Mikah's Lost Love

In 1999, Freestyle Fellowship's Mikah Nine released his solo debut, It's All Love, on Pure Hip Hop, Inc. Like PEACE's debut, it's a very home-made release: a CD-R with Mikah's name sharpie'd on it, and artwork printed on color paper for the case. It was pretty limited, and even marked "ROUGH MIXES FOR PROMOTIONAL USE ONLY." But these Fellowship cats were once major label artists, so again, like with PEACE's album, you know this had to get re-released, right?

And re-released it was! In 2001, Mary Joy Recordings (a Japanese label that specialized in lyrical, underground US artists) finally picked it up and put it out a professional version with a newly subtitled name, It's All Love: American Nightmare.  But Mary Joy albums could be tough to find in the states (most of us just ordered 'em off the internet), so The Goodlife collective's label decided to give it another release in 2002. And since all of these releases were CD-only, Twentyfour Seven Records selected seven choice cuts and pressed them on vinyl in 2003. That's a lot of It's All Loves.

But the Pure Hip Hop version had something none of the others had: a different track-listing and some unique songs.  Again, like PEACE's album, songs got switched around, making the original pretty essential.  Actually, wait... both versions (the Mary Joy and Afterlife versions are identical, content-wise) have 19 tracks.  So that means both versions have unique songs and are essential.  Clever marketing, record labels.

So let's look at what the later, more accessible versions have first.  Most of the songs on are the same across the board, naturally, albeit in a different order.  But two differ (and no, the vinyl EP doesn't feature any of the exclusives from either previous release... it does have an exclusive Bonus Beat, though).  On the American Nightmare version we have:

18. On the Line - This is a pretty fresh song, that's never been released anywhere else, with Mikah kicking a pretty non-stop flow over a really fresh beat by Joseph Leimberg, who produced all of the American Nightmare version, and most of the original version. You may know Leimberg better by another name, Dr. Soose. Yeah, he was the trumped player in Mad Kap! Well, apparently, his talents weren't limited to just that one instrument, because he laid down something nice and perfect for Mikah to flow over.

19. Outro - Yeah, this is a bit of a "who cares?" one. It's essentially a reprise of one of the album tracks, "Come Up Off My Love." Nice to have as a bonus if you're getting both versions, but "On the Line" is the only real reason to score hunt down the a later version.

Okay, so now let's look at the original's two exclusives.

4. Come Up Off My Love (FJ) - There are actually two mixes of this song on the original album, one subtitled "FJ" and on subtitled "JL." The initials stand for the producers - so "JL" is Joseph Leimberg, of course, and "FJ" is for Fat Jack. To be honest, both versions sound a bit different than what we hear on the later versions (remember, after all, these are rough mixes), and none of them stand out. They're all very low-key productions with Mikah doing some not-too-impressive singing.  Still, if you dug the later ones, you'll probably enjoy the Fat Jack one, too; as it captures the same feel.

14. Homegirl - An exclusive song, never released anywhere else. The beat has a really deep, soulful feel - I don't know if any of the music is live instrumentation, or if Joseph just did an excellent job of making it sound that way; but either way it works. Unfortunately, Mikah's singing isn't up to the track (his singing was a problem with a lot of his material at this phase in his career), but the beat manages to carry him.

So, in the end, it's pretty much all good news. Both versions give you some exclusives, so you can be happy owning either or both versions. But the exclusives on the original aren't so great that, if you're not a huge Mikah fan, you'll have to drive yourself crazy trying to hunt down an OG mix. In fact, the newer one easily has the best exclusive.  So casual fans can just pick up the later one and feel satisfied. But for the hardcore, there is more out there to be found; you can even pick apart the variances between the rough and later mixes, and maybe find a new preference among the other album tracks  And Mikah got to sell his album multiple times to many of the same people. Everybody basically wins.

Los Harmless

When Haiku De' Tat formed, it seemed like a perfect matched based on unspoken but inherent understanding between the artists and their audiences. We were gonna get the live music and rhythms of Abstract Rude combined with the lyrical wizardry of Aceyalone, and the result would be a west coast mainstay. But in the end, only one half of the pairing held up their end, as we see here on their first single.

