One Song

Onewerd feat. Myka 9 - Your Own Monster
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One Song: OneWerd feat. Myka 9 - Your Own Monster

Brandon Backhaus | July 20, 2016
Like several other rappers turned educators, OneWerd, is keeping the it hella live for the elbow patch set. I do challenge you to find another rapper in the teach rap genre that packs more rhymes per syllable. OneWerd also consistently runs a monthy hip hop gathering in the SOMA District in San Francisco called, Builders, throws one-off shows with underground heroes, releases projects that garner local acclaim from the weeklies, and drops singles with microphone magicians like Myka 9. And… and… AND this mother fucker holds down a real career.  He’s truly one of the good guys. And his whole existence makes me chortle heartily at the host of 30+ asshole rappers bitterly complaining about how the XXL Freshman got put on while asking who got...
P.O.S. - Wave
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One Song: P.O.S. - Wave

Brandon Backhaus | July 13, 2016
The anxiety is real! I’ve been so fucking stressed out! Life has been jumping up and down on my balls for the last six months like my supple testicle skin was stretched out across a trampoline frame.  For those of you that don’t know, Minneapolis artist P.O.S. dealt with some life or death health issues. Requiring a liver transplant is no fucking joke. And to hear him come back from mad-dogging Mr. Muerte, to make music so confident and yet chill, makes me look at life happily trampolining on my testes like so fucking what.  Most of my struggles are of my own design. I eat like shit (though I’ve been trying to do better). My exercise regiment is the opposite of a regiment and more like irrelevant (though I’ve been trying to do better). My struggles with alcohol and drugs...
zavala, vivir
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One Song: Zavala - Vivir

Joel Frieders | July 10, 2016
Remember when this dude used to drop hip hop? You don't care? Samesies. Whatever this asshole releases, it's some how completely fucking magical.  Zavala has always been that dude that could produce massive amounts of heat, while still sounding whimsical and still making me want to rip clothes off of unassuming pedestrians, but the direction towards house music that makes me want to solve the world's ailments has been both entirely welcome and unexpected. "Vivir" is yet another step in the direction of finding that balance between dancing and thinking, or 'thancing' as the kids are calling it these days. I'm convinced that the world's problems will gradually find answers through the ideas of a cadre of 13 and 14 year olds with headphones on, dancing by themselves...
astronauts, skeleton
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One Song: Astronauts - Skeleton

Joel Frieders | July 3, 2016
This band makes me consistently feel like I'm floating and my head is all laid the fuck back on the tube. All four of my limbs are in complete opposite corners, as if ready to square off in a battle for who is the most fucking comfortable. The pace of the river around me is swift enough to stop any bugs from landing, but not so fast as to cause the peace to end any sooner than I'd prefer. Astronauts make everything just slow the fuck down so I can appreciate as much as possible.  How the shit do they do that on every song? "Skeleton" has that creamy fucking guitar plodding along in the background. I mean sixteen holy jesus shits on a rustic looking canoe paddle with greek letters burnt into it hanging on the wall of a rich white man's home office, this song is a...
falside, snacks
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One Song: Falside - Snacks

Joel Frieders | June 28, 2016
It's no secret I adore this man. Falside's beats are the gin to my yang, the vodka to my gimlet, the high sparrow to my Cersei. Yes, I'm into sodomy. The latest drop from wee Falside is "Snacks" and it takes the listener on a progressive thump thump, from playground to underground sex club. While at one point I felt like I was on the set for the music video IESHA from ANOTHER BAD CREATION, it soon morphed into me getting sweaty in between two androgynous shirtless and glittered people wearing masks and furry boots.  I want to both hoop with the bros and get stripped and whipped. IT'S THE AMERICAN CREAM DREAM ON TWO LEGS! I fucking love how I never know what this dude is up to. Alls I knows is I'm ups. I'M UPS BRUH!
dosh and ghostband, kool aid
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One Song: Dosh & Ghostband - Kool Aid

Joel Frieders | June 9, 2016
Dosh is one of my favorite rhythm jizzers. Dude can play two pencils on a half empty tepid teapot and I'd be all "WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! BRO, DO THAT ONE THING AGAIN THAT MADE ME DO WHAT I'M DOING NOW WITH MY ARMS! WOOOOOOOO!". Of course, in my world, that teapot is half full bro. But Dosh & Ghostband juuuuuuuust dropped "Kool Aid", the first single (aka just the tip) off their new album, Def Kith II: The Price is Ill, which comes out July 8th, 2016. (( YOU SHOULD PRE-ORDER IT HERE. )) Not only does this shit feel like 3am in a dank unnamed loft space in the middle of some misty metropolis, it feels like I have 6 lighters in my pockets and I'm completely out of cigarettes. I'm hungry for a breakfast I can't afford, but I'm with people...
hospital, louder
Soundcloud

One Song: Hospital - Louder

Joel Frieders | June 9, 2016
Sounding like a spritely Jullian Lennon, wearing man leggings and a loose fitting puffy shirt, Hospital take jazz hands into the 23rd century. Now, I'm not one to show off my interpretive dance prowess, OH WHO AM I KIDDING OF COURSE I AM, CHECK THIS PLIE INTO A DOUBLE HALF CARTWHEEL ROUND OFF BITCHES! Ok, fine, I'm one to show off my limberness and shit. But Hospital's new bag "Louder" is one of those tracks where you start calmly nodding your head like in A Night at the Roxbury, but then about 56 seconds in you've found yourself with your leg wrapped around a banister and a pair of leg warmers yanked all the way up to your fucking grundle. You're fabulous bro. Just look at you. If I was a betting man, and I'm fucking NOT, I'd wager this ...
zavala, turns off
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One Song: Zavala - Turns Off

Joel Frieders | June 6, 2016
My favorite thing about Zavala, besides the pretty twinkle shimmers the dude bathes me in, is his ability to make me smile while confused. I never know where dude is going, and I always assume he's lost, but then I open my eyes and "holy fuck, we're hear!". See that? That was a play on words bro. We're "HEAR"? CMON. CLAP. JUST CLAP AT THE WORDS ON THE PAGE BRO. GO.  Zavala's production has always been borderline cinematic chase scene, but as the dude ages it seems more like he's branching out into the apocalyptic ceremonial bonfire soundtrack like we all had hoped. "Turns Off" is completely unexpected, and as you wait for the beat to drop in some form or another, you notice all the swirling pretty birds and shit, but when it DOES drop, it drops...
Ryley Walker, The Halfwit In Me, folk, dead oceans
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One Song: Ryley Walker - The Halfwit In Me

Tom Doz | June 2, 2016
If you haven't been paying attention, I probably love Ryley Walker more than the birds that he allows to nest in his hair.  That dirty loveable hippie. Okay, so I don't know for a fact that he is dirty...or even a hippie, but I can't help thinking that he has a soul that is in tune with nature. The dude in interviews just seems like a free spirit...whatever that means....and it translates into his songs. Folky. Jazzy. Jammy. Patchouli.  OH MY GOD....he has me talking liking a hippy. I CAN'T HELP IT THOUGH. I'm going to go wash out my mouth with soap that looks like a block beeswax. 
kauf, a ruin
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One Song: Kauf - A Ruin

Joel Frieders | May 23, 2016
I fucking love Kauf. I fucking love how his songs sound like he dropped a metal bowl of slinkys and marbles onto a hollow wooden floor and then recorded the flitters and skitters and then records whispery sexy vocals over them and all of a sudden I'm shimmying in a hunched over position and humping an ass made of my imagination. Yes. That sentence was supposed to feel like that bro. Kauf, once again, murders "A Ruin", and it's essentially four different tracks all smooshed together into one long missive about trying to hurry up to party with me. That's just what this dude writes about. He writes about having tacos out on some veranda overlooking some futuristic metropolis, yes, but he wants to share the salsa bar with me bros.  Everyone eat all...

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