As NEMS closes out 2022, a year that saw him breakthrough in a major way; social media sensation, securing brand deals with Puma and Monster Energy Drink, launching his own Podcast, Outside With Gorilla NEMS, which airs on the Revolt Podcast Network and Seasons three and four of The Crew League Basketball and appeared on three episodes of Wild N’ Out, he does so with one last single, “Don’t Ever Disrespect Me,” featuring Ghostface Killah.
“Don’t Ever Disrespect Me” is taken from NEMS forthcoming collaborative album, Rise Of The Silverback, with Scram Jones which will be released in the 1Q of 2023.
The producer behind the iconic song “Girls, Girls, Girls,” Just Blaze shares what it was like to bring the song to life, while taking a deep dive into the making of Jay-Z’s hit album The Blueprint.
Recently, legendary producer, DJ, architect of early 2000’s hip hop and pioneer of sampling Just Blaze talked with lyricist and emcee Talib Kweli on the People’s Party podcast to discuss his influences, impact and journey with music.
The iconic turn tablelist also dished the massive influence the legendary producer, Pete Rock has on his production. Blaze and Kweli also discuss the close mutual friends they share in the business and talk about J Period’s spiritual decision to ditch sampling around the time of his contribution to the Black Star album and how that led to Blaze getting the bulk of his record collection.
Find out Blaze’s take on why Kanye’s stated that he was his arch nemesis while they both were working as the chief producers at Roc-A-Fella and so much more!
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Twenty-seven years ago today, one of the greatest conceptual albums in the history of Hip Hop was released. Raekwon The Chef released his debut album, Only Built 4 Cuban Linx, guest-starring his right-hand man, Ghostface Killah aka Tony Starks.
Released on the Loud/RCA imprint and produced exclusively by The Abbott himself, Only Built For Cuban Linx was available on cassette, which was manufactured and distributed in a violet casing, thus, spawning its nickname. The album’s influence was tremendous on other landmark LPs of that era including Jay-Z’s Reasonable Doubt and Nas’ It Was Written, with heavy mafia references, the introduction of Cristal to the hood, and constant usage of the 5% Nation’s language of Supreme Mathematics and Supreme Alphabets in the lyrical content. The album also introduced the other WTC members via their aliases i.e. RZA is Bobby Steele, Ghost as “Tony Starks”, Deck is “Rollie Fingers”, Meth is, of course, “Johnny Blaze”, Masta Killa as “Noodles”, the Genius as “Maximillian” the Chef as “Lou Diamonds” and all together known as the “Wu-Gambinos”, which is the 16th track on the journey.
The Four and a Half Mic Classic’s(writer Nicholas Poluhoff) storyline plays out as a film, using many samples of John Woo’s Killer as an interlude between several tracks. The album contained several classic singles that had lives of their own in others spaces. The platinum-selling album yielded legendary hits such as the radio/female friendly “Ice Cream”, the inspirational “Glaciers Of Ice”, the genre sparking “Criminology”, which gave birth to many “Shark N****s”, which was an ode to biters and commanding them to “be original”. Ghost even shot a dart at the late B.I.G., accusing the slain legend of biting Nas’ pre-adolescent album cover concept. The album concludes with a positive build from the late Popa Wu aka Freedum Allah, which reminisces about the past life of a young, crime Raekwon who evolved into the multi-faceted individual seen today, which ironically is called “North Star(Jewels)”.
This platinum-selling time capsule is a must-have for all real Hip Hop fans, aficionados, critics, and historians. Salute to the entire Wu, especially Rae, Starks, and the RZA for this gem. We will forever be in debt to you guys for the “Purple Tape”.
What comes to mind when you think of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles? The Statue of Liberty, pizza, maybe the Manhattan skyline? All of these are defining traits of New York City, which doubles as the home to our favorite fictional group of reptiles. The Turtles have always embodied New York in a way that few other fictional characters in pop culture do.
With Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge coming out, the publishers over at Dotemu knew early on they wanted one of the game’s many themes to be the Turtles’ love for the city. They also wanted tie something in that paid tribute to the era when the Ninja Turtles were at their peak. So, they looked around and quickly realized who they wanted to partner with the Wu-Tang Clan — specifically Ghostface Killah and Raekwon.
“We knew that, for the soundtrack of the Turtles, we wanted to have guests,” Dotemu’s Adrien Marie tells UPROXX. “We wanted to have big guest stars because it makes sense for the project and we wanted to raise the bar. Adding to what we have already been doing, we have a lot of different artists and guest stars, but we wanted to go further into mainstream music … we also were thinking about the fact that TMNT and hip-hop makes sense. A deep part of our perception is that it’s very anchored in there, it’s in the TMNT DNA, to have something hip-hop, and so we were thinking about hip-hop artists. And it’s New York, so we didn’t want to have any West Coast artists. So, our thought process was that we need to have East Coast hip-hop artists from the ’90s and the Wu-Tang Clan was at the top of the list.”
