Old Raps with DJ Levins

Hey all, this will probably be the last episode of Old Raps. LNWY have been super cool over the past year, paying for an APRA license AND paying me to make the show in the first place but they're shifting the focus of the site and moving away from podcasts for now. Big thanks to Darren, Danny and everyone at LNWY for getting this up and running. It's been fun as hell.

I recorded this episode in March and it's been in limbo since, but I thought I'd upload it for you to listen to as it's a great ep! Thanks so much to everyone who listened to an episode, maybe there will be more, who knows? You can catch my other podcasts Hey Fam, Serious Issues and All The Small Games wherever you get podcasts.

Old Raps Episode 7: Free Keak

E-40's massive 2006 single Tell Me When To Go introduced me to a number of things: the word hyphy, the concept of ghostridin' the whip and most important of all, rapper Keak Da Sneak.

Most casual rap fans will only know Keak from his verse on that song, but he actually invented the word hyphy, an abbreviation for hyperactive, a term used to describe the bulk of the wild, ecstasy influenced rap coming out of Oakland and The Bay Area in the mid 2000s.

His truly unique, raspy voice has always been a favourite of mine. His back catalogue is incredible, tonnes of solo records plus a few with his late 90s group 3X Krazy, and I've always kept an eye out for new Keak Da Sneak albums and features over the last decade.

The last few years in particular have not been kind to Keak. In 2017 he was shot twice (https://www.vibe.com/2017/08/keak-da-sneak-shot-stable-condition) and the injuries sustained from the second shooting have left him in a wheelchair. Last year he was caught with a weapon on him and given a prison sentence. Earlier this year Keak appealed that sentence (https://www.vibe.com/2019/02/keak-da-sneak-prison-sentence-delayed?utm_source=t.co&utm_medium=referral), asking that he still serve time, but under house arrest instead of in prison. In February he was given 60 days to improve his health before turning himself in.

You can still sign the petition (https://www.change.org/p/alternative-sentencing-instead-of-prison-for-disabled-rapper-keak-da-sneak) for Keak to serve an alternative prison sentence, and if you need a soundtrack while you sign, this month's episode of Old Raps features eight of my favourite Keak Da Sneak songs.

UPDATE: He began his sentence in April

https://www.kqed.org/arts/13854812/keak-da-sneak-begins-prison-sentence-after-lengthy-legal-battle

Tracklist

1. Keak Da Sneak - Sneak Come Out At Night

2. Keak Da Sneak - Drank, Weed, Sex (Featuring Ant Banks)

3. Keak Da Sneak - Here Comes Keak Da Sneak

4. Keak Da Sneak - Get That Doe (featuring Eklips Da Hustla)

5. Keak Da Sneak - T-Shirt, Blue Jeans & Nikes (featuring E-40)

6. Keak Da Sneak - Bumpers (featuring E-40)

7. Keak Da Sneak - Rappin' My New Twist

8. 3X Krazy - Keep It On The Real

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A musical journey from Houston to New Orleans.

For tracklist and more information head to https://lnwy.co/listen/old-raps-episode-6-louisiana-highway-10/

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It's impossible to do the Neptunes production discography justice with one episode (they produced more than 100 songs in just 2003 alone!), this episode contains a selection of some old favourites and a few obscurities that'll kickstart a re-obsession and lead to you listening to their entire back catalogue for the rest of the year.

Tracklist:

The Neptunes - The Battle: Speed

N.O.R.E. - Oh No (Remix featuring Capone, Jadakiss, Big Punisher, Maze & Musalini and Angie Martinez)

E-40 - Quarterbackin' (featuring Clipse)

Foxy Brown - Candy (featuring Kelis)

Roscoe P Coldchain - Hot (featuring Pusha T)

Philly's Most Wanted - Cross The Border

504 Boyz - D-Game (featuring Master P, Krazy and Pusha T)

N*E*R*D - Rock Star (Electronic Version)

702 - I Still Love You (featuring Pharrell)

T.I. - What's Yo Name? (featuring Pharrell)

Clipse - Gangsta Lean (featuring Clipse)

Philly's Most Wanted - Please Don't Mind (featuring Andre Wilson)

This episode is brought to you by LEVINS! Specifically, all of his podcasts! He's putting up a new episode of each of his five podcasts every day this week, including Hey Fam, The Mitchen, Old Raps, Serious Issues and All The Small Games! If you listen to all of them, you'll be able to put together a secret message that will maybe give you access to something cool and/or disappointing! Fun! ​

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Inspired by the opening scene of Black Panther, Levins selects a handful of tracks that were released by Oakland based rappers in 1992. Featuring Too Short, Mac Dre, Pooh Man, The Coup, 2pac and more.

For more info and tracklist head to lnwy.co

In this episode of Old Raps, Levins plays a bunch of his favourite songs from the early days of No Limit Records, when Master P and his brothers C-Murder and Silkk The Shocker used money from a malpractice suit to start a record label in Richmond, California. No Limit Records would eventually move to New Orleans and sell millions of records, but this episode is about the records they made in the Bay Area before they blew up.

You've definitely heard at least 50 Dungeon Family songs in your lifetime. Maybe they were mostly Outkast tracks, a few Cee-lo songs, and Waterfalls by TLC.

Dungeon Family are the absolutely legendary collective from Atlanta whose core members include Outkast's Andre 3000 and Big Boi, Goodie Mob's Cee-Lo, Big Gipp, Khujo and T-Mo, Killer Mike, Cool Breeze, Backbone and the production/songwriting team of Rico Wade, Ray Murray and Sleepy Brown, better known as Organized Noize.

I could put a two hour show together for every one of these artists, and maybe one day I will, but for now, here's a celebration of one of coolest collectives in rap. I've tried to keep it both broad and obscure, finding weird cuts and unreleased jams from the ridiculously overstocked back catalogue. There's a surprisingly large number of songs in this episode that are definitely not raps, but they are old, like the selection of songs from the boy band Bobby Valentino was in when he was 16, or every one of the soulful sex jams by the devastatingly underrated Sleepy Brown.

This episode assumes that you're already familiar with all of Outkast's albums, Goodie Mob's back catalogue and the Organized Noize Netflix documentary from last year - but you can definitely go back and experience those after listening (spoiler alert: they're incredible).

I listened to most of these records for the first time through cheap computer speakers attached to an iPod while flipping burgers five years back. Feel free to recreate those ideal listening provisions before tuning in.

Tracklist

Witchdoctor - D.F.

Lil' Will - Looking for Nikki (featuring Cool Breeze)

Parental Advisory - Maniac

Cool Breeze - Hit Man (featuring Witchdoctor and Backbone)

Society of Soul - Peaches N Erb (featuring Big Rube)

Sleepy's Theme - Simply Beautiful 

UGK - Bump and Grill (featuring N.O. Joe)

Lil' Will - Low, Low (featuring Cool Breeze and Pimp C)

Goodie Mob - I.C.U. (featuring Sleepy Brown)

Slimm Calhoun - It's OK (featuring Andre 3000)

Youngbloodz - 85 (featuring Big Boi)

Lil' Will - Yesterdays

Mista - If My Baby

Sleepy Brown - Till (Your Legs Start Shaking)

Bubba Sparxxx - Like It Or Not (featuring Sleepy Brown)

Parental Advisory - Down Flat (featuring T.I.P.)

Dungeon Family - White Gutz

Cool Breeze - Weeastpointin' (featuring Sleepy Brown)

Sleepy Brown - I Can't Wait (featuring Outkast)

Dungeon Family - Follow the Light

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This is episode #1 of Old Raps, my brand new radio show for lnwy.co. This episode is a sequel of sorts to the Cash Money Bounce Mix I made in 2015. That mix featured songs produced by Mannie Fresh for Cash Money Records in the 1990s and so does this episode - only the mix was all New Orleans bounce tracks. This episode is all about the more straight-up hip-hop tracks Mannie Fresh produced during those same years - a retrospective of Cash Money from 1992 till just before they signed a huge deal with Universal Records in 1998.

New episodes of Old Raps will drop at the start of each month. Every month I'll be focusing on a different label, producer or region, playing a few of my favourite songs and rambling a little in between them. Hope you like this first episode, stay tuned for more.

Listen to Cash Money Bounce on Mixcloud.