Das Racist

RED DAWN

Finally, celebrate Goldenheart’s release

Make Time for These Hip-Hop Shows at CMJ 2012

By all means, enjoy the whispy waifs warbling their sensitive indie ballads up and down the city during CMJ. But make time for some hip-hop while you do. Here are a few acts worth your time. See Also: - Don't Miss These Bands At CMJ - Handy CMJ Flowchart Panel Selector

STREET TREATS

And the best vendor of 2012 is . . .

Q&A: Meyhem Lauren On Hotel Life, Ralph Lauren, And Why The Wu-Tang Clan Is The Best Rap Group Of All Time

Room 426 at the Embassy Suites hotel in Texas might not be up there with the great rap recording studios, but for two days earlier this year it was transformed into an impromptu hip-hop spot by Meyhem Lauren. While he was there, the Queens resident and long-time Action Bronson associate cut a new mi ... More >>

RAPPER'S DELIGHT

No sleep till Queens 
(by way of Manhattan)

Asshattery In 140 Characters Or Less: Which Musicians Are The Biggest Klouchebags?

If you're on the Internet you might have heard of Klout, a pseudo-scientific way for measuring the slippery ideal of "online influence." Taking into consideration a variety of factors, it has (despite its often being utterly gameable and as a result off the mark) turned into a way for people online ... More >>

Q&A: Big Baby Gandhi On Rap Battling At Nine, Rebelling In The Facebook Era, And Getting Das Racist's Attention With Negative YouTube Comments

"Gandhi Mandhi was the name that they called him/ Now the honeys call me Young Kama Sutra/ Old white people real mad 'cause I'm the future." That cheeky rap is from "Boogie Nights," a jubilant track on Das Racist affiliate Big Baby Gandhi's recent mixtape No1 2 Look Up 2. The free tape is packed wit ... More >>

GREEDHEAD IS GOOD

Big Baby Gandhi hits Glasslands

Stephen Colbert Is A Bit Miffed That His Pop Conference Paper Got Rejected

Next weekend, various stripes of music nerds (critics, academics, people who just like to think a lot) will descend on New York for the EMP Pop Conference, an annual mind-meld of pro and amateur musicologists that's taking place in our fair city for the first time. The conference, sponsored by the S ... More >>

COLOR BLIND

The AAWW evaluates 
multiculturalism (with YouTube)

STARRY NIGHT

Philip Glass curates the Tibet House jam

Pazz & Jop 2011: Michael Tedder On Fucked Up's Majesty, Danny Brown's Cunning Skills, And The Joy Formidable's Outro Power

To supplement this year's Pazz & Jop launch, Sound of the City asked a few critics to expand on the reasonings behind their voting. Here, Michael Tedder breaks down his entire ballot, and along the way he talks about about the operatic heights of Fucked Up, the shredding ability of Annie Clark and R ... More >>

Pazz & Jop 2011 Comments: Raves and Rants

Making cases for the great and the grating

Q&A: Pitchfork Reviews Reviews On Emailing Strangers And Publishing A Zine

​Almost a year and a half after starting a Tumblr dedicated to reviewing each of the five reviews that appear on Pitchfork every day, David Shapiro—colloquially known by the name of his blog, Pitchfork Reviews Reviews—is releasing The World's First Perfect Zine, a New York Times-ment ... More >>

Afro-Punk To Throw A CMJ Showcase Starring Death

​Last month Hurricane Irene washed away the Afro-Punk Festival, the weekend-long celebration in Commodore Barry Park that was supposed to have headliners like Cee Lo Green and Janelle Monáe and an undercard rounded out by YIMBY alums like Das Racist and Cerebral Ballzy. While there were hopes ... More >>

Spaceghostpurrp And ASAP Rocky Will Keep Santos Party House Weird Next Thursday Night

​ When previewing Main Attrakionz's August 26 show at the New Museum, I noted how in recent months the city has become a gathering point for many of the rest of the country's rap weirdos. This trend is likely to continue now that Das Racist's Heems (whose group is bringing Detroit's Danny Brow ... More >>

Das Racist

Live: Kool Keith Keeps It Weird At 285 Kent

​ Kool Keith w/Spanish Broads, New Optimism, Nine 11 Thesaurus 285 Kent Saturday, August 13 Better than: Getting eaten by a halfshark alligator. Hip-hop might seem increasingly shiny and sugar-coated, but the genre's bizarre and shadowy recesses haven't been completely abandoned yet. Eminem ... More >>

THE GREAT OUTDOORS

Get out of your steamy apartment and dance next to hot people

Q&A: Yeasayer's Chris Keating On USB-Stick Mixes, Bonding Over Weezer, And Why He Loves 'YMCA'

​ The past two years have been good to Brooklyn-based band Yeasayer. While they released their second album Odd Blood a little over a year ago, "Ambling Alp" and "O.N.E." shot them to stardom in the blogosphere and mainstream music circles in the fall of 2009. Their popularity was, in large pa ... More >>

BLACK-TIE OPTIONAL

Bands, beer pong, and a dance-off await

SXSW 2011 In Photos, Starring Odd Future, Trash Talk, Das Racist, and Other People Who Like To Break Things

