DJ Clue - You Can't Impeach The President '99

This has been online before but I just ripped my own copy and thought I'd post it as a) it's the first Clue tape I bought and b) it's full of bangers. Of particular note is Hate Me Now as an exclusive, an early airing of Full Clip, Eminem's Role Model (not 97 Bonnie & Clyde as the cover states) and some treats off Ruff Ryders Vol 1. You also get a young Fabolous opening up proceedings and an up and coming Ludacris closing the tape with a brief freestyle over the Ha instrumental. This is also the tape that put me up on Cali Chronic and the Deja Vu remix. All in all it was £10 well spent.

DJ Clue - Triple Platinum (1997)

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Some great stuff on this Clue tape from '97: freestyles by The LOX, Cam'ron & Mase, McGruff & Big L, Black Rob and Prodigy & Big Noyd, plus the dirty version of the Firm Biz remix and a lot of Bad Boy and Jay Z related things. Full tracklist is here.

I came across this one whilst tidying up my hard drive . It wasn't one of my own rips so it hadn't made it's way onto the blog. I actually copped this from SOUL's now dormant site which was a great source of tapes for a long time but unfortunately most of the download links are now dead. Speaking of which, I've had a few requests recently to re-up some of the other Clue tapes I posted but haven't had time. The Mixcloud links are still good though so hopefully that'll do for now.

DJ Clue - Platinum Plus (1997)

No cover for this but you can get the tracklist here. The last 4 tracks are missing off my copy which makes me think it might've been a CD version dubbed to tape (a lesser spotted 110 minute tape no less). Notable tracks include the Mary J remix over Call Me D-Nice, which I hadn't heard before, the So So Def remix of Hey AZ, and what I think is an unreleased Cam'ron collab with Charli Baltimore and Lil Cease. My favourite Mariah Carey track is on there too.

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Got some good things on the way in the next few weeks and months. Have a good Christmas and New Year.

DJ Clue - Who Is Clue? (freestyle compilation)

First thing's first, I'm not sure this is the correct title for this mixtape, It was amongst the large batch of legit Clue and Juice tapes donated by Rich (thanks again!) but there's no artwork or labels. It just has 'Who Is Clue?' written on the inlay card. I'm pretty sure it's an unofficial tape - it's 60 minutes long for starters - that's essentially a 'Best Of Clue Freestyles' compilation. It includes the Sauce Money and Jay Z one over 'Benjamins' ("thought you was Chinese the way you duck Sauce"), Prodigy over You Ain't A Killer and McGruff and Big L on the You're A Customer beat. There's also Mase over Who Shot Ya and the classic Nas freestyle over Young Gifted & Black and Nobody Beats The Biz. Some of them I've posted on here in the past but it's always handy to have them all in one place.

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DJ Clue - ClueManatti (1997)

As promised, here's the full Clue tape that the Prodigy freestyle below came from. Alot of heat* on this one including AZ, Wu Tang, CNN, Sauce Money and that freestyle by DMX and The LOX that eventually became 'Get At Me Dog'

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*'I'll Be Missing You' not withstanding of course

Prodigy - You Ain't A Killer freestyle (1997)

"you're frail fam anything your team wanna do, you and your mans are shook part 1 and 2"

More 90s QB freestyle action. Prodigy was an absolute monster around 96/97. Here he does his thing over Big Pun's 'You Ain't A Killer' instrumental and throws a few shots at Keith Murray along the way.



Taken from DJ Clue's 'ClueManatti' tape. I'll post the full thing soon.

DJ Clue - Clue For President part 3 (1998)

Still got a few Clue tapes to post up so here's some classic '98 biz. This is one featuring the infamous Chain Gang freestyle by Black Rob & The LOX along with all sorts of other treats...

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DJ Clue - Cluemanatti part 2 (1997)

Some nice stuff on here, in particular the intro to side 2 which is some sort of special done for Steve Stoute's birthday by Nas, Mary J, Noreaga and Femme Fatale. There's also freestyles by Cam'ron & Cardin and Jay Z & Sauce Money aswell as joints by The LOX, Puffy, Foxy Brown, AZ, Mobb Deep and CNN.



Think the rip came out ok but there might be one or two parts where the sound jumps. Haven't played it back in full yet so if its unbearable let me know.

DJ Clue - Dedication 2 (1996)

Clue. Dedication part 2. Side A is a whole bunch of blends "for da ladies" whereas the flipside has all the new bangers...

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DJ Clue - Winter part 1 (1995)

Clue's 'Winter part 1' tape from 1995, because it's cold outside. Lots of blends on this one...

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DJ Clue - Winter part 1 (1995) by Djstepone on Mixcloud

DJ Clue - Clue For President (1998)

Another banger from Clue. This is the tape with The Lox freestyle over 'You Know My Steez', plus some Jay Z, Onyx, Mic Geronimo, Cam'ron and Noreaga...

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DJ Clue - Clue For President (1998) by Djstepone on Mixcloud

Still got more Clue & Juice tapes to come.

DJ Clue - Springtyme Stickup 1996

As promised, here's the full Clue tape featuring the Prodigy freestyle posted below...

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DJ Clue - Springtyme Stickup 1996 by Djstepone on Mixcloud

Still plenty of Clue & DJ Juice mixes to get through, plus a few Cutmaster C bits. I'll try and mix them up with a few other things in between though.

Prodigy & Ty Nitty - DJ Clue freestyle (1996)

Taken from DJ Clue's 'Springtyme Stickup 1996'. Prodigy and Mobb affiliate Ty Nitty over GFK's 'Motherless Child' instrumental. P was a beast back then. Full tape to follow soon...

DJ Clue - Desert Storm '98

More Clue. Too many bangers on this one. A snippet of Hard Knock Life (which I still maintain is a great record) sets things off plus there's Fabolous' breakthrough freestyle on Hot 97, a couple of blends and a Kool G Rap freestyle, and you 'Banned From TV' in its spiritual home.

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DJ Clue - Desert Storm '98 by Djstepone on Mixcloud

DJ Clue - Birthday Blizzard '96

Premium golden era mixtape right here. Early-ish tape from Clue as he was starting to make his name as the DJ with the exclusives...

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DJ Clue - Birthday Blizzard '96 by Djstepone on Mixcloud

Props Over Here

There's been a lot of good things appearing on line recently. Shout out to everyone putting in work and making the effort..

10 classic DJ Clue mixtapes from 1995 courtesy of the ever reliable Stan Ipcus

Judging by the beats used on the freestyles he's been dropping recently, seems like Fabolous has been checking some of his old Clue tapes as well. He even roped in the man to add a few shouts and adlibs for him. The freestyles are decent and you have to admire Fab for dressing like he's in his early 20s even though he's pushing 40.

Great interview with Diamond D on The Combat Jack Show. If you don't have time for the full 90 minutes at least skip to 1 hour 6 mins for his less than complimentary thoughts on The Fugees

Great (if a bit too short) documentary on the golden era of New York radio in the 80s

which leads nicely into these tape rips I found on Soundcloud (download limits are maxed out but you can still stream 'em)

Pete Rock & Marley Marl - Future Flavas on Hot 97, 1995

Funkmaster Flex - Street Jams on Hot 97, 1993

finally, I haven't heard it in it's entirety yet but the new Alchemist & Oh No album is out now and worth investigating. Judging by the track list there's a bit of something for everyone on there.

That should keep you busy for the time being...

Philly's Most Wanted - Next Episode freestyle (2000)

 

Philly's Most Wanted first came to my attention via a German music channel I used to pick up on satellite. They had the video for 'Cross The Border' in heavy rotation for a while and as it has one of those choruses that will stay stuck in your head for days, I eventually ended up copping the 12". 

The remix that followed flipped it into a whole different track, with a beat that sounds like the Neptunes' take on Its All About The Benjamins and guest verses from Pusha T (back when he was known as Terrar) and Fabolous, who's gets his maths all wrong and implies he was a big time coke dealer at the age of 12. Both tracks are a bit slept on well worth picking up. You get the feeling that if the Clipse weren't around, PMW could have been the ones getting first refusal on beats like 'Grindin' and Boo-Bonic might be wowing hipsters with increasingly bland drug raps over shitty beats instead of  the aforementioned Pusha.

Anyway, this is taken from a promo 12" for the duo's album (there was also a DJ Clue hosted mix CD which is why he's on the intro). 5 minutes over Dre's 'Next Episode' beat...

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For all the talk about 'bringing New York back' - which lets face it, still hasn't happened after nearly 10 years - a Philly renaissance its well over due.

DJ Clue & DJ EnvyDesert Storm mixtape Vol. 4 (2002)

Early 00s NYC mixtapes always seem to go down well around here so you go...

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Highlights include a decent pre-Aftermath 50 Cent track ('Elementary') that I'd completely forgotten about, and what I think is an unreleased Shyne track that sounds like was produced by The Neptunes.
I'm a big fan of this era as it was the time of what I'd refer to as the Credible Club Banga - songs that worked on the dancefloor without crossing the line into being corny or outright pop. As I was playing out regularly around that time that was something of a godsend, so big up to Pharrell, Timbaland, Swizz and the rest of 'em for that. It was also a time when you could still put tracks from a new Large Professor album next to songs by Big Tymers and Angie Martinez and no-one would bat an eyelid. Can it be that it was all so simple then..?

DJ Clue - Hate Me Now 2 (2002)

Staying on the early 00s mixtape tip, this one got a lot of play from me back in the day. Rocafella were running things back then and they're all over the tracklist, particularly as 'State Property' was about to drop. These CDs are always good for rediscovering or picking up on songs that didn't really blow up; personal favourites on this one are Mobb Deep's 'Its Over' (listed as 'U Aint Ready 2 Die'), the Styles P freestyle over 'Times Up' and Beanie Sigel & Young Chris 'Home Of Philly'. As cheesey as the sample is, I always liked 'The Champions' aswell (and I fucking hate Queen). I think that might be the first time I heard Kanye rap.

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Canibus - 100 Bars freestyle (1999)

I've no idea if this has appeared on the net before but I found it on DJ Clue's 'Cant Impeach The President 99' mixtape. Canibus does what he does best and spits pure non-stop punchlines and battle raps for about 5 minutes.

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