one here, mostly new music by D.O.G., Mr. Wilson, A-Ma-Zon (a kinda dope song with Sean Kingston), Dollars, Nik Stylz, Unreal, and Profound, who's got a new mixtape dropping soon.

Caddy Da Don f/ Tim Trees, Huli Shallone, Los, Skarr Akbar and Bossman - "Whole City Behind Me (Remix)" (mp3)
2007 is pretty much the year of the all-star posse cut here in Baltimore hip hop, and I love it, I hope it continues through 2008 and beyond. There's really no reason everyone in the scene that matters shouldn't be on a track with each other. Caddy Da Don's been on a few of these already, so it's only right that he's got one of his own, now, a remix of his single "Whole City Behind Me." I dig that it runs through all 6 verses in only 3 minutes, too, no messing around or dragging it out. Caddy Da Don has another track on this mixtape, where he actually does a song to the "Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star" beat that B-Banks played at the Beatman Battle II a few weeks ago, which is kinda hilarious to me, but he makes it work.

Labels: Architects, Bossman, D.O.G., Heavy Gold, Huli Shallone, Los, mixtape/album review, mp3, Ogun, Skarr Akbar, Tim Trees, UnReal, XO