DOMINO of Hieroglyphics

A production Legend…Giving up Game

Raise them right pt. 3!!

The Reminisce over You (T.R.O.Y: The moment I first heard the saxaphone begining to this song I was hooked. That day I proceeded to listen to the promo 12” at least 5 or 6 times in a row. This is, the great producer, Pete Rock’s finest moment. CL’s rhyme, reminiscing about fallen loved ones, does the job well but it is trully the beat that makes this a Hip-Hop Classic. The bassline, drums and particularly the haunting psychedelic backgroud vocal sample brilliantly mesh with the sax pieces. Check out how Pete changes the drum patterns by dropping snares n rolls at various places throughout the song. The original song he samples for T.R.O.Y (Tom Scott’s “Today”) is kind of a cheezy psychedelic influenced jazz/pop song in the vain of The age of Aquarious from Hair. Pete tranforms it into something totally hip and funky, the mark of a great hip-hop production. This is definately one of my top 5 Hip-Hop songs of all time.

Black Steel in the Hour of Chaos: I had to put my favorite song from my Favorite Hip-Hop album of all time, Public Enemy’s, It takes a Nation of Millions to hold us Back. I miss the days when songs of substance were the norm in Hip-Hop. Public Enemy single handedly educated an entire Hip-Hop generation. Public Enemy was perfect, Chuck D’s militant lyrics and powerful preacher like voice, Flavor Flav’s hype and comic relief and the Bomb Squad’s manic soundscape of drums and samples. In this song Chuck defiantly states, “to understand my demands, I gave a warning…I wanted the governor ya’ll plus the Warden to know, that I am innocent because I’m militant. Posing a threat, you bet its fucking up the government.”