Pete Rock & CL Smooth and Leaders Of The New School on Kiss FM (1992)

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Not one of my own tapes but I found it buried deep in the depths of Soundcloud and thought it deserved to be bought back to life, and this blog is the perfect home for such a thing.
LONS alongside Pete Rock and CL perform on Richie Rich's Rap Academy on London's Kiss FM back in May '92. If you want a good example of how record labels handled hip hop in the UK back then, Elektra had both groups performing at different venues in town on the same night. Top work there lads.

As you would expect from anything involving a young Busta Rhymes, this a lively affair with them hyping each other up and ad libbing all over the place. Classic material.

Radio 1 Rap Show 22.08.97 with Jay Z & Busta Rhymes

Jay, Dame Dash and Busta (accompanied by Spliff Star, Rampage and DJ Scratch) on this '97 show while they were all in town to perform on Westwood's stage at the Notting Hill Carnival.

Radio 1 Rap Show with Funkmaster Flex, Lil Kim and Busta Rhymes (2000)

The first thing to say about this show is that it starts with Christina Aguilera dissing Eminem over The Real Slim Shady instrumental (a song which was possibly the start of Em making really bad records). If she could rap on beat it might've been bearable but she can't so it just sounds terrible, however I think we can all agree that in 2017 a new Christina song is likely to bang harder than anything Eminem can create at this point. Seeing all these high profile rap DJs, journalists and "influencers" feel the need to have an opinion on the Eminem album and acting like it's a surprise that it's really fucking awful is just baffling to me. 

Anyway, once that's done Westwood hands over to Flex who has Lil Kim in the studio. That's followed by Busta Rhymes in part 2, who's heavily plugging the release of Anarchy. They're really pushing the singles Get Out and Fire to the extent that if you ever needed evidence of payola this wouldn't be the worst place to start, although if I recall these songs never really blew up on the same scale as Busta's other lead singles. His run of club bangers from '96 to 2006 was equalled only by Jay Z, but there was a bit of a dip on this project. Fire ain't bad but didn't really catch on and Get Out sounds a bit too Hard Knock Life-ish. The real gem on the album is 'The Heist' with Ghostface, Raekwon and Roc Marciano over a Large Pro beat. One that the backpackers probably missed when it dropped and are now being charged big bucks for the German promo 12" , probably due to the J Dilla produced A-side.

Weirdly, this show also contains Flex cutting up a bunch of 80s classics, which is the same mix that was previously broadcast a few years prior (like, '96 or something). I know this because I posted it before.

Westwood live from Sylvia's in Harlem (2003)

A ridiculous line up of guests on this show. You can find the first 90 minutes with Ja Rule and Sean Paul here, but the second half  is where it's at with Timbaland, Busta Rhymes, Noreaga, Kardinal Offishall, Freeway and TOK all passing through.

And here's the Freeway freestyle over In Da Club

NB: at the start Westwood says Busta will be on the following night's show, but this was a Saturday (there was no show on a Sunday) so I'm guessing this wasn't actually broadcast live and they forgot to cut that out of the edit.

Don't Sleep #13 Lil Cease ft Busta Rhymes, G Dep & Mr Bristal 'More Dangerous' (1999)

You have to wonder how Lil Cease must’ve felt when he pitched up to the annual Weed Carrier Convention in 1999. He’s on a table with Memphis Bleek, Streetlife and Cuban Link. All of them were granted some time to shine on their respective bosses albums. Cease had never got on Life After Death, despite doing a sterling job of holding BIG's weed and making sure there was plenty of paprika Pringles on the tour bus. All Bleek had to do was memorise a verse and he not only got on Reasonable Doubt but ended up doing the fucking intro to Volume 2 over one of Premier’s best beats. Life was not fair. Still, now that he’d finally had the green light for his own album everything would be lovely. The budget was huge because it was nearly impossible for a rap album not to go gold, and he’d got a bunch of beats that Mase had turned down, which not only saved him a bit of money but also dispensed with the issue of finding his own sound. Redman, Jay Z and Puffy had all recorded verses for it so all he needed was a dope cover and he was good to go.

As it turned out, the hilariously bad cover was not the only problem with Cease’s album but it probably didn’t help matters. I purchased it recently - not for any significant amount of money obviously – on the strength of the fact that I really liked ‘More Dangerous’ and thought that maybe there’d be a few other similar tracks on there worth having. There was not.

