Potholes In My Blog

Phonte – “The Good Fight” [Video]

Sometime between the last Little Brother album and Phonte‘s solo debut Charity Starts at Home, it seems like folks kept snoozin’ on Phonte. I can’t pinpoint any concrete reasons, but his 2011 full-length was incredibly slept on. It packed a heavy dosage of lyrical wit and boom-bap production, but just didn’t grasp the audience it might have three or four years ago. With that said, Phontigallo lets loose of some visuals to go along with his album cut, “The Good Fight”. Keeping in line with one of the major themes of the LP, Phonte hammers home working class struggles and offers some words of encouragement. Charity Starts at Home is out now.

Hit the skip to watch the video.

Raphael Saadiq – “They Don’t Know You” F. Common & Ledisi p. Steve Spacek

By Gedi Dabakaeri on 2/9/12 in Streams

Back in 2004, Raphael Saadiq opened his studio doors to Steve Spacek to produce an album for one of his sub labels. The album was supposed to be called Pookie Blue Room and it featured 10 songs produced by both Steve Spacek and Morgan Zarate with Raphael singing on all of them. It also featured guest appearances by Common, Q-Tip, Ledisi, and Sir Bentley. Anyhow the album was never completed and therefore never released, but this new track, “They Don’t Know You,” with Common and Ledisi has found its way online. Yeah, this definitely deserves a proper release. [via]

You can stream “They Don’t Know You” after the jump.

Lee Bannon – “The All That Beat Cast”

By David Reyneke on 2/9/12 in Downloads,Streams

Lee Bannon has his first Plug Research full-length coming up later this month. Instead of leaking singles from the album, he decided to put together 10-minute standalone tracks that have absolutely nothing with the release. His first crack at it, “The All That Beat Cast”, which samples clips from a nostalgic Nickelodeon favorite, All That. Lee Bannon’s Fantastic Plastic is set to drop Feb. 28 via Plug Research.

Hit the skip to stream the single.

Dam-Funk – “I Gotta Let You Know”

By David Reyneke on 2/9/12 in Downloads,Streams

More saucy rhythms from Dam-Funk? I can dig it! While I would love to see the left-coast funk machine put out some more official material, all these quick leaks certainly do the trick as well. It seems like Dam’s speciality lies with live performing, anyway. There is word that he will be dropping something come Spring time. Let’s hope he sticks to his word!

Hit the skip to stream the single.

Asher Roth – “Dope Shit” [Video]

By David Reyneke on 2/9/12 in Videos

Asher Roth comes clean with a set of visuals for “Dope Shit”, a single off the recently released Pabst & Jazz. The video is pretty straight forward, as we watch Asher cruise down sunny streets interacting with random hooligans throughout. The more I see Asher rocking actual hip-hop tracks, the more I forget this was the same white boy that put out “I Love College” not long ago.

Hit the skip to watch the video.

Jay-Z & Kanye West – “Niggas In Paris” [Video]

By David Reyneke on 2/9/12 in Videos

Need another reason to listen to Jay-Z and Kanye West’s “Niggas In Paris”, well, here is the highly anticipated official video. Using live footage and audio, The Throne employ the Photo Booth mirror image feature and amazing light effects to make put us into full seizure mode. We are also left with a disclaimer before the video rolls, just in case you might actually have epileptic tendencies.

“THIS VIDEO HAS BEEN IDENTIFIED BY EPILEPSY ACTION TO POTENTIALLY TRIGGER SEIZURES FOR PEOPLE WITH PHOTOSENSITIVE EPILEPSY, VIEWER DISCRETION IS ADVISED.”

Watch the Throne is out now. Hit the skip to watch the video. And, of course, let us know what you think.

LyteSho! – Two/Six [Album]

By Johnathan Kochis on 2/9/12 in Downloads,Streams,Uncategorized

Many hip-hop fans remembered J Dilla on his birthday, Feb. 7, and “#NowPlaying Donuts” was something you may have seen if you follow any of those hip-hop fans on Twitter. Donuts was an instrumental album, not a collection of tracks rappers wanted no parts of, and that’s one reason why it was so memorable. LyteSho!’s newest release, Two/Six, isn’t Donuts, of course, but it is cohesive. It’s a seamless listen; so seamless that it actually made me check to make sure one song ended and another began. It’s only the third project we’ve heard from LyteSho!, but it may be his strongest yet.

Hit the skip to stream/download.

Maximino – “Less Talk, More Groove”

By Johnathan Kochis on 2/9/12 in Downloads,Streams

We first heard Maximino when he released his dense, and a bit dark EP, Not So Cold, Cave, about six months ago. His latest track is “Less Talk, More Groove” and it has at least as many layers as the epidermis, but it’s more funky than melancholy. It’s the first offering from his upcoming project, Enter The Year of The Dragon, which I’m guessing won’t bless us with any Sisqo revivalism, but still seems to have promise.

Hit the skip to listen and download.

Dirty Hank & Reason – The Monty Brogan EP

By Andrew Martin on 2/9/12 in Downloads,Streams

Rhode Island hip-hop has been killin’ it lately. Recently, I got hooked on Falside and Juan Deuce’s excellent Mechanics EP and now, I’m looking to get drunk-as-fuck to the wylin’ rhymes of Dirty Hank and Reason. Their joint project, The Monty Brogan EP, is nine tracks worth of boom-bap madness featuring production from Falside and Mad Plaid. If you like your hip-hop grimy, a lil’ strange, and full of booze-fueled wordplay, you’re going to love this.

Hit the skip to stream/download the EP.

Earl Sweatshirt – “Home”

By Andrew Martin on 2/9/12 in Streams

Earl Sweatshirt is either officially back or Odd Future is trolling the entire music world. Hard. Last night, a new track emerged from the previously “missing,” disgustingly talented rapper and, fittingly, it’s called “Home”. It’s also ridiculously ill and proves that dude’s still the best pure rapper in the bunch. Really, I could prattle on about how huge this is and what this could mean for Earl and OFWGKTA moving forward, but I’m just waiting for some real confirmation that this isn’t just a big ruse.

Stream “Home” below.