ATSIC S04E23 - YKNOWWHATIMSAYIN

Baggylean is back with a mix that included 7 new songs from Alberta bound artists. The usual coast to coast coverage is focused Westward this time around, with Toronto being the furthest East representation. Plenty from the prairies, Winnipeg, Saskatoon, the West coast, and even the hometown of Lethbridge check in.

I do these mixes for people who find it tough to make time for finding new Hip Hop. I know there are a lot of heads out there that are raising families, slaving away at a job that doesn’t pay them enough, and trying to maintain a social life with a bunch of people who listen to the same music they did in highschool. I know I find a lot of inspiration listening to all this new music every week, and I hope other people are getting some value from them too.

There’s a few female artists on this one who I probably followed on Spotify because I heard them featured on someone else’s track, because I don’t know a lot about Denise De’ion, Eazy Finesse, LolaBunz, Charmaine, Chenzehn, or Jean Deaux, but they all impressed me enough to include on the mix. Club stuff here, high energy dance floor fillers with female empowerment braggadocio bars. Can’t call it who’s who, or who’s the best.. doesn’t matter, I’ll pay attention to them all and figure it out as things shakes out.

Junk has the top rap album in the country this week, according to a post on his IG, so that’s dope. His new one “NO WATER IN HELL vol. 1” is doing numbers bigger than I normally like to include on a show intended to help people find new music, but I still think there are people who aren’t paying him the attention they should be. “Mephistopheles” breaks down the bargaining table of being an indie emcee who’s “unknown, sitting on classic albums.”

Calgary based emcee $tik (who I was put up on by my homie AJA Louden) brought on his right hand man bozosapien for the assist on “Ice Cream”, a new summer single with a breezy ice cream truck melody tinkling away under lyrics about the joys of living a life of variety.

There was an album by RayTheNihilist a while back that I got to debut on #ATSIC in an earlier season. I chopped up Big Lebowski samples about being a nihilist on it and Ray said I was the first person who seemed to get it. He’s got a new one out called “I’ve Been Doing Good”, and “Ruckus” finds him surfing out of Saskatoon on some self produced stoner trap.

From there we bring things home with the homie Danny G. We recorded a version of this track “idgaf” at my place a while back (get at me if you need studio time), but I don’t think this was the same version. I don’t know where it came from cuz I ghosted out of town for the first few months of spring/summer this year and when I got back this was mysteriously online. More to come from this guy though, he’s coming back to put more work in on new stuff.

Up in Edmonton, Cory Snow recruited Kryple to tell us why he’s the muthafuckin man on “The Man”. I mean he aint lie, Kryple’s probably one of the artists in Edmonton who can draw a decent crowd in cities across the country. He’s also one of several emcees I’ve heard recently state that he’s “the best where I come from". Touch might have other ideas. But that’s Hip Hop. I’ve always said that if you don’t like your own lyrics the most, you should probably rewrite that shit. Personally I don’t pick “best” art or artists. There are a lot of dope rappers doing it in Edmonton.

Haviah Mighty’s new “Crying Crystals” album is full of gems. There’s 2 on tonights mix, “Manifest It” and “Sensational”. Both are dope, with Haviah knocking out bars confidently over some big rumbling 808s. Baggy does some light work on the outro of the second one.

Normally nothing gets played twice, but if something had to be, I’m happy with it being Chezza on “Step Out!” Sending files back and forth with Baggylean lead to me playing this on 422 and forgetting to tell him not to put it on 423. So here we are. Learning curve in full effect.

Jazzfeezy is a Toronto based producer, and he landed himself what I’d assume was a big juicy placement by getting his beat featured on some sort of “EA SPORTS Madden NFL” project. They’re a credited artist on the song along with the rappers, Kvng Moses & CxMeesen, so I’m just assuming this is from a Madden games soundtrack. Which sell millions and millions and should pay well to the music they feature.. I hope. At the very least placement like that is a good look because people around the world will see his name.

$our._T is the second $ sign replacing the S artist today.. leading me to ponder how effective doing something like that in order to have a unique name actually is. But that’s beside the point, and Steve, the Connect and him would probably say “Fvck Everybody” if they were asked about it. It’s nothing I’ll lose sleep over, all love.

