The new Mavado vid for “Last Night” is finally here! Little X directed this gully tale from Mavado’s debut album Gangsta For Life.

We also have this mash-up of Mavado and Jay-Z on the Mission riddim – the tune is called “The Rock”:

([ Click To Add Mavado & Jay-Z "The Rock" To Player ])

(I’m still working on this ^ new feature, so let me know if it works for you or not. Thanks! )

My favorite track on the new Erykah Badu album New Amerykah is the Madlib production “Healer”:

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A Heatwave mash-up of General Levy and Lily Allen titled “Mad LDN”:

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Reggae music lost another champion of the island sound: Joe Gibbs, legendary producer, recording engineer, label founder and manager died of a heart attack at the age of 65. Gibbs created one of my favorite reggae tunes of all time – “Two Sevens Clash” – recorded by Culture in 1977. Gibbs also created many of the big roots and rock-steady riddims of the late 60′s and early 70′s and continued to produce hit after hit throughout the 80′s dancehall era. ([More →])

A new song called “Serious” features the combined powers of Sean Paul, Busy Signal and Busta Rhymes (audio only):

Energizer Medley featuring Bounty Killer, Mavado, Aidonia, and G Mafia:

Mavado was pure fire last year and he’s set to keep blazing up the reggae and hip hop scenes in 2008! His highly-acclaimed debut release Gangster For Life was just the beginning, the Jamaican deejay has since recorded with Foxy Brown, Wyclef Jean and Uncle Murda. Near the end of 2007, he attended DJ Khaled’s b-day bash in Miami and the two must have really hit it off because they spent the next day in the studio, laying down a track for Khaled’s album. ([More →])

Philly-based beat meister Diplo and UK house/bass producer Switch have each assisted M.I.A. to create the sick riddims that she sings over, they’ve toured together, and now they’re finishing up a joint album. Diplo produced a lot of the music on Arul and Switch traveled all over the globe with M.I.A. to help her record the songs for Kala. Last year, Diplo went to Jamaica to record dancehall’s superstar deejays (rappers) for a new project with Switch. I can’t wait to hear these tunes, they’re going to be wiiiiiiiicked!! Diplo and Switch’s bumpin electro-influenced dancehall-hip hop hybrids with thick Jamaican patois rapping on top? Sounds perfect! ([More →])

The illustrious Ninjaman brought a lot of laughter and joy to fans worldwide in 2007. The don gorgon claims to have put down the gun in favor of teaching today’s youth (though he does carry a sword these days). He dropped one of the year’s hottest tunes – “Preacher” on the Church Heathen riddim – which he shared with Shaggy’s “Church Heathen” and the two artists created a video for both songs with a scathing commentary of organized religion. Ninjaman was also named one of the Best Dressed artists at Sting by OutARoad and gave a fantastic performance which you can see part of here. ([More →])

DJ Don Letts compiled a wicked collection of tunes for Dread Meets Punk Rockers Uptown from his vast collection of reggae and dub 7-inches. The album is a veritable soundtrack to London’s legendary Roxy Club circa December ’76 – April ’77, where the Pistols, Clash and Banshees were known to kick it while Letts spun irie tunes. Dread Meets Punk Rockers Uptown features 16 tracks by King Tubby, Culture, Jah Stitch, Horace Andy, Lee “Scratch” Perry, U-Roy, Junior Murvin and many more.

The album even includes the apocalyptic Culture song “Two Sevens Clash”:

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Concert review of Eek-A-Mouse and Pato Banton at the Independent In San Francisco: Sunday January 13th 2008.

What joy to see Eek-A-Mouse and Pato Banton both in one magical night! Pato Banton is a spritely man who seems possessed by the music at times and lights up an entire city when he smiles. Eek-A-Mouse is larger than life with a subtle flair and he fills the stage as he sings and waves to people in the crowd. Both are huge crowd-pleasers – each interacts with the audience and encourages an irie atmosphere. Both singers pulled people out of the crowd to join them on stage – Pato pulled someone from the crowd to perform “King Step” with him, while Eek-A-Mouse pulled lots of people on stage to dance to “Border Patrol.” But that’s where the similarities end. From their backing bands to their backgrounds, these two reggae artists are worlds apart. The overall experience satiated every hope and expectation from a reggae show. ([More →])

A brand new documentary on reggae culture will reveal what really gwaan behind the scenes, on the road, backstage and inna di yard. The 90-minute flick is called “Reggae Uncensored” and features personal interviews with Buju Banton, Ninjaman, Sean Paul, Mavado, Beenie Man, Damien Marley, Macka Diamond, Sizzla, Junior Reid and many many more. The story is helped along by the doc’s host Chyna and English subtitles for the patois-challenged. ([More →])

The lyrics are en francais but the story told is universal. Here is the mini-movie for Admiral T’s “Ti Moun Ghetto” on the Guardian Angel Riddim:

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The video for Vybz Kartel – “My Scheme” on the Darker Shadow Riddim by Stephen “Di Genius” McGregor:

I live in the kind of haus where random zines and propaganda often appear and disappear like time-traveling nomadic visitors. This week, an issue of Cyclic Defrost from January 2005 appeared on the kitchen table. Cyclic Defrost, one of the most exciting and well produced zines on experimental music culture, is based in Australia; and the fact that I picked up an issue from January 2005 and thought it was something fresh will attest to how ahead of the game their content is. This particular issue featured an interview with DJ/Rupture about his travels, his music, his influences, etc. A Boston-native who was living in Barcelona at the time of the interview, Rupture is an extremely active experimentalist who mashes everything from world music to breakcore and makes it sound good. Rupture recently teamed up with one of NYC’s hottest producers, Matt Shadetek, to form the multi-media platform that we often Big Up on this site: Dutty Artz. ([More →])