Damn It Feels Good To Be A Gangsta

Camp Lo's "Uptown Saturday Night" mixed R.D./In My Lifetime-era Jay-Z production (courtesy of Ski, who produced Dead Presidents) with Wu Gambino stream-of-consciousness raps and flows Pun'd be proud of. In short I liked it, with Sparkle my favourite track. They've leaked a new single: Black Hollywood & I'm looking forward to the comeback.

Big Narstie v Coldplay - Spun A Web remix is a beautiful example of what happens when you mix grime and piano rock, taken from Narstie's "What's the Story Brixton Glory", where he also raps over the likes of Oasis, The Verve and (gulp) James Blunt.

j_dilla-say_it_feat_taraach_and_exile is from duke's mostly instrumental "Jay Loves Japan" EP. Like James Brown and Ray Charles in recent times, I had love for Dilla while he was alive, but sadly didn't fully appreciate how important he was until he had passed on. Phat Kat's "Nasty Ain't It" has another sick Dilla beat. It's from his new Carte Blanche album, which along with Black Milk's Popular Demand shows Detroit repping in '07.

Mobb Deep's "The Illest" was off their "Free Agents" mixtape in 2002, which for me was 1 of their better efforts this decade. Like too many rappers these days, P and Hav seemed more comfortable here, making the songs they wanted to make, than on their albums 2nd guessing what record buyers want and ending up producing mediocre common-denominator music. It's an epic song that, played loud, has a similar impact on me to "P.S.A." and "What U Know": makes me feel like I'm THA SHIT. A great quality for any song to have.

R.Kelly feat Snoop - Double Up. As recently as "Chocolate Factory" and "Happy People" I enjoyed Kells' albums, but since then either he's fallen off or I've outgrown him (my favourite Boondocks episode might have something to do with that) or both. Still, this track, though predictable, picks up where "That's That" left off and is hard to hate.