From 6/4/2025
What up Hip Hop,
It’s been a minute. Hope you and your loved ones are staying safe and enjoying the weather. Where I’m at in New England it’s been nice all week but rainy on the weekends for the past few. I find myself staring out the window on those days, muttering “we needed this” and feeling grateful my plants are getting nourished. I’ve turned into that dude and I’m not that mad at it, haha.
Anyway, some things I wanted to inform you all of:
Thursday June 5 Blak Madeen will be performing at the Middle East in Cambridge, MA with Immortal Tech, REKS and more. Gonna be a dope ass show and I will def be in the building for that. If you’re in the area, you should def come on out to support.
Me and the boys have been working hard on a bunch of new joints, we were in the studio the past few weeks recording some fresh bangers and mixing/mastering a few others.
Me and Al have a new joint dropping soon, a possible SpitSlam collab and I’m hoping it all works out but either way we have a new one dropping soon. The track also features some dope ass cuts from the man and frequent collaborator DJ DS (shout out to Dave!).
I also produced a new joint for Blak Madeen and it is harder than steel. Waiting to approve the final mix (Shout to Arc at The Bridge) but can’t wait for everyone to hear it.
It’s been tough to feel like trying to sell or promote anything when the daily news has been crazy and everyone you know is feeling strapped. So I wanted to make an effort to use this newsletter to intentionally share info, in addition to whatever I have going on. Whether that is some cool sh!t I’m into, read about, etc. or info to take action on, I’m hoping this will be a bit more useful to some of you. Here goes:
First, the genocide in Palestine is still ongoing with fresh tragedies each week. Lotta talk about fake accounts on social media but one place that has a definite and documented charitable mission is the Palestine Children’s Relief Fund - www.pcrf.net.
Lotta ICE action going on in and around my area. All persons in the United States have constitutional protections, including the right to remain silent when questioned or arrested by immigration officers, regardless of immigration status. Everyone should know their rights regarding encounters with ICE or those claiming to be. Some useful info here: https://immigrantjustice.org/
ICE/CBP etc officials cannot ‘legally’ (that word is doing a lot of work lately) arrest anyone without a court warrant signed by a judge, different from an ICE arrest warrant. There is some good info about that in the above link.
Get involved at the local level. Can not stress this enough. Please get involved in your town/district/whathaveyou because it is a simple but effective way to resist.
One tool that I have found particularly useful is LegiScan - https://legiscan.com. From the federal and all the way down to the state level, you can easily track bills and their progress through various committees and chambers. This is especially useful if you are trying to mobilize acton on any number of harmful bills that are being advanced across the nation. I don’t care where you are (in the US), chance sare theres some foul shit happening legislatively. A good way to stop a lot of bad legislation is to fight it while in committee, before it goes to the house or senate for a vote. LegiScan will tell you exactly who to contact in order to voice your opinion as a constituent.
New book out recently from Evan Auerbach and Dan Isenberg -
Do Remember!: The Golden Era of NYC Hip-Hop Mixtapes. This looks like a dope ass read and a must for anyone around at that time. Being from the ‘burbs I was lucky to hear a fraction of these so I look forward to learning and hearing more. DJ Eclipse was talking about it a couple weeks ago on Rap is Outta Control - peep that episode here:
https://www.mixcloud.com/
As for the book, I won’t link to Amazon but if that interests you check it out at your local bookstore or ask your library to stock it. Respond back with links of your own if you know of any particularly good mixtapes that have been preserved.
Speaking of DJ’s - We all know there are many ’types’ of DJs in this culture, but I am speaking now of those in the specific role of presenting new music for the culture. DJs like Chris Green, DJ Glibstylez, DJ Ronsha & G-Zon, Professor Mike Jordan, DJ Creationblue, Craig Mosher, there are many more that have weekly shows and put in hours of work just to get new music out there for the masses. I’m gonna list all their mixcloud links below but reply back with some of your faves. They provide most of my musical diet as of late and keep this culture alive. Shout out to the DJs.
https://www.mixcloud.com/
https://www.mixcloud.com/
https://www.mixcloud.com/
https://www.mixcloud.com/
https://www.mixcloud.com/
https://www.mixcloud.com/
https://www.mixcloud.com/
https://www.mixcloud.com/
That’s all for now,
I want to share more but this is getting a bit long as is.
Take care
Peace