Shredding the Balloon - Hilltop Hoods

So the Hilltop Hoods released their newest album Drinking From The Sun this week and as expected I’m in love with it. Enjoy this track which is quickly becoming my favourite off the album.

Tunguska - Prime

Following in the tracks of the burgeoning Aussie Hip Hop scene Prime lays down a catchy track that is hard not to listen to over and over again. Check out his triple j page for some more of his songs.

Download / triple j

Starin’ Through My Rear View - 2pac

I miss how rap/hiphop used to be actually about something. 

The world, the world is behind us
Once a motherfucker get an understanding on the game
and what the levels and the rules of the game is
Then the world ain’t no trick no more
The world is a game to be played
So now we lookin at the world, from like, behind us
Niggaz know what we gotta do, just gotta put our mind to it and do it

Today, my people, is a grand day. Today I give you the newest single by who are most likely my favourite still active band. The first track released off of the thier upcoming February release Drinking From The Sun the Hilltop Hoods have picked up right where State of the Art left off and the results are amazing.

Amazing instrumentation, slick rhymes and backing vocals by friend Sia give their track ‘I Love It’ an instant likability. Between these guys and Childish Gambino it’s hard to find two better artists that better represent the changes that are needed in hip hop music. Enjoy!

An excellent ending to an excellent album. The rest of the hip hop world should take notice that anything done genuinely is 10 times better than all the rest of the stuff that seems to proliferate through the radio and at the club. If you have the chance check out Childish Gambino’s album Camp as it is most definitely worth a listen.

Outro

” This is on a bus back from camp. Im thirteen and so are you. Before I left for camp I imagined it would be me and three or four other dudes I hadnt met yet running around all summer getting into trouble. It turned out it would be me and just one girl. Thats you. And were still at camp as long as were on the bus and not at the pickup point where our parents would be waiting for us. Were still wearing our orange camp t-shirts. We still smell like pineneedles. I like you and you like me and I more-than-like you but I dont know if you do or dont more-than-like me. Youve never said so I havent been saying anything all summer content to enjoy the small miracle of a girl choosing to talk to me and choosing to do so again the next day and so on. A girl whos smart and funny and who if I say something dumb for a laugh is willing to say something two or three times as dumb to make me laugh but who also gets weird and wise sometimes in a way I could never be. A girl who reads books that no ones assigned to her whose curly brown hair has a line running through it from where she put a tie to hold it up while it was still wet

Back in the real world we dont go to the same school and unless one of our families moves to a dramatically different neighborhood we wont go to the same high school. So this is kind of it for us. Unless I say something. And it might especially be it for us if I actually do say something. The suns gone down and the bus is quiet. A lot of kids are asleep. Were talking in whispers about a tree we saw at a rest stop that looks like a kid we know. And then Im like oeCan I tell you something? And all of a sudden Im telling you. And I keep telling you and it all comes out of me and it keeps coming and your face is there and gone and there and gone as we pass underneath the orange lamps that line the sides of the highway. And theres no expression on it. And I think just after a point Im just talking to lengthen the time where we live in a world where you havent said oeyes or oeno yet. And regrettably I end up using the word oedestiny. I dont remember in what context. Doesnt matter. Before long Im out of stuff to say and you smile and say oeokay. I dont know exactly what you mean by it but it seems vaguely positive and I would leave in order not to spoil the moment but theres nowhere to go because were are on a bus. So I pretend like Im asleep and before long I really am I wake up the bus isnt moving anymore.

The domed lights that line the center aisle are all on. I turn and youre not there. Then again a lot of kids arent in their seats anymore. Were parked at the pick-up point which is in the parking lot of a Methodist church. The bus is half empty. You might be in your dads car by now your bags and things piled high in the trunk. The girls in the back of the bus are shrieking and laughing and taking their sweet time disembarking as I swing my legs out into the aisle to get up off the bus just as one of them reaches my row. It used to be our row on our way off. Its Michelle a girl who got suspended from third grade for a week after throwing rocks at my head. Adolescence is doing her a ton of favors body-wise. She stops and looks down at me. And her head is blasted from behind by the dome light so I cant really see her face but I can see her smile. And she says one word: oedestiny. Then her and the girls clogging the aisles behind her all laugh and then she turns and leads them off the bus. I didnt know you were friends with them.

I find my dad in the parking lot. He drives me back to our house and camp is over. So is summer even though theres two weeks until school starts. This isnt a story about how girls are evil or how love is bad this is a story about how I learned something and Im not saying this thing is true or not Im just saying its what I learned. I told you something. It was just for you and you told everybody. So I learned cut out the middle man make it all for everybody always. Everybody cant turn around and tell everybody everybody already knows I told them. But this means there isnt a place in my life for you or someone like you. Is it sad? Sure. But its a sadness I chose. I wish I could say this was a story about how I got on the bus a boy and got off a man more cynical hardened and mature and shit. But thats not true. The truth is I got on the bus a boy. And I never got off the bus. I still havent. “

Great track from Australian rapper Seven. Reminds me of Atmosphere and Classified.

Lauryn Hill lends her powerful vocals to the Frankie Valli classic, Can’t Take My Eyes Off Of You.