.L.W.H. - The Tape Hiss Hooligan

I've heard the Amsterdam public library, Bibliotheek, likened to a colossal Apple store, in sleekness and modernity. I thought the person sitting next to me was watching porn, but it turned out to just be a very PG-13 scene in some tv show which I don't recognize. A lot of people do watch porn in libraries, though, or at least so I'm told. I recall the description of a row of computers labelled "Porn Alley" in a library where my father used to work because there were no security cameras covering the row, and old horny men would flock to this row to do their business or what have you, and the large exmilitary staff member would have to sneak up on these people and scare the crap out of them and warn them not to do that shit anymore. This library has a huge music collection, at least in comparison to the libraries I'm used to raiding the music collections of, though those are public libraries of towns that are much smaller than Amsterdam. They have obscure electronic compilations that I didn't even know people owned, let alone libraries. I'm hoping to come down here with my colossal laptop tomorrow and rip some CDs.

The album that's really striking me now is this album The Tape Hiss Hooligan by producer / independent filmmaker .L.W.H(odge).

It's a hip hop album, and it features many rappers including Main Attrakionz, Squadda B. and Shady Blaze. This is the second hip hop album I've talked about on this blog so far and it certainly won't be the last. It is my belief that from a production standpoint, hip hop and electronic music are very closely related, and that's becoming even more obvious as we continue to have modern beat-smiths like the Brainfeeder crew and others really straddling, blurring the line between the two. It's going to take me several more listens to really get to know The Tape Hiss Hooligan and decide what I think of it, but my first impression is that this guy is a really good producer. He's not doing anything terribly experimental here, really. Most of the other hip hop I've been paying attention to this year definitely is. It's not nearly as three dimentional and bizarre as Shabazz Palaces' Black Up or as rhythmically progressive as Knxwledge's Hexual.Sealings.LP, definitely a far cry from the layered, dramatic beats of Clams Casino. The Tape Hiss Hooligan is, both in beats and rapping, a direct and dirty album, but it's presented in a very classy way. The backing tracks really go all across the board, some minimal and hard hitting, others beautiful and melancholy and others still groovy. The rapping is solid, nothing outwardly spectacular but definitely good, steady and reliable, and also delivered with this world-weary, stoned out casuality. The whole thing's got this gritty, stark, realistic feel to it. It hits an exhilarating high with "Spinning 87," which is just achingly beautiful and groovy as fuck, behind rapping that has real command. I wanted to embed a youtube video of the song in this post but it doesn't even seem to be on youtube yet. YOUTUBE HASNT EVEN HEARD OF IT YET, THATS HOW FUCKING UNDERGROUND THIS ALBUM IS. .L.M.H. really lets this album go its own course, beats setting really distinct atmospheres for the rappers to go to town on. It seems to me like Hodge is communicating things that are different than what the rappers are saying, not necessarily bigger things but parallel things. Part of how he asserts his voice on The Tape Hiss Hooligan is by how he handles the intro, outro and interludes, and I won't try to break that down because they are definitely things you should experience without any prior knowledge of them. He's definitely showing and not telling, which is exactly how you write well and direct well so it makes sense that this methodology translates to music as well. So if you're into hip hop check it out, definitely.