Two For One Friday & The Return Of The Unreleased Gems: Part 4

It's Friday once again, and we know what that means. Let me apologize for the lack of posts on my part this week. Computers will be my downfall, I know it. I'm going to end up throwing it out my window of my apartment and hit someone in the head three stories down below. So needless to say I've had problems uploading albums this week. Even my work computer has been uncooperative. Luckily for me at least one of my partners is holding it down this weekend with a lil' international flava.


Omniscience- The Raw Factor LP
http://www.sendspace.com/file/o57iz9

OMNISCIENCE - THE RAW FACTOR

Year: 1995Label: East/West Records

1. Intro 2. Maintain 3. Greatest MC In The World 4. Who Is Down With Us 5. Lost In The Music 6. Everybody's Got An Ego 7. Love To The Crews 8. Bumpheads 9. Touch Y'all 10. Amazin' 11. My Main Man 12. Big Kap (Interlude) 13. Get Our Dicks Sucked 14. Act Like You Know 15. Lady's Freestyle 16. We Do It Like This 17. Rules Of The Game 18. Stage Domination 19. Fuck The Critics (Interlude) 20. Causin' Terror 21. Halfway

Thanks to ShareAndSshareAlike for the track listing

Today we'll jump into one of the harder to find albums out there, at least before the mp3 boom, and even now it's not the easiest thing to find. Before I get into this, I must thank 6MWTD for dropping gem on the cocaine blunts boards this spring.

Omni was an MC coming straight outta of North Cacalack (North Carolina for those who don't know). Finding info on him is rather difficult, most of what I tracked down came from two sites, the legendary Vinyl Addicts (RIP) and a site that I never knew about before www.smalltimehustle.com that had the most info about Omni that I've ever seen.

He first appeared on the scene sometime in the early 90's as part of a group called Funke Leftovers with another North Carolina pioneer The Rhythm Fanatic from the early Bizzie Boys crew that also included Ski of Roc-a-Bloc fame. The duo dropped a single called "I Like Girls" in 92'. Around 93' Omniscience ventured out as a solo artist and dropped "The Funky One Liner" EP. The EP featured four tracks, two for sure appears on this LP.

On the strength of that EP, Omniscience got signed to Elektra's East/West Recordings, which would turn out to be the kiss of the death for Omni, among many others during this period of Elektra's mishandling of classic underground hero's. He would drop the underground gem of 95' with his first single "Amazin'" (pictured up above). He would then drop a second single "Touch Y'all" which featured a remix w/ Sadat X, which Smoov from Vinyl Addicts posted up during his hayday. Shortly after the release of the second single, Elektra would do to him that they did to 8Off Agullah, Supernatural and a host of others, they shelved the album and dropped them from the label. As far as I can gather, the album was shipped as a promo to DJ's and the such during the time and that's probably where this came from.

Omniscience sounds like (voice wise) a mix of buckshot, canibus, and someone else I'm still trying to put my finger on. Lyrically he's pretty nice with his. He drops lot's of one liners ("I'm not Denny's, I serve many brothers") guess thats why he calls himself the "Funky One Liner". Production wise, as far as I can tell, there were at least three people/crew's involved in the production of the album, The Rhythm Fanatic, 3 Boyz From Newark, and Rheji Burrell and Vincent Herbert. There is some nice smooth shit and there is some funky ass shit. It's very well produced.

This copy isn't bad as far as sound quality. Some tracks fade out, and I'm not sure if that's the way they are or not and their sounds like some basic freestyles here and there, so not sure what the deal is with that. None the less if you are a fan of the early/mid 90's east coast sound, this is a MUST HAVE. Enjoy!

**ADDED***

For more Omniscence flava check out these 3 different versions for each single all in one zip file:

+Amazin'(3 Boyz from Newark Ka-Ka Lak Mix-Clean/3 Boyz from Newark Street Mix-Clean/LP Version)+Touch y'all (LP version/Remix #1, Clean/Remix #2(feat.Sadat X)Clean)http://www.sendspace.com/file/r1idij

-6MWTD

The man came thru' again!

Dr. Dre Roadium Mixes: Criminal

http://www.sendspace.com/file/wwr7ji

Part two of our "Two For One Friday" is a piece of west coast history. One of the legendary "Roadium Mixtapes", the "Criminal" edition for the west coast legend, Dr. Dre.

Now I'll be the first to admit, even though I'm from the west coast, my knowledge of these things are not all that great (I was always an east coast cat caught in the west coast area). I was hoping to have a friend of mine write the article since he has more knowledge than I do, and he still might do that when we drop a few more of these classic mixtapes. But for now, you'll have to deal with my limited knowledge of these little beauties and what I could scrape up on www.apollojams.com . It's thefirst track listing I've ever seen for these is found on that site and the BEST west coast old school mixtape site I've ever seen. Check it out if you are into old school westcoast shit also if you want to own this and the others, you can buy them there. Also Thaformula.com had an excellent article that covered these mixes some time ago.

Apperently Dre sold these mixes at the Roadium swap meets, an old Drive-In theatre that hosted swap meets once it closed down. They were mixed up by Dre and sold by Steve Yano. It's also the beginning of Eazy and Dre as a partnership. There is quite a few of them floating around, at least six copies that I'm aware, maybe more. Anyway, I'll hopefully have a more knowledgeable source dropping the knowledge on these in the near future, so I'll stop acting like I know what I'm talking about and let the "tape" speak for its self.

> CRIMINAL mix begins (11 parts, 62m.):
> starts with "fuck it up, Dre!" (w/ Eazy-E LIVE doing the intro)
> Dana Dane: Cinderfella Dana Dane (Profile)
> L.L. Cool J: I'm Bad (Def Jam)
> Boogie Down Productions: Poetry (B-Boy)
> Real Roxanne: Romeo (Select)
> Public Enemy: Rebel Without A Pause (Def Jam)
> Salt 'n' Pepa: Tramp (Next Plateau)
> Schoolly D: P.S.K. (Schooly D)
> Ice T: Doggin' The Wax (TechnoBeat)
> NWA: Dope Man (the entire jam!) (Macola 1034 EP track, 10/87)
> Eazy-E: Boyz-N-The-Hood (the entire jam!) (Ruthless, 7/87)
> Ice T: Six In The Morning (the entire jam!)
> Eric B & Rakim: Paid In Full (M.A.R.R.S. remix) (F.A.B.)
> Boogie Down Productions: The Bridge Is Over (B-Boy)
> Boogie Down Productions: Criminal Minded (the entire jam!) (B-Boy)
> Dana Dane: Cinderfella Dana Dane (the entire jam!) (Profile)
> Dana Dane: This Be The Def Beat (w/ Ice Cube LIVE freestylin' over the beat) (Profile)
> Salt 'n' Pepa: Tramp (Next Plateau)
> Spoonie Gee: Godfather (the entire jam!) (Tuff City)
> Classical Two: Rap's New Generation (Rooftop 1003, 3/87)
> ???: (instrumental w/ James Brown samples....what is this???)/cuts out

Enjoy---Travis