The Artistry of J-Dilla

James Dewitt Yancey (February 7, 1974 – February 10, 2006)

on the birthday and three days before the anniversary of the death of J-Dilla i thought i would bring up the artistry of the music that he made.  as a person with experience "making beats" i would say i am authorized to put my two cents in as to what is and what is not good quality production.  true, all music is subjective to the taste of the listener, but there's a difference between knowing something is catchy and something that has had time and expertise put into it.  the way that dilla chopped beats was pretty far ahead of it's time... from listening you can tell that there is some complicated arranging of samples going on there.  artistry is all about the details...

the album donuts is dilla's opus.  it is the album that best exemplifies what dilla was all about.. what's the expression? "often imitated never duplicated" right?  check out this track for an example of how dilla manipulates a sample to take it from a loop into its own completely new thing:

workinonit

j-dilla rest in peace.

you were and still are an inspiration to a whole generation of beat makers, and provided us with some dope music.

 

Nas/Al Hirt Re-Edit "Harlem-Queens Hendoo" dj jesster

put together a couple of my favs here.  the al hirt song "harlem hendoo" and nas' "if i ruled the world" for this one.  it's a second attempt at ableton live for me.  trying to chop up the original, then add some equally chopped drums and a vocal flavor from the nas song "if i ruled the world" featuring lauren hill, aka l-boogie.  it's not perfect but it's what i came out with tonight.
it's not exactly what i set out to do, but i like it enough to post it.  nas is definitely in my top 7 for emcees.  al hirt is not in my top 7 for trumpet guys but i've loved this sample ever since de la used it for "ego trip" .. i'm starting to sense a trend here.. one of these days i'll have this ableton thing worked out better... probably never as good as i had that sp1200 mastered, but at least better than now.  hope you dig it.
peace,
jesster

Harlem-Queens Hendoo - DJ jesster by jesstermix77

The Dirty Rappers "Fowl Play" spoof on Deep Cover by Snoop and Dre

this past sunday was the violas. it's the award show/hoiday party for the village theatre... this has been a very interesting year for the guys at the VT, mostly bad but with tons of promise at the end.  we are moving to a new space in 2012 and just launched a very successful kickstarter campaign to raise money for the move.  people are very excited about the promise that 2012 holds.. thus making for a great violas to end 2011.

one of the cool things about the violas is that some of the guys/girls put together video presentations.  bleez has always had an idea of doing a song called "fowl play" about the places to get cheap eats in the old 4th ward.. sort of as a sequel to the song i did about east atlanta called "eat that chicken."  it's basically a spoof video on the dre and snoop song "deep cover."  we shot a video last weekend and i edited this the other night.

the Village Theatre on kickstarter

please help out to support something that i support. the village theatre is having to move from their current location to a new space. the current location is getting demolished but this is a good thing. the guys at the VT are using this as an opportunity to move up in the world of improv comedy.

in an effort to help raise the necessary funds to make this move possible the guys are using a site called kickstarter.com .. they are offering free tickets to shows and other great promo items as incentives to help get the new location off the ground. please check it out and show the guys your support.

http://kck.st/tKT944

thanks

Joe Sample "In All My Wildest Dreams" DJ jesster re-edit

one of the records in my vinyl collection that i always felt was underrated was a joe sample album called "rainbow seeker."  it had a hidden gem on there called "in all my wildest dreams."  at first i just thought it was cool 'cause it was the sample that de la soul used on the album "de la soul is dead" for their WRMS skits..  but as i got to listening to the song i started to appreciate it for what it was.

lately i've been working with ableton live a little bit.  i'm still figuring it out and i have a long way to go before i would consider myself proficient, but this was a decent start.  i went home to boston last weekend and put this together mostly on the flight.  my idea was to take a funky jazz kinda song and make a DJ friendly edit of it that you could use to start or end a party.  this seemed like a good place to start.  i warped the track and basically just added some drums and a bassline.  i wouldn't say i made the song better because it was fine as it was.. i just kinda DJ'ed it up.

since this worked out pretty good, as far as i'm concerned, i'm going to probably try and do some more.. i've already got a few classics from the crates in mind.
thanks for listening.
peace,

jesster

In All My Wildest Dreams (jesster ReEdit) by jesstermix77

Rep Your Hood new website

so these shirts that i've been working on with jordan have come a pretty long way.. what started with just an EAV design has busted out to a line of shirts with 7 different designs.  in anticipation of the response from the chomp and stomp we've re-vamped our site: http://repyourhoodapparel.com/ ... check it out and let us know what you think.. 

www.repyourhoodapparel.com