Jive (1994)
Every Wednesday, in honor of Ed Lover Dance Day from Yo MTV Raps, I take a break from rock and roll to write a little bit about hip hop. In the late 80s and early 90s hip hop ruled my musical life. During this often called 'Golden Era' I discovered so much incredible music. As I am slowly replacing the CDs I've had for twenty-five plus years with vinyl copies, I'm going to talk about some albums that had a really important impact on me during some very formative years.
The last of the Casual singles from the golden era is this three-way split EP that also features fellow Hieroglyphics acts Souls of Mischief and Extra Prolific. It features songs from the soundtrack of a movie called A Low Down Dirty Shame, which I've never seen despite it starring Keenon Ivory Waynes and me being a huge a huge fan of I'm Gonna Git You Sucka. Maybe I need to check it out one day.
As far as this single goes, we get two versions of an exclusive Casual song called "Later On." The LP version features a laid back, storytelling vibe with a a jazzy drum vibe, some keyboards in the hook and some atmospheric chatter in the background. It's not my favorite Casual song from this era as I prefer Casual when he's hitting a little harder, but lyrically there's good stuff here. The remix of this is far superior in my opinion. It has a completely different vocal take and some new lyrics over a beat that is still slower in tempo, but hits much harder than the LP version.
Souls of Mischief contribute "Get The Girl, Grab The Money and Run." The LP version probably isn't as strong as anything on their 93 'Til Infinity album that was released the previous year, but it's still a strong offering. Hiero was operating at a level so much higher than most at this time, even their lesser tracks can hang with the best of the era. The Souls remix has a beat that's a bit more minimalistic than the LP version. It's good, but in this instance I think the one the put on the album was better.
Lastly we have the Extra Prolific track "In Front of the Kids." Nothing really to see here as this is also on the Like It Should Be full length, so nothing exclusive here. It's not even one of the better songs on that album. This EP should be a perfect bridge from writing about Casual singles to writing about Souls of Mischief singles, but those Souls singles are expensive and I don't have them all yet. Hopefully one day.
Casual - "Later On":
Souls of Mischief - "Get The Girl, Grab The Money and Run":
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