Of course, the Wu-Tang Clan was formed in Staten Island. There are few people in music that better represent New York than them, so having Ghostface Killah and Raekown involved in the game was an obvious decision. So much of Shredder’s Revenge is about capturing the original spirit of the Turtles that many people grew up with in the ’80s and ’90s. From having a new rendition of the original theme song playing in the opening cinematic, to the entire game’s style, it’s a trip down memory lane for everyone involved.
So how exactly did Dotemu and the developers over at Tribute Games involve them? The spoiler-free answer is that it does play in the game and it’s one of the best moments of the entire game, but there are some secrets to the song that we don’t want to reveal without a spoiler warning.
A disclaimer: If you plan on playing Shredder’s Revenge then be warned that the following few paragraphs will have spoilers for both the game and music.
The track that Ghostface Killah and Raekwon made plays during the boss fight with Shredder towards the end of the game. It’s a really cool moment, because Shredder joins in a little earlier than expected. It’s a fun fight and the best thing to do is blast the music and enjoy the moment to its fullest, but there’s a fun little secret that Marie told us about what the song is supposed to represent.
“So, the idea was to have a rap battle,” Marie says. “Cyrille [Lambert] wanted the first part to be Shredder’s, which is why the first part of the song is from the point of view of Shredder, and then the other side of the track is the reverse. It’s when, after all of the menacing lyrics from Shredder, you have the Turtles fighting back. This is why the second part of the track is the Turtles saying, ‘No, this is this is our fight and we’re going to win.’ Based on that, Cyrille worked with Kid Katana records, and Tee Lopes, the composer of the soundtrack of the game, Tee created a beat, then Raekown and Ghostface recorded their parts.”
The song is a delight, it’s reminiscent of the infamous “Go Ninja” scene from the second movie. If they ever decide to make another Ninja Turtles movie, please let them do a battle rap scene and bring back the Wu-Tang Clan to make a cameo.
Cowabunga, motherf*ckers! Wu-Tang Clan and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles together at last?! You gotta figure the Turtles still owe us after having to weather the ’90s storm of the Vanilla Ice x TMNT“Go Ninja Go” collab. The dawn is now upon us as Ghostface Killah and Raekwon have officially penned a new track for theTeenage Mutant Ninja Turtled: Shredder’s Revenge video game and it’s awesome, dude.
Titled “We Ain’t Came To Lose,” the track is bona fide motivation for the sticks in the beat-em-up-style game. Ghostface comes in hot right off the bat, spitting, “Nice to meet ya, now I’m here to beat ya / With full force, mess up ya facial features. Hasta la vista, I’m sonnin’ all y’all, Little Caesar’s / All y’all stuff ya face with is pizza, pizza.”
It’s clear how natural this marriage of timeless city dwellers is before Ghost drops easily the best line in the track with, “My stomach cringes from all o’ ya fake ninjas,” to drive the point home. Raekwon The Chef is on the hook, repeating, “We ain’t came to lose,” like a mantra, leaving any shred of Vanilla Ice’s memory in the dust.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtled: Shredder’s Revenge is due out on June 16 via Tribute Games and Dotemu and will be available on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Microsoft Windows, and Linux. Peep the audio of “We Ain’t Came To Lose” above.
On June 3, 1997, the Witty Unpredictable Talent And Natural Game gave the world a double dose of their killer bee stings when they dropped the Wu Tang Forever double CD LP.
The album was executively produced by the Abbott himself, RZA, along with assistance from 4th Disciple, Inspectah Deck and True Master. Released to the public under the Loud/RCA imprint with direction from the illustrious Steve Rifkind, this album was certified gold in its first week and was certified 4X platinum by the RIAA within four months of its release.
Some of the hits include the album’s lead, “Triumph”, “Older Gods”, “Duck Season” and the prophetic title of their current album, A Better Tomorrow. The Clan just celebrated 20 years together in 2013 looking back on two decades of music. The Clan is also currently working on an album with Ghostface Killah running the show.
Peace to the entire Clan for giving us such a monumental project without the assistance of radio/video play, which is the mark of true artistry. Salute to RZA, Divine, Power, Steve Rifkind and everyone who helped make this album a timeless classic!
On this day in 1970, rapper/actor Dennis Coles aka Ghostface Killah was born. The chamber of eccentricity comes almost exclusively from Tony Starks, who has been compared to the likes of Slick Rick with his signature, six inch high eagle bracelet and other excessively gaudy jewels.
At the foundation of the Wu saga, Ghost’s face was unseen and wasn’t revealed until the Chef’s Only Built For Cuban Linx classic “Purple Tape”. With ten solid solo albums under his belt, Ghostdini continues to impact the game along with his WTC family.
The Source Magazine would like to send a super shout out to the “Ironman” of Hip Hop on his degree day! Enjoy!
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