You don't have to go home, Tyler, but you can't stay here. All photos by Rebecca Smeyne.​Another SXSW is in the books, granting great relief to those of us who were just subjected to five straight days of partying-related Twitter updates, and great sorrow to those who became accustomed to the ... More >>

SXSW Cheat Sheet 2011

An assortment of local bands heading to Texas for beer, BBQ, and maximum blogability

Week in Review: Top Train-Wreck Bloggers

Presenting... burger-core. Pic by Puja Patel.​In the week we spent holed up in Sound of the City headquarters preparing Pazz & Jop results, we still found time to report back from shows by former Talking Heads members Tom Tom Club, former Deee-Lite member, Lady Miss Kier, former the Pack membe ... More >>

Week in Review: Where For Art Thou, Masta Killa?

Ariel Pink says hi. Photo by Rebecca Smeyne.​In the week we found out exactly how many professional music critics can actually name all nine members of the Wu-Tang Clan (the results may surprise and depress you!), we also found ourselves accusing Kanye West of maybe ripping off a Dr. Dog video ... More >>

Zach Baron's Top 10 Albums of 2010

Guess who? Photo by Rebecca Smeyne.​Alright, let's do this, before I change my mind. With apologies to The-Dream, Sleigh Bells, Ted Leo, Kylesa, Swans, Zola Jesus, Marnie Stern, and all other vestiges of my punk rock past, and especially you Nicki Minaj, who missed both of my lists this year. ... More >>

Lil Wayne, Mötley Crüe, Gaslight Anthem, Das Racist, And Insane Clown Posse Are Playing Bamboozle 2011

​The annual multi-day Bamboozle Festival, held every spring in a lovely parking lot or three out at the New Meadowlands Sports Complex, mingles emo punks with metal dudes and crossover-minded rappers, to often hilariously uncomfortable effect: The first day of last year's version was co-headli ... More >>

Week In Review: You Know We Were Kidding About That Best Year Ever Thing, Right?

A thing that happened. Photo by Phil Freeman.​In the week we debated whether 2010 was the best year for music ever (you guys know that was a joke, right?), we pitted Chris Brown against Katy Perry, Titus Andronicus against LCD Soundsystem, Taylor Swift against M.I.A., and house music against h ... More >>

Week in Review: Who's Your Daddy?

​In the week we began our countdown of the 20 worst songs of 2010, we celebrated by mocking efforts from the Far East Movement, Ringo Starr, Godsmack, Trade Martin, and Lil Wayne. Where will Susan Boyle fall? Tune in next week and suffer more abuse until you find out.

Robyn Is Playing Radio City Music Hall

​It's been a real We Did It sort of day, with various Internet phenoms beknighted by various ivory-tower institutions that once seemingly loomed far above them: New Simplicity leading lights Cults signed to Columbia, Das Racist and Odd Future carefully considered by the New Yorker, the world f ... More >>

Week In Review: We Also Accept Your Future Apology In Advance

Everybody just stop yelling, OK? Photo by Daniel Snyder.​In the week we talked about Odd Future, kidnapping and murder, and why we sometimes like the things that repel us, we also saw the group live--alongside every other music critic in the city. They struck a weird balance to the other big r ... More >>

Here Is Das Racist's Best New Music Acceptance Speech

​Yesterday, local role models and our friends Das Racist snagged the coveted 8.7/Best New Music designation from Pitchfork for Sit Down, Man, the second of two dense, drug-addled, deceptively smart mixtapes the trio has produced this year. It was a national vindication of what we've known in N ... More >>

Week in Review: Sit Down, Man

​​​​Behold the amazing talents of Ryan Dombal.​In the week someone introduced us to the term "rap sabbatical," we got investigative, bringing news of the newfound hip-hop ban at Savalas (which sent DJ Ayres packing), HARD Fest's harsh words for M.I.A., Lil Wayne's prefe ... More >>

Presenting The Top 19 Most Ridiculous Lines on Das Racist's Sit Down, Man

​Even casual observers of this blog know of our great esteem for Das Racist, and our great excitement at the release yesterday of their latest mixtape, Sit Down, Man, featuring guests from Diplo to El-P, Boi-1da to Devo Springsteen. Samples include "People Are Strange" and "Return to Innocence ... More >>

Das Racist+BBU+Lionshare

Dipset's Jim Jones and Dame Dash Crashed Das Racist's Show at Death By Audio on Friday Night

Jim Jones gives punk rock the gas face. All photos by Rebecca Smeyne.​These are strange, wonderful times for hip-hop fans in New York. Former Roc-a-Fella mogul and Jay-Z cohort Damon Dash is running a modern day version of Warhol's factory out of a rented loft in Tribeca. Curren$y kills time a ... More >>

Das Racist And The Pitchfork Reviews Reviews Guy Are Speaking At Happy Ending Friday Night

​Never too early to begin planning your weekend, so alongside the New Yorker (!), let us draw your attention to Refresh Refresh Refresh, the reoccurring lecture/reading series at Happy Ending on the L.E.S. wherein online dignitaries regale us with "the stories of what happens in the moments be ... More >>

