Amoeba Music Hollywood Hip-Hop Top Five 10:30:08


1) T.I Paper Trail (Grand Hustle/Atlantic)

2) Prodigy, Big Twins & Un Pacino Product of the 80s (Dirt Class Records)

3) MF Doom Operation Doomsday
(Traffic Entertainment)

4) Foreign Exchange Leave It All Behind (Hard Boiled)

5) Lil Rob 1218 Part II (Upstairs Records)

Thanks to Ray at Amoeba Hollywood for this week's hip-hop chart with T.I.'s sixth and latest album Paper Trail still going strong, holding down the number one slot a month after its release by the ever- popular Atlanta rapper. The number two hip-hop album seller at the SoCal Amoeba this week is Prodigy of Mobb Deep fame, who teams up with BIg Twins (aka Twin Gambino) and Un Pacino for the New York City themed Product of the 80's album on Brooklyn's Dirt Class Records. The album captures a bygone (rougher) era in a place and time each of these NYC artists, who were born in the seventies, witnessed first hand growing up. On this new collaborative album the rappers are backed by production from the likes of Jake One, Sid Roams, and Benny Needles. The Traffic Entertainment reissue of MF Doom's Operation Doomsday is selling well at all of the Amoeba stores, including Hollywood, where it is number three this week.

Even though it was on the opposite coast and about 3000 miles from the nearest Amoeba store, there were numerous Amoeba logo sightings (on bags and t-shirts mostly) over the weekend at the big WFMU Record Fair at Manhattan's Metropolitan Pavilion on West 18th Street.

Understandably the giant annual music collectors convention, which boasts 10,000 square feet of vinyl (lots of rarities), CDs, DVDs, and magazines & artworks, etc., draws many of the same folks that Amoeba Music attracts-- diehard music fanatics. "Let's face it, music collecting is an addiction," laughed DJ Babu, who visited the fair on the opening day, Friday, when he also did a live set on WFMU from the Chelsea location.

LA native Babu, who coined the term turntablist and who is known for both his solo DJ/production work (his Super Duck Breaks on Stones Throw is a classic) and his membership in Dilated Peoples, Beat Junkies, & Likwit Junkies, said that over the years that he has spent way more time and money at the Hollywood Amoeba than he cares to even think about. Today (Oct 28) is the release date of Babu's latest album, Duck Season Vol. 3 on Nature Sounds. Look for it at Amoeba.

And if you think Babu traveled far, how about record collector Nakajima who flew over all the way from Japan for four days specifically to shop at the all weekend record fair!? But then this record fanatic has also made previous trips to the US from Japan specifically to shop at the Hollywood Amoeba (where he got the Amoeba t-shirt he wore over the weekend as in picture below right). New Yorker Andres (pictured above left proudly clutching his Amoeba record bag), who lives just a few blocks from the Manhattan record fair location, said that he got his bag on "one of several visits" to the Hollywood Amoeba store. "I love Amoeba and every time I go to LA I go to Amoeba," he smiled.