Tag: Ill Flow

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Stacy is in town!

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After a really crappy week I was surprised by my old friend and former music producer, Stacy Burkett, who called me out of the blue. He was back in NYC for a few days and was reacquainting himself with NYC. It has been probably five more years since we have been in the same place so it was great to catch up with him. The last time we spoke at length was after he found one of my New York Cine podcast sessions online and heard me discussing our time working on my hip-hop demo over 20 years back.

Truth be told, he needs to move his @$$ back to NYC after so many years on the left coast.

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Happy Birthday to The Microphone Fiend

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Today is the birthday of William Griffith, better known in hip hop circles as Rakim, also known as Rakim Allah, a.k.a. the microphone fiend, a.k.a. the God MC, a.k.a the Greatest MC of ALL TIME in my humble opinion. He is turning 47 today.

Rakim took his name from Sun God RA and the ancient Egyptian kingdom of KIM. He was one of the first MCs to move from simplified verses into a style that blended complex metaphors with internal and multisyllabic rhymes culminating in a laid back delivery. At a time when other contemporaries like LL Cool J, KRS-One, and Run-DMC. delivered their vocals with screams and force, Rakim defied those conventions by developing a flowing style capable of verbally deconstructing an opponent all while making it seem like he wasn’t even breaking a sweat.

When he released the track “Follow the Leader” and I heard how Continue reading “Happy Birthday to The Microphone Fiend”