1) Wale Ambition (Warner Bros.)

2) Black Milk & Danny Brown Black and Brown (Fat Beats)

3) Lateef The Truthspeaker Firewire (Quannum)

4) People Under The Stairs Highlighter (Piecelock 70)

5) Mac Miller Blue Slide Park (Ingrooves)

Thanks to my man E-Lit at Amoeba Berkeley for taking time out of his day in video above to run down all the new and recent hip-hop releases for this week's Hip-Hop Rap Up which includes longtime Oakland emcee & Solesides/Quannum star Lateef The Truthspeaker's first solo outing: the star-studded Firewire on Quannum which includes such Bay Area hip-hop greats (and longtime collaborators) as DJ Shadow, Dan The Automator, Lyrics Born (his partner in Latryx), The Grouch, Del the Funky Homosapien, Headnodic, and Chief Xcel (who handles production). The new Lateef the Truthspeaker album track "Oakland" that features Del The Funky Homosapien & The Grouch and appears below in audio play mode, I predict will soon become the new Oakland anthem.

  Amoeba Music Berkeley Hip-Hop Top Five: 10:17:08

1) Lil Wayne Tha Carter III (Cash Money/Universal)
2) Micheal Franti & Spearhead All Rebel Rockers (Anti)
3) Murs Murs for President (Warner)
4) People Under The Stairs Fun DMC (Gold Dust Media)
5) Jean Grae & 9th Wonder Jeanius (Blacksmith)

Joe the Plumber vs. Joe the Butcher? All this recent talk of Joe the Plumber, including on David Letterman's great John "I screwed up" McCain interview last night, which was far more direct and revealing than the debate the previous night, got me thinking of another Joe-- late 80's/early 90's Philly hip-hop producer/remixer Joe "the Butcher" Nicolo. Joe produced such politically charged records as The Goats' "Typical American"/"Burn The Flag" record and the 1991 single/album track "Read My Lips" under the pseudonym A Thousand Points of Light, which heavily sampled and mocked then-president George H. Bush.

Joe the Butcher also produced and released the all original breaks album Butcher Beats And Breaks in 1988 on Atlantic Records (dig for it in the Amoeba crates where it shows up from time to time). Philly born producer/record executive Joe the Butcher became staff producer at Columbia Records in the 80's, doing work with the likes of the Rolling Stones and Billy Joel. But he made his real mark in hip-hop when he created the Columbia distributed Ruffhouse imprint, whose impressive roster included Cypress Hill, The Fugees, Kriss Kross, and the aforementioned (and totally slept on) hometown crew The Goats.

                         

                                               Jamoeblog Top Ten 10:15:08

1) Paris "Don't Stop The Movement" (Guerrilla Funk)

2) The Mighty Underdogs "UFC remix (cuts by DJ Shadow)" (Definitive Jux)

3) Madlib "Gamble On Ya Boy (feat. Defari)" (Rapster/BBE)

4) People Under The Stairs "Up Yo Spine (Live at the Fishbucket pt. 3)" (Gold Dust)

5) Mike Relm "Everytime (feat. Del & Adrian Hartley)" (Radio Fried Records)



6) Jake One "Trap Door (feat. MF Doom)" (Rhymesayers)

7) Hu$tle Simmons "Over and Out (feat Buff 1 & DJ Cru Cut)" (Break Bread/Traffic)

8) Murs "The Science" (Warner)

9) Mulatto Patriot "Audio Terrorist (feat. Ras Kass, Casual, & Proper Jones)" (MP Productions)

                                        Ameoba Music Berkeley  Hip-Hop Top Five  09:19:08

1)  Michael Franti & Spearhead All Rebel Rockers   
     (Amer-I Can/Unity One/Anti)

2)  Diplo Top Ranking Santogold (Mad Decent)

3)  The Game LAX (Geffen/Interscope)

4) Young Jeezy The Recession (Def Jam)

5)  eLZhi The Preface (Fat Beats)

The number one selling album at the Berkeley store this week is from the Bay Area's very own veteran political musician Michael Franti and his group Spearhead. Recorded in Kingston, Jamaica and produced by Sly and Robbie, this brand new full length titled All Rebel Rockers is the anticipated follow-up to the acclaimed Yell Fire!, released two years ago on Anti. This new album may not possess that same sense of urgency as its predecessor and hence, takes a little longer to get into, but All Rebel Rockers is still a very good album. (Yell Fire! is a hard one to top because it was so powerful a release.) Naturally, with Sly & Robbie at the controls, it has more of a reggae feel than the other genres it incorporates (mainly hip-hop and soul). 

Amoeba Music San Francisco
Hip-Hop Top Five: August 01, 2008

1) NaS Untitled (Def Jam)

2) Jean Grae + 9th Wonder Jeanius
     (Blacksmith)

3) People Under The Stairs The OM Years 
     (OM hip-hop)

4) Husalah & B-Luv Tonka Boyz
    (SMC Records/City Hall)

5) RZA as Bobby Digital Digi Snacks
    (KOCH)

A shout-out to Luis in the hip-hop department at the San Francisco Amoeba Music for this week's Top Five chart, which includes the new Bay Area indie rap release from the rhyme duo Husalah & B-Luv, Tonka Boyz, that features guest spots from such local faves as PSD, Yukmouth, The Jacka, and Dubee. Also charting high this week is the double CD retrospective by People Under The Stairs (PUTS) from OM hip-hop. Disc one is "The OM Years" and includes such crowd pleasers as "San Francisco Knights," "The Cat," and "Jappy Jap," while disc two (my personal fave, since it has some stuff I had not heard before) is titled "B-sides & Rarities."  

Luis admits that he is not really feeling the new RZA as Bobby Digital (Digi Snacks) and I have to fully agree with him.This, the artist's fourth solo record, not only fails to match any of his Wu Tang output, but also falls short of his own previous solo work. However, as is often the case with overall mediocre albums, there are a few great songs to be found on the 15 track Digi Snacks, including "Drama" featuring Monk and Thea and "You Can't Stop Us Now" (feat. fellow Wu warrior Inspectah Deck).