Bushwick's Party Expo Is Still Having (Dry) Shows, Despite Cop Shut Down

all photos by Nate "Igor" SmithNYPD pays a visit to the Street Boners book-release party Last Thursday, the NYPD shut down our favorite Wu-Tang-endorsed, Superman-marked DIY space, Party Expo, during the release party for Gavin McInnes's Street Boners book. Wyldlife and Das Racist were scheduled to ... More >>

Tonight! Dan Deacon, Jimmy Fallon, Das Racist, Simian Mobile Disco, Reverend Horton Heat, And Dylan Fest

Tonight, Dan Deacon, the life-affirming ("Who wants to live forever!?") king of spazzcore, plays the Cake Shop alongside Ponytail's Dustin Wong, a comparably minimalistic acoustic doodler. Over at Party Expo, the ubiquitous Das Racist celebrate Street Boners' hipster fashion joke book, while Briti ... More >>

Tonight! Beach Fossils, Woods w/ the Joshua Light Show, Phosphorescent, Everybody Was In The French Resistance...Now!, These are Powers, Buzzcocks, Das Racist, And Lady Gaga w/ Elton John

Tonight, The Deli's "Best of NYC" festival kicks off with Beach Fossils, the sensitive, disaffectedly distorted surf bums with a mobile drummer. At the Abrons Art Center, the Joshua Light Show splashes lava-lamp gurgling, polka-dotted hallucinogen projections atop Woods, a lo-fi folk act whose psy ... More >>

Week in Review: Fist Fight in the Parking Lot

In the week a chipped tooth kept Lil Wayne out of jail and a secretive, proprietary Billboard chart made a success out of his new, abysmal Rebirth, we pulled our Paul Wall grills out of the closet, just in case. You never know when your hood pass might get pulled, you know? Care for a Sightings p ... More >>

This Week in the Voice

​Pazz & Jop needs no introduction. The main page, the albums, the singles, the ballots, and essays by Sean Fennessey, Mike Powell, Rich Juzwiak, Chuck Eddy, Zach Baron, Maura Johnston, Rob Harvilla, Mikael Wood, Clover Hope, and Das Racist. The celebrity sudoku known as blind items is a mena ... More >>

A Nightlife (And Ice-Skating) Enthusiast's Guide To Thanksgiving Eve

NYC is a town of transplants, a fact that's never more obvious than during the holiday season. While thousands of New Yorkers take off work early and spend hours upon hours in traffic, at the airport, and stuck in train stations, we think those of you who are left in town should make the most of i ... More >>

This Week's Voice: BLK JKS, Pearl Jam, Brooklyn Book Festival, Bright Star, The Informant!, Will Ryman, and More

Vinyl Life: Not just hitting the space bar. Photo by David Herron.​In this week's Village Voice, Rob Harvilla spends an evening at S.O.B.'s with BLK JKS and returns, a bit overwhelmed: "No band on the planet right now is overplaying with the titanic, fearless, stupendously excessive gusto of S ... More >>

Here's an iPhone Snap of Jim Jarmusch Watching Caribou Vibration Ensemble at All Tomorrow's Parties

My terrible iPhoneI would suck as a member of the paparazzi. As a taste of the absolutely epic experience that was All Tomorrow's Parties New York this past weekend, I give you an iPhone snap of Jim Jarmusch watching Caribou Vibration Ensemble yesterday afternoon. (It's no Mary Gaitskill rapping Da ... More >>

Pig Destroyer, Eyehategod Now Playing a Suddenly Much More Metal CMJ 2009

​CMJ 2009 has just announced another wave of performers: The xx, Pig Destroyer, Eyehategod, Patrick Watson, Z-Trip, Midnight Juggernauts, Saul Williams, Janelle Monae, Superdrag, Miles Benjamin Anthony Robinson, Bear Hands, and UUVVWWZ will join Japandroids, the Very Best, Das Racist, Pissed J ... More >>

Today In Ill-Advised Attempts to Summarize Youth Culture: "There's Only One Viable Avant-Garde Art Form Nowadays, And It's Called Indie Rock"

Our Dylan, in action. So this is making the rounds lately, and aside from that first quote (the first line of the piece, following a please-young-people-don't-kill-me disclaimer), key sentiments include: * "Three stages were surrounded by hipsters, and for a short while I actually hung out with D ... More >>

Islands

Week in Review: I Have a Blog, This is What Happens.

Rebecca SmeyneThese Are Powers' Pat getting his temperature taken in China​ In the week leading up to All Points Wet (har har), vandals insulted the word "gay" in describing Coldplay, we came up with suggestions for a Beastie Boys tribute on Friday at All Points West, and there were plenty of ... More >>

Other Perspectives on the Big Show: "Do Not Go to Siren Fest Hungover!"

Combing through various Twitter/blog Siren dispatches, I am struck by this treatise, from Pop Tarts Suck Toasted (splendid name, bizarre sentiment), which laments the author's recent alcohol intake but features some excellent pics of the Future of the Left bassist's leap into the crowd (one of my ... More >>