Aaro has the most used ATSIC drop in the 3 Baggylean mixes so far. The reasons for that might actually be more nuanced DJ techniques that I’m ignorant of, but until I know otherwise, I’m going to assume it’s because Aaro is alphabetically first and my DJ friend didn’t have the time to look any further into the folder for other voices. This track “My Head” with Obe G has been in the vault for a while, Aaro sent it over with some others that hadn’t been released and I sorta forgot about it in favour of leaking the new stuff. Props to artists who send music. Makes my day.

L.E.S. finds Toronto veteran Tona in champion form back to remind everyone where he represents. If you need to start a fight in the gym, this is the part of the mix that you’ll want to strike during. Glorious horns of triumph on this one.

“Like That” is the first Philip Solo release I’ve been able to include on #ATSIC, but because I met the guy once back when we both lived in Edmonton, I keep listening to his stuff. Someone certainly likes his metal scream/rapping styles, he’s blown up on YT since moving to Vancouver and adapting beautifully to the modern media landscape, taking his grind online. Now that I think of it.. when I met the guy, he was at my ex’s place when we just met.. wonder what they were up to haha.

Sometimes I can’t really tell where people are from, so I assume it’s where Spotify tells me most of their listeners are. Artists bios online are often hilarious for a number of different reasons, but having anything there is a lot better than having nothing. Tell us where you’re from, and don’t make believe that you don’t live in the middle of nowhere like the rest of us. Anyway, I think Mark Shawn is making music out of Calgary, based on a bit more internet sluething than I ever really want to have to do (friends of the show like Sarafin, who are in Calgary, also follow him on IG).

I’ll be talking to Winnipeg producer Frost Gamble on Sept 5 for Fly in Formation on Twitch, and I had thought we’d be talking mostly about his recent weekly output with NY based emcee Tone Chop, but then I saw this “The Wind and the Waves Remixed” album. I’m not 100 percent sure, but I think I’m hearing enough religious content in this song that Im going to assume the rest of the album is gospel as well.. but I have no real idea. Before the interview I’ll figure it out, but until then, I wanted to include this because I thought the Wu sample being used on something outside the genre like this was really cool.

Sargeant X Comrade are artists I’ve been hearing a lot of shoutouts for lately on Fly in Formation interviews. Both Thomas Quinlan and Ol Gorilla Bones spoke highly about their new album “Lo Fi Future”, and I think someone in an earlier interview was explaining to me how Comrade = Whatevski = MoGravy. I had no idea, even though I was aware of all 3 of his monikers. Anyways, the new album is in fact dope, and I’m glad I tapped in to hear it. I played the first of 2 features from Prevail on it. That guy doesn’t get enough props. Prev’s been out there smashing everything he speaks on over the past few years with XL the Band, and still using a “Swollen Members” tag in every song, even though Madchild is no where to be seen, because no ones checking for his solo stuff, I guess. They should be, and his Alpha Omega stuff with his little brother too.

I ended the mix with a brand new drop from Tariiiq, an artist who I might personally toss into the “best in Edmonton” melee. “Smoke the Pain Away”, has the top shelf lyricist hanging in a cloud of smoke and kicking chill shit for the soul. Relatable content here. Sometimes looking out the window at a sun blotted out by the smoke can be a lot, but at least we’ve always got music.. and our other various crutches.

If you enjoy this kind of music, tap in weekly, I’m going to do my best to keep doing this show consistently. I’m really enjoying it, and I’m loving it that the numbers are starting to climb over on Mixcloud. If you’re on board already, do me a favour and tell a friend to tune in. Spins from Mixcloud pay artists the same as spins on other streaming platforms, so that’s the reason DJ’s use it to upload hour long mixes like #ATSIC. Supporting the show is supporting the scene, but make sure to buy music and go see shows when your favourites come through your town. Run the numbers up on episodes and songs and videos and whatever other content, both mine and other artists, because it helps open doors if independent artists or content creators can point to a proven solid online following. Thanks for the support.

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UPCOMING FLY IN FORMATION INTERVIEWS

AUG 22 - Epic

AUG 29 - Arlo Maverick

SEPT 5 - Frost Gamble