Cease isn’t a great rapper. Not that that’s ever got in the way of success but he obviously saw Mase’s success as his blueprint and plays up the ladies man angle while throwing in a few tougher tunes for the fellas. The thing was we already had Mase. As a result, the highlights on the album tend to be the guest spots. Future Sport would’ve made a great solo track for Redman. 4 My Niggaz is worth a listen just for the sake of hearing a Jay Z verse from the late 90s that hasn’t been played to death. That’s pretty much it. The rest of the songs probably wouldn’t bother you too much on their own in the context of say, a DJ Clue tape, but digesting the whole thing in one go is a big ask.

As a result it definitely qualifies for a ‘weak albums with 1 or 2 good songs’ list. Nashiem Myrick’s piano led beat for More Dangerous wouldn’t have sounded out of place on The War Report and as it sounds different to pretty much everything else on ‘The Wonderful World..’ it seems strange that it’s the opening track. Busta Rhymes is restricted to chorus duties, reciting a line from Biggie’s ‘Warning’ and Mr Bristal and G Dep put in a decent shift with the verses. So Dont' Sleep.

Busta Rhymes, Common & Rampage Kiss FM freestyle (1997)

I've had a few people come through donations for the site recently. First up is this one from boom-bap champion Milkcrate Kid. A ten minute Busta Rhymes, Common & Rampage freestyle on Max & Dave's Kiss FM show from 1997



Always thought Rampage was pretty dope. Wild For The Night was a banger. Like the rest of the Flipmode he never really managed to escape Busta's shadow though.

*BONUS* - also courtesy of MCK, Chuck D & Hyenas From The Desert on Max & Dave's show from 1996 GO HERE

If you'e got any old tapes stashed away that you think will be of interest get in touch.

The Show

For those of you who need to be told, these are old flyers - not adverts for upcoming events! Im not sure if the Busta flyer is for the show that ended in The Forum getting torn up, or for the comeback show (when he actually performed). I have a feeling that the Raekwon show might've been cancelled at the last minute. I'm still a bit gutted I was too young to reach Flava Of The Month...

Funkmaster Flex 'Big Truck Series Volume 1' freestyles (2001)

This 12" a is collection of some of the highlights of Flex's 'Big Truck Series' mixtape. It kicks off with Nas 'Stillmatic' (the dis track over the 'Paid In Full' beat) and is followed by 2 short freestyles by Fabolous and Kurupt. The flipside features Redman and some weed carriers, Busta and Rah Digga, a Foxy Brown freestyle recorded live on Hot 97 and Benzino wraps things up.

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I've got the 12" of the Nas track if anyone is need of a good quality/no DJ version.

Flava In Ya Ear remix (DJ Step One blend)

I haven't posted a blend for a while so here's something I just cooked up: the acapella of the 'Flava In Ya Ear' remix over the instrumental of Outkast's 'Southernplayalistic...'

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"Its ridiculous, nobody bust one shot for BIG..."

I try and avoid following the pattern of most other Hip Hop blogs but as the Biggie and Craig Mack freestyle on Westwood was one of the first posts that got this site some attention, along with the fact I actually remembered it was March 9th today, I thought I'd drop a couple of B.I.G related things for you.
Pretty much everything Mr Wallace recorded has already been heard already (although the holy grail seems to his collabo with Onyx and Naughty By Nature - anyone holding that apart from Puffy?) so instead I'm gonna break tradition and come with something a bit more recent.

This is a mammoth posse cut by Busta Rhymes, Maino, Red Cafe, MOP, Uncle Murda, Styles, Sheek & Lil Cease called 'March 9th'. Produced by the UK's Dready, this is probably the most fitting tribute to Biggie. It sounds like it hasn't been mastered/mixed down properly but its still great anyway - nice and rowdy and a million miles away from 'I'll Be Missing You'. Not sure if this ever came out 'officially' but if anyone has a better copy then hook me up.


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As a bonus here's the Green Lantern remix of 'Letter To BIG' by Jadakiss


Artwork by 563 (again!)

If you want an interesting read on the story behind the whole Biggie/2Pac thing, realniggatumblr got something for you.

Shout out to Mike Nice.