See, unfortunately, this was just about the time Acey went from being the wild freestyle MC whose audience was outraged that Book of Human Language only got 2 Mics to the MC who could phone it in because he'd already "proven himself," and whose records immediately found their way to the discount bin. I mean really, the lead track tells the whole, depressing story.

"Los Dangerous." This was their attention-getting 1997 debut. They're rocking over the Dre and Snoop's infamous "Deep Cover" groove... the same infamous bassline, the same drums but weaker drums.* Abstract replaces the piano stabs with a sick saxophone sample and a sing-song hook that blends perfectly with the track - it's like they were originally written together. Ab also kicks the first verse, which is ok... heavy on cliche and sort of exactly what you'd expect from any west coast rapper flowing over "Deep Cover." And finally Acey comes on to drop a quick few, mediocre bars. The hook is sung about fifty more times, and we're done, ball decidedly dropped.

It's not that Ace's verse sucked so much (although it was kinda lame), but that this should've been where they excelled. When you take what's already become one of the most beloved gangsta rap beats in history, you know you're not going to blow anyone's mind with the music - we've already got that single! So taking a beat like that, it's like you're saying, "well, sure, you've heard this before, but wait till you here what WE gon' do with it," and come with something next level. This should have been underground hip-hop's answer to the mainstream, "oh you like your big time Snoop Doggy Dogg, huh? Well, you won't believe how much more talented true, underground MCs are!" But instead they just kinda fart around on the track for a couple minutes, and you're left thinking, "well, ok I guess; but I'd rather hear Snoop's verse now, please." Pretty fucking underwhelming. I wonder if this isn't what inspired Big Pun to record "Twinz" (also 1997), like, "you dummies; this is how you do it!" ...That, or Haiku bit the concept of rhyming over "Deep Cover" from him. Frankly, either is possible.

Oh well, at least they included the instrumental on this single, so you can get "Deep Cover" with the sax sample, and you can rap your own, better version. ;)

That's one of two exclusives on this. The other is the B-side, "Kaya (Extended Version)." On the album, "Kaya" is a short, little 2-minute number with a nice groove, a simple hook, and that's about it. Here, it's extended to a full-length song, mainly by repeating the hook about a thousand more times. They did also add a quick verse from Acey to this mix, but I mean like two to three setences quick. Otherwise, it's all about them saying the word "Kaya" as many times as they possibly can, "got to have Kaya, now, Kaya, Kaya. Got to have Kaya, yeah; Kaya, Kaya. Kaya Kaya kaya kayakayakayakayakayakayakayakayakaya!!!!!"** Ahhh!

Oh yeah, the hook is also a direct lift from Bob Marley. And to be fair, the original album version isn't too bad for a cover. Instrumentally, they do something different with it and create their own little groove. If you just take it as a throw-away tune used as album filler with low expectations attached to it, it's kinda cool. But sadly, this is just another testament to Ab Rude doing something and Acey letting a good opportunity flounder. This beat with some ill rhymes would've been dope. But, sadly I have to report that the shorter album version is actually the more definitive version of this song; because all the extended version has to offer is repetition.

Finally, the single rounds itself out with "Still Rappin'," another album track. Again, there's some decent instrumentation, but generally it's a pretty boring song. And if the title led you to believe "finally, this is where Acey is gonna shine," well, it isn't. It's mostly Ab singing, and he sounds good... And Mikah 9 makes a guest appearance here, but it's basically thrown away, since he and Acey both direct their energies towards singing like Rude. Plus the subject matter is boring (they are underground rappers who stay true to rapping underground), and like with the other tracks, the hook takes up a good 50% of the song. Again, it was okay as album filler, but it really didn't need to be pulled out and highlighted on a single.

And that's it. I don't know. I was thinking about pulling out my copy of the full album and relistening to it after this; but now I don't think I'll bother. That's usually not the effect you want your lead single to have, is it?


*Update 9/14/11 - As has been pointed out in the comments; they're not the same drums. It's not even difficult to notice the difference, so shame on me. These drums are played live and seriously overuse the cymbal. They're softer and more roll-y and just generally aren't as good.

**Ok, that might be a slight exaggeration.