Sometimes I have an overarching concept for these blends. Sometimes the concept is: play joints. Hence what follows are runs on two new dancehall riddims which found their way to me courtesy of blasssmaster general Johnny Wonder, sutured together with a few cumbia refixes from all bouts.
Sort Out Riddim Blend:
Sort Out Riddim:
Einstein, “Push It”
Capleton, “No Love”
Mega Banton, “Property”
Maka Raw, “Big Bamboo”
Cumbia:
Coki & Benga “Night” (Sonido Del Principe dub)
Santigold, “Shove It” (Toy Selectah cumbia refix)
RR Riddim:
Bounty Killer, “Badman in a di Building”
Flippa Mafia, “Start War”
Vegas, “I Shall Not Be Move”
Download: Ghetto Palms Sort Out Blend
The Sort Out is pretty self-explanatory dancehall from the Young Veterans crew: Capleton destroys it on a gun tune, there’s one promising new dude (Einstein), one nah-call-it-nuh-comeback old veteran (Mega Banton), and one deejay operating under a pseudonym (Maka Raw, who sounds a lot like Macka Diamond). Situation normal.
The first of the cumbia joints is actually a sonidero-style dub of the Coki and Benga dubstep track “Night” that was featured on Ghetto Bassquake recently. You can check the video for the original here, which nicely illustrates how I feel about most dubstep: kind of like watching a squid swim in the ocean for five minutes. Kinda fascinating but after about a minute you start wishing for a voiceover, and after three minutes it's only of interest to serious scientists. This Sonido Del Principe dub I can fuck with, however. It feels more like riding the local bus into the jungle eco-habs in Tayronas National Park at night and watching the Land of the Lost-size bugs swarm around in the headlights. Pretty impressive for a dude who makes tropical music in Amsterdam.
The other is Toy Selectah’s refix of “Shove It.” Yes I probably could have given my traffic a little bump by putting Santigold or Toy Selectah in the header but it just felt like cheating since his whole LP has been up on Mad Decent for a month now, it just took me til now too realize how good this is. Like so good I might actually like it better than the original? Something about the cumbia marching step really brings out the horns and the old Clocktower dub quality of Santi’s vocals. Anyway if you missed him at Santos last week, grab the Mad Decent tracks or the newest Bersa Discos comp which is totally dedicated to his raverton stylings
Last up is the RR riddim from Armz House production, which manages to be on some warlike stuff while staying in a dancer’s tempo and layering the military drum pattern with echoey shakers that wouldn’t be out of place in a cumbia track. It is pretty much built for Bounty Killer but Vegas might be the artist who dominated the set. I’m already a little tired of his "robbing old negro spirituals for dancehall melodies" tactics but since “I Am Blessed” is governing the dancehall I don’t expect them to go away any time soon. Still, here it works with the funereal chords of the riddim and the verses show he is easily the nicest singjay in dancehall right now.