The Baby Steps Review Cubby

Your Bi-Weekly Hip Hop Review With Special Guest:

The Ketchup Samurai

The Beast can not confirm nor deny the existence of the Ketchup Samurai, but does allow him to speak his mind from beyond the tomato patch and into your psyche. The Beast does, however, recognize the average Buffalonian’s serious consideration when purchasing music, in a poor economy such as WNY's. In that everlasting pursuit for the hip hop jewel, the Ketchup has decided to take it upon himself to lend his hip hop ear to the public. You may say the Samurai is a little biased towards more traditional hip hop, but in reality he simply knows what he wants to hear when deciding what Indian foods he'll put ketchup on next. The ratings given to these hip hop albums are the opinion of the Ketchup Samurai and him alone.

Read these reviews carefully and I hope you come to see a clear view of what your ears are begging for. The Samurai has spoken.

The Patented Ketchup Rating System

1 tomato - See ya in the $1 bin

2 tomatoes - Buyer beware

3 tomatoes - Good buy

4 tomatoes - Steal this album

Undeclared Classic

 

Artist: Madvillain (MF Doom & Madlib)

Single: “All Caps” b/w

Oh my goodness! Now I'm no DJ but if I was then Madvillain's latest 12" single "All Caps" b/w "Curls" would be a 12" I would drop for in a New

York second. The track "All Caps" is so fucking dope, that I wasn't sure what made my tomato's tingle more... the tracks or seeing Janet Jackson's right breast during the Super Bowl half-time show. Either way MF Doom, with super producer Madlib, created a jewel that would even out shine Master P's watch. Also on this 12" single is the track "Curls" which cements in my heart that I have to have this album when it drops early spring. The 12" also contains "The Illest Villains (remix)"and a skit entitled "Scene Three" which is in the typical MF Doom style of interludes. DJ's out there stand up and drop them duckets on a 12" that will get more play than the Paris Hilton sex tape on the internet. Speaking of internet, you can check out the video to Madvillain's "All Caps" on the Stones Throw web site. It's very entertaining and done in dope comic strip style. After watching this video or listening to these

tracks you'll be begging for this album to get an early release date. I give this 12" single 4.5 out of 5 tomatoes.

Artist: Mighty Casey

Album: Original Rudebwoy

There's something about Boston rappers that makes me wonder if they're angry at those damn NY Yankee fans or if those bean town baked beans are killing they're rectums by the millions. Mighty Casey, for example, is a high yellow brother who swears the key to a huge hip hop career ismaking songs about sex and liquor. Wait....he may be onto something. Original Rudebwoy is 10 tracks of pure nonsense. Now don't get me wrong. This album does have tracks that I find quite enjoyable and lets me know I'm still that strange guy who dabbles in a raunchy track from time to time. My favorite track "White Girls" which just so happens to be my theme song, is a very catchy song that may upset the beautiful sistas out there but lets face it...white girls seem to be climbing the ladder on the thick charts and this songs tells it all. Another track I've grown to like a lot is the song "Liquorland 2" which DJ Lo Pro and I agree is a cool track with plenty of humor at liquors expense. I know, it seems I'm loving this album but truth be known 2 or 3 likable songs doesn't exactly point me towards the cash register. Tracks like "Black Rapping School", "One Night Stand", "Down With Bush", and "Rap Spectacular" are sure to turn away the conscience hip hop head and rightfully so. But I guess Bostonians can tolerate that sort of shit

since they swear Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch put Boston on the hip

hop map. Remember 'Good Vibrations'? Yuck! Anyway, I give this album 2.5 tomatoes.

Artist: Steele of Smif-N-Wessun

Album: Amerikkka’s Nightmare

I have very low tolerance for rappers who were once in a group and decide "Yo man, I'm better than so and so. I'm a put out my own shit",

only to find out so and so was better. That's exactly what I thought of this album. It's more of a mix tape then an actual album and I held my attention for about 30 seconds. AmeriKKKa's Nightmare is a perfect title

because I'm still scared it's actually in record stores. As far as tracks I sort of liked there's..ummm...let me get back to you on that one. I swear this album sounds like a bad G-Unit demo before they learned they can make it in the rap game by riding 50 Cent's coat tails. Steele even went so far as to makeHoods", "Whose Gangsta", "Guns & Drugs", "Blood & Sweat", and "Moove", which he bit off of Ludacris. I sat and listened to this album like I said for 30 seconds and quickly looked in the mirror to see what I transformed into and it wasn't pretty. All I can say is I had the same look my parents gave me when I told them I thought Mr. Rogers was a pedophile. I give this album 1 tomato. A rotten one. Purchase if you must.

Emcee Sick speaks on That Old New Shit!

Damn Ya’ll!,

††††

My man the Mighty E.R. hit me a copy of Last Emperor’s new full-length. †Starting from the beginning as many of us tend to do, my reaction was not too animated. †There was no karate-chopping any associates of mine in excitement as I perused through the first few tracks of this album. †By the time I got to like 8, I was profoundly disappointed, and proceeded to took it out of my CD drive to get to reviewing some other shit to play on the radio. †

A couple weeks later (last Sunday before the radio) I took the latter half of the day to review the entirety of all the music I have received in like the last month, so amidst a whole slew of new releases I figured that it was only right to give ‘Music, Magic, Myth’ the complete one-through. †I picked the action back up at track 9 entitled ‘Animalsitics’ which I immediately recognized as a remix (I think it is a remix at least) of the song that resoundingly introduced The Last Emperor into the underground hip hop scene back in the late 90’s. †This remix is fly, not quite as fly as I remember the original being, but fly nonetheless.... †††but, it also could be that the notion of this being a remix is just based on me feeling differently about ‘Animalsitics’ because of it going from being in a fresh context to now a seemingly drab one. †To my absolute surprise, tracks 10-19 ended up being a whole nother album, and a pretty classic one at that. †Track after track threw my reservations farther and farther away from the fast-forward button, as I gained steady distance from the lackluster beginning. By track 15 and 16 I came to expect every next track to be straight dope.... ††and that’s what I got. †

I didn’t make it past this album to review any other music that evening. †Needless to say, I dedicated much of the playlist at the beginning of that radio show to share a generous serving of this tail-heavy full-length with Buffalo’s radio-land. †I’ll get to some more releases in a short for ya’ll.

In the meantime, peep out my man Ketchup to the left with the tomatoes.