Ok... so if you haven't already seen them, be prepared for some good news. A new label called No Sleep Recordings, with some big-time distribution through Traffic Entertainment, have released two compilations of vintage, unreleased material from Godfather Don and Kwest tha Madd Ladd! Woot! And from what I hear, the sound quality is top notch. So, go get them. You want them.Ok, now here's the REALLY BAD decision of the title that has be so incredibly frustrated with the guys at No Sleep who put this together - Both of these albums are chock full of previously released cuts. And both artists have way more than enough great unreleased tracks to take their place and fill the albums. The official write up for the Kwest tha Madd Ladd's These Are My Unreleased Tracks says, "he recorded over 50 songs, many of which were not present on his debut." Over fifty. So why have they filled the CD with stuff like the old "What's the Reaction?" remix and the tracks from his Gub-Ment Cheese 12" instead? "What's the Reaction" remix? That's not even rare!
I could see if he only had, like, 5 or 6 unreleased tracks, and so they decide to fill the album with "bonus" 12" remixes and such... But this way we'll still probably never hear most of those 50 genuinely unreleased tracks!
It's the same with Godfather Don's The Ninties Sessions. It's FULL of tracks from his old Hydra 12"'s that all us fans already have. They've even included 5 of the 6 tracks from his recent Slave of New York EP. Meanwhile, we know there are a grip of other Don cuts that have never seen the light of day. For instance, there's about 10 really great Cenubites songs I've got radio dubs of - at least as good as on the original, classic Cenubites EP - and they have never been released! Those would have been wonderful to have included on this album.
Anyway, both albums do have some quality recordings of some actual unreleased tracks... so they're worth picking up. And a little extra good news: according to their myspace page, "for all you fellow vinyl junkies, we will be releasing several limited 12" samplers of music previously unavailable on wax." So that's promising. But, man, No Sleep's decision to keep us from hearing those genuinely unreleased tracks in favor of "What's the Reaction" remix? FUCKING WACK!!
Update: No Sleep has addressed the issue of the other Kwest tracks, saying "we don't have them and sadly they may never be obtained. Unfortunately, Kwest did not keep good copies from back then. We were EXTREMELY fortunate to get DAT copies of what is on the CD from Dan Charnas himself. He does not have everything either but shared everything he did keep. Kwest constantly tells us about additional songs and concepts that he worked on, but are now lost to the ages...The album currently consists of material recorded and left off his debut album, as well as songs that were recorded soon after his album for the EP he was working on. He opted out of his deal before the release of this EP. A fan can tell which songs are from the EP by the noticed change in his style and wordplay (i.e. "Bust 'Em Off" and "Why Me?"). In short, what was found is what was released on this CD....To make the purchase stronger we added the 12" only stuff to please long time fans.."
They also addressed the similar topic of Don's other unreleased material: "as a huge fan of Stretch and Bobbito, I know (as most other fans do) about the deluge of material that was out there...Again, Don doesn't have copies of a lot of things anymore. He does have unreleased Cenobites material but that could not be included without involving Kool Keith. We are currently working on getting that stuff out to you too, so stay tuned! Hopefully through other sources, we can get you more of the solo material as well. Again, sound quality is key with these releases and our goal is hopefully share as many songs as we can in proper CD format."
I have to say, these are pretty satisfactory answers, and the fact that they're working on releasing more of Don's stuff is certainly promising. Apparently there are still issues of them breaking an exclusivity deal that Don had with DWG for material from their Slave of New York EP, but I guess I'll leave that between them. So good looking, No Sleep, for speaking on these issues and I'll certainly be keeping an eye out for your next Don release.
Tags: Godfather Don, Kwest tha Madd Ladd
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