We been listening to you hip hop fans that want to hear more of our music. The Exhibition Files is our chance to give you some of the music we been working on. First up is OkiZoo’s Chi town transplant PreCise.  This song is about a young lady named Colors and what the wrong choices can lead to. Produced by Big Lo.

Download: PreCise – Colors (prod. by Big Lo)

REWIND: Download – PreCise – Eisa meets Afro

OkiZoo’s Junglist and Hip Hop DJ, Selrahc decided to spread a little holiday cheer by recording himself doing a little scratch practice with his cell phone(very sideways). Be on the look out for Drum & Bass mixes from him and DJ John Glist (say it fast) before the end of the year.  Also a little message to you DJ’s who live at home with your mom and aren’t very good. He’s coming for you!!! Merry Christmas.

P.S. our DJ’s (Tek Steez, John Glist, Selrahc, Alf, Jam On) are awesome!

Large Professor, formally of the rap group Main Source and hip hop producer extrodinare, chats with the people at Amobea about digging, making records, and his Vinyl Gloves. Shouts out to the Left Coast and Amobea Music.

(If you don’t remember how the Extra P gets down, scroll down to that last Boomin’ System post and peep game)

You know it’s funky… cause you heard it from here see / A jam that you love that don’t get no airplay (c) LL Cool J

What’s good readership, hope everyone is having a great week. We at OkiZoo have been working nonstop to make the blog as dope as possible, even coming up w/ new blog segments. Every Monday we’re going to bring you The Boomin’ System a blog post dedicated to making sure you have some dope jams to bump in your iPod, Zune, Car, Stereo, Walkman, or whatever system you use lol. If you like what you see/hear then please leave us a comment and let us know that we’re on the right track.

With Thanksgiving right around the corner, I want to start off w/ giving some thanks to the readers of the blog for all of their support in spreading the word. We really appreciate the love you all have been sending our way, and now w/out any further delay…

OkiZoo Presents: The Boomin’ System

1. Buff 1 – The Shift (prod by 14KT)
The future is now, and Athletic Mic League members Buff1 & 14KT are leading the way. I featured 14KT on the blog before, I told ya’ll this dude was serious w/ the production. He continues to bring the heat as Buff1 goes bananas on the beat. Epic!

2. Royce Da 5’9″ – Something 2 Ride 2 (Feat. Phonte)
This is a little something to ride to, kick back and just catch a vibe to. Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock somewhere you should know that Street Hop is in stores now, and this is one of its standout tracks. No, Phonte isn’t rapping on this one. He is bringing you that trademark soulful sanging tho.

3. Slum Village – Dope Man
RIP J Dilla, RIP Baatin 2 of the illest. Slum Village is back on the scene, this is a promo leak for their brand new Album Villa Manifesto. For those of you that didn’t know Fantastic Vol 2 is being re-released in 2010 w/ several unreleased tracks & the original production how J Dilla wanted it to be. Check out
The Find Magazine for more info

4. A.R.M. – Heaven Only Knows (Feat. Brother Ali)
Heaven only knows the pain in my eyes. Rain and the snow, the stress, and hard times. Heaven Only Knows I Hustle For My Shine! A.R.M. stands for ‘African Rebel Movement’ and is comprised of Ghanaian emcees M.anifest & Krukid, as well as Seattle-born, Brooklyn-based producer Budo. This is my favorite track right now, it’s uplifting, soulful, honest, and just a dope ass track from some real Hip Hop heads. Enjoy!

5. Kenichiro Nishihara – Consider My Love (Feat. Pismo)
Some fresh Japanese Hip Hop from Kenichiro Nishihara. This song is featured on his album Humming Jazz, and I most definitely recommend you all check this cat out. As is common w/ Japanese Hip Hop the beat has a soulful, jazzy melody to it. Pismo is excellent behind the mic w/ his raw flow and clear delivery. I guarantee that you’ll be intoxicated by this song as soon as you hear the chorus. Kampai!

6. Muneshine – Bon Jour (Instrumental)
Canada’s Muneshine, focusing mostly on jazz, soul and funk influences, for his latest Instrumental album ‘A Walk In The Park’ gives you a sound reminiscent of BBE”s early “Beat Generation” series… Yo word life, I’m going to record something over this track. It’s just too good to leave alone.

7. J-Rocc – Secondhand Sureshots (Instrumental)
If you missed the post I made about Stonesthrow x Dublab’s documentary on beat making check it out below. This is J Rocc’s contribution to the documentary, you hear a snippet of it on the end of the trailer for the Secondhand Sureshots documentary. This is an amazing piece of music, very impressive.

8. Mayer Hawthorne – The iLLs
I dedicate this song to any of you reading this that had a bad day today. You know the ills of the world, they can get you down… but then we get BACK UP! I’ve been a fan of Mayer Hawthorne ever since I saw that heart shaped vinyl of his on youtube. He’s got that old school northern soul sound, w/ a little jazz, and a lot of funk. You can’t go wrong w/ this guy.

9. Diamond District – Make it Clear
The DMV trio (DC, Maryland, Virginia) of Oddisee, XO and YU have made one bangin boom bap album called “In the Ruff”. This jam is to make it clear that the vintage 90′s Golden Era sound is still alive. The drums on this one KNOCK thanks to Oddisee’s
stellar production.

10. Shad – I Don’t Like To
YO! I don’t really like to but um, I put the smack down like it’s rehab. Make sure that there’s no relapse for these cats. Ya’ll cowards couldn’t rap this dope w/ a zig zag, WORD! The Old Prince is in the house!!! Canadian emcee Shad puts his wit on display over this smooth but rough banger off his “The Old Prince” ablum. This song BANGS!!!

Happy Thanksgiving Readership!

EL3G

What’s good readership, it’s been a while since I put ya’ll up on some new artists so let’s start the week off right. Before we get into it though, I want to drop a little news on you.

The word on the net is that Mos Def, Jay Electronica, and Curren$y have teamed up to form the supergroup called Center Edge Territory. Apparently all three met at Dame Dash’s DD172 Studio during the recording of the BlackRoc project. I’m definitely looking forward to hearing new music from these three. Curren$y posted a new track produced by Mos Def on his twitter yesterday. The download link is below, enjoy!

Curren$y – Breakfast (In & Out) (prod. Mos Def)

Having said all that you already know the first artist up this week is none other than the hot spitta himself. As a teenager, he was signed to Master P’s No Limit Records until 2005, when he signed with Lil Wayne’s Young Money Entertainment, where he remained until late 2007. While still at Young Money, Curren$y created Fly Society with skateboarder Terry Kennedy, first as a clothing company, then expanding to release music with Amalgam Digital. I present to you…

Curren$y –> www.myspace.com/flyspitta

Check out Curren$y at Amalgam Digital

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This next artist isn’t really new, but you haven’t heard anything from him in quite some time. He hails from Brooklyn, and just like the OkiZoo Crew he’s famous for rocking the party and repping the Zoo. This emcee simultaneously brought a measure of humor and a touch of the absurd to one of hip hop’s greatest groups. Often noted for his unusual microphone technique, outrageously profane free-associative rhymes delivered in a distinctive half-rapped, half-sung style. He has a brand new track on the new Blackrok project, and being that Nov 13th marked the 5th anniversary of his death i think it’s only fitting that we honor him. I present to you…

Ol’ Dirty Bastard –> www.myspace.com/oldirtybastard

.

Click to Download Ol’ Dirty Bastard – Coochie ft Ludacric & The Black Keys

Rest In Peace to one of the craziest muthafucka’s in hip hop history. ODB had the illest personality of all time, do yourself a favor and listen to a Dirt Dog record today… because WU-TANG is for the children (c) ODB

NIXONS

EL3G

That’s right readership, what we’re gonna do right here is go back… Way back into time, lol. Let’s wax nostalgic for a minute. A few days ago I was going thru the Blog Roll checking on a few of OkiZoo’s favorite sites when I stumbled upon an interesting video by Hip Hop Legend J-Zone.

Real G’s Rock Tapes from richdirection on Vimeo.

Now I won’t go so far as to say that in 09′ I still rock a walkman, or even own one. However J-Zone really got me to thinking… I Fell In Love w/ Hip Hop Because of a Cassette Tape. It was the summer of 1990 and I was in the 4th or 5th grade living in North Carolina at the time. My parents and I took a road trip to Philly to visit family, and I remember while there it was decided that my cousin Renee would come back to NC to live w/ us. Renee was your classic 90′s Philly jawn, what LL Cool J referred to as an “Around the Way Girl”. I remember thinking back then how she looked like a member of Salt n Pepa’ to me, lol. It was on the trip back to NC that it happened.

I’ll always remember this, me and Renee were in the backseat of my Dad’s 1988 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme Classic, and she elbowed me in the ribs to wake me up. She whispered, “Yo, El check this out” as she handed me her walkman and headphones. I remember being kinda salty at first because I was sleep, but I let it slide. I put on the headphones and my ears were invaded by the tunes of Digital Underground’s classic hit “The Humpty Dance”. That was the first time I really payed attention to Hip Hop, and I was instantly hooked.

After seeing J-Zone’s video on tapes, my homey John Book, who has quite an extensive music blog over at This is Books Music took the time out to write out a few “cassette reflections” that also reminded me of how much I loved tapes back in the day. Below is a selection from John Book’s write-up, but you can check out the write-up for yourself here –> JohnBook’s Cassette Reflection It’s a really interesting read, w/ some history about Tommy Boy’s tapes and why they had that “fruity smell” back in the day. Real heads know what I’m talking about.

“I like what he (J-Zone) has to say about how he’s not retro, because he made those tapes, he lived through those tapes. At the end of the video, he goes up and says he has 8-track. Gotta love it… There was somewhat of a craft to make the perfect tape, to know how to develop sides.”

What were some of your experiences w/ cassette tapes like?  Drop a comment and let us know.

What’s good readership, this is your main man EL3G back again to put you mofo’s ON to some of that good good hip hop music that’s floating around out here. You know how OkiZoo does it, we bring you the best fresh and new music that mainstream media won’t play. Yeah that’s right… that Underground ish!

Speaking of underground, be sure to check out that new Home Brew post below as their EP is just too damn good to sleep on. Home Brew presents… Last Week EP

This week since I’m in a somewhat sentimental mood, I’m going to start off w/ one of my favorite DJ’s from my hometown. Philadelphia is a city known for birthing internationally known DJ’s such as Jazzy Jeff, Cash Money, ?uestlove, and King Britt. That’s right, the 215 is home to more than just Cheese Steaks, the Eagles and the World Champion Philadelphia Phillies (Repeat BABY!) my city is renowned for it’s many DJ’s and its funky soulful music. This weeks spotlight shines on a DJ that I had a chance to interview for The Rec Radio. This man has dedicated 25 years to jet setting all around the globe displaying his craft, digging and spinning everything from Hip Hop, Classics, Funk & Soul, House, Afrobeat, Breaks and all things funky he continuously strives to set himself ahead of the pack. Ladies and gentleman I present to you…

DJ Skeme Richards –> www.myspace.com/djskemerichards

Check out his blog Anything Goes w/ DJ Skeme Richards

Dissection Tutorial (Teaser) from Jerome White on Vimeo.

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Next up is my favorite new beatmaker. I found out about this producer on accident. I was looking for a song by another group, Boom Clap Bachelors and stumbled across a remix that he did for them. My mind was blown away by the futuristic boom bap, so much so that I played that song for the rest of the day on repeat. Word… lol, this beatmaker definitely has the ability to make you fall in love with a track. It’s only fitting then, that his latest project has been entitled ‘Love Is Real’.

His beats leave your speakers to travel through the universe and give black holes new heartbeats. They’re playing this on Venus, they eat this for breakfast on Neptune, they live by this on Saturn. The love hums in the stratosphere, vibrating right back to your ears. I present to you…

Afta-1 –> http://www.myspace.com/afta1

Check out his website www.Afta1.com

Alright family as always I have to leave you wanting more, be sure to check out those links and leave a comment and let me know if you feeling this weeks spotlight.

SideNote: Sat Oct 31st I’ll be brodcasting OkiZoo MhZ Rebellion Ep 7: Cannabis & Chamomile
at www.gtownradio.com 8-10pm EST be sure to tune in!

NIXONS

EL3G