I forgot to post this up. I reviewed Room E’s new instrumental album, Penguin Child, for this week’s CityBeat. I know I’m bombarding you with a bunch of crap I’ve written elsewhere. But yo, when time is short, I gotta prioritize writing that pays and might somewhere be read by a cute Asian chick who will recognize me ordering a Ghetto Big Mac at Fancy McDonald’s and then hook me up with her less cute friend with more “personality.” ::crosses fingers::

Anyway, Penguin Child was cool. The review’s below in its entirety. Because it started getting ridiculous posting a 150-word snippet of a 300-word review. You can see it at CityBeat here. Be on the lookout for more Room E x Parker & The Numberman team-ups. Check out a promo video of Room E after the jump.

Once you discover that Room E is a skinny Asian dude who produces instrumental hip-hop, you might be tempted to think of that other skinny Asian dude who produces instrumental hip-hop: Nosaj Thing, who sits at the center of L.A.’s thriving beat scene. But the labels—musical and ethnic—are where the similarities end. While Nosaj Thing and his cohorts mine production glitches to conjure new shades of darkness, Room E embraces a lighthearted aesthetic on Penguin Child, his first full-length album.

Thanks to the L.A. beat scene, much of instrumental hip-hop has gone harsh, with lots of lo-fi fuzz and glitchy samples pushed past the limits of digital manipulation. Though Room E also employs samples and synthesizers, he takes a more traditional approach on Penguin Child, smoothing the edges to fit the various pieces organically into his compositions. He also incorporates live instruments like xylophones, pianos, accordions and drums.

With all this lush instrumentation, his soundscapes bubble over with joy and serenity. “Migrate” and “Bed & Breakfast” capture the rush of adventure and the discovery of new lands. “Earl Grey” is pure and sweet. The recurring Arctic theme (see tracks “Wooly Mammoth,” “Polar Bear,” “Igloo” and the title track) seems to center not on a snowy environment, but on its delicate beauty.

Room E has a bright future—he recently signed to Proper Songs, a small U.K.-based label that has plans to re-release Penguin Child. But it’s unclear whether he can avoid knee-jerk comparisons to other superficially similar artists. I wouldn’t usually bet on it, but this exuberant, promising album makes me believe it can happen.

Reading be fun though:

1. Video: Parker & The Numberman – The Babysitter [prod. Room E]
2. SD CityBeat: Album Review: Crhymes – The Evolution of Crhymes
3. CityBeat: Album Review: