Blackalicious - Shallow Days

Today is feeling like a Shallow Day, there’s a lot of grey outside, the wind is blowing pretty hard and there doesn’t seem to be a balance for what’s to come. A Shallow Day can consist of many things; many factors in our lives that make us feel grey. Like when someone doesn’t understand your perspective or outlook on a subject and feels that your outlook isn’t beneficial, but you know in your heart it is, something like this falls into the Shallow Day category. Why give an opinion if what I’m saying is falling on deaf ears. How come it’s so hard to embrace change or differences these days? Blackalicious lyrics speak to those who are willing to listen and accept diversity, after seeing him in concert a couple years back, I knew he wasn’t about the limelight because he has no stage presence at all. No one was pumping up the crowd, he never told us to put our hands in the air but he did say sit back and enjoy the music. He showed up on stage dressed in all black, stood in one place for almost the whole show and ripped the concert inside out. Spokane never saw a Hip Hop show of that magnitude in awhile, I along with the people of Spokane had no idea we were going to get the show we did for only ten bucks and he did a two hour set. Again, a great musical talent is questioned for the type of lyrics he displays, conscious raps for the brain go a stray in the mainstream world, because his words differ from what the average black rapper speaks about. “Time and time, a brother asks why the rhyme is not laced with a gangsta touch I said "Simply because I don't live that way, still kickin' them rhymes rugged and rough. But that won't sell, cause you gotta keep it real so that we can feel where you're coming from because these streets is ill so if you ain't killing niggas in rhymes your whole sound's just bubble gum." Blackalicious isn’t a hardcore rapper; in fact if peaceful rap was a genre he’d probably fit right in, peaceful harmonies are exhibited through his beats and lyrics. "I won't contribute to genocide; I'd rather try to cultivate the inner side and try to evolve the frustrated ghetto mind the devil and his army never been a friend of mine.” These are lyrics fighting against those who speak negatively to the youth, topics such as violence or drugs that detour young minds into believing that these lyrics are a way of life.

LYRICS!!!
http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/blackalicious/shallowdays.html

Little Brother - Beautiful Morning

Wake up you guys, Little Brother's in your ear. Phonte, Rapper Big Pooh and 9th Wonder y'all on the beat. "Wake up to a new day, spread my wings, take a shot of the crown cuz I'm going through things" the beat along with the opening verse blows me away and gets my mind, body and spirit ready for the day. Little Brother in my eyes, is the most underrated Rap group in the music world, with no recognition from mainstream heads for there brand of Hip Hop, Little Brother's just trying to tap into your conscious with beats and lyrics that grab you and give you an idea of the struggles they go through as college graduates trying to make it out of there dorm and compete with artists who claim they bang and slang. Bangin and slangin of some sort is what a majority of people like to hear in America, it's all about the money one has or the cars and the hoes, if a rapper ain't got that they aren't proven. I can tell you from my own experience as a college student, money is something students don't have. Little Brother would be the first to tell you they're not ballin but most importantly they're not acting like they are ballin to satisfy you. They're doing this rap stuff to pay homage to those who constructed the blueprints for them to become who they are today. That's why I love this group, your never going to hear a track that sounds like what you hear on the radio or MTV and BET, instead your going to hear music with meaning. "Each day's another chance to do the things I could've done the day before, but I didn't and I known I should've, So I say a prayer for the gone for gooders, Who left this world, then kiss my girl "good mornin', shuga" this song could be every bodies wake up song. Could you imagine setting your cell phone alarm to this song and waking up to lyrics of motivation. I know, because its my alarm ring tone. I wake up to this song every morning because I expect every morning to be beautiful, rain, sleet or snow you make your morning beautiful by what you do once you get out of bed. I'm not talking about hygiene, I'm talking about what leaps and bounds you've made to make the life you live beautiful. I guarantee this won't be the last you hear from Little Brother.
It was hard to find a link but i did, here's a direct link to download the song
http://www.iridebeatsandmelodies.com/mytop5/top5ers/july/Beautiful%20Morning.mp3
And the Lyrics to the track.
http://www.lyricsmania.com/lyrics/little_brother_lyrics_13601/the_minstrel_show_lyrics_41082/beautiful_morning_lyrics_444591.html
Enjoy y'all.

Aesop Rock - Shovel

“My kitchen sink leaks like your itching to speak a secret ‘bout the world spins but nobodies pledged allegiance and why? His beaming smile knew a private agony that burns and when the children met divinity, I sat to watch the merge.” Since 2001 I’ve been bobbing my head to Aesop Rock, because he’s “6 foot 4 with a sick flow”, then, Aesop Rock’s rhymes were mind boggling (and they still are) in fact too much for a sophomore high school mind to follow. Back then I didn’t comprehend music fully; instead I understood beats and rhythms, melodies which put me into a coma of listening. I can remember so many occasions where I found that one song and would have to play it at least 3 or 4 times a day to reach my musical satisfaction of the day. When Aesop Rocks’ Labor Days came out I discovered one of my favorites from The Aesop Rock collection, Shovel. To me Shovel has the type of beat that gets the brain waves cooking in a way that motivates or inspires ingenuity in the form of how to approach rough days ahead. Every time I listen to Shovel I feel like I’m conspiring something big, plans and thoughts of how I can take over the world haha, but that’s just the beat, wait until you listen to the song and try keeping up with Aesop’s wordplay. Guarantee it’s going to be hard to follow, in fact you may think, damn Joe what the F**k are you listening to, but you have to give him a chance. Being an underground hip hop fiend I definitely have the patience for rappers good and bad, but trust, Aesop Rock is Hip Hop in its truest form. Most importantly through his lyrics you can tell he’s content with his current status in the social listening of Hip Hop. His lyrics aren’t meant for you to keep up with, they’re meant for you to sulk over and rewind from time to time, to figure out what he means when he said “I don’t shrug instead of the ramifications of my shovel, loving the consequence of uprooting the jungle.” Thank you Aesop, for real Hip Hop.
Here's the link to the song and a link to "Shovel" lyrics, check it out http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdRSCxWYot8
http://www.sing365.com/music/lyric.nsf/Shovel-lyrics-Aesop-Rock/D1AB138B3734BD1048256D0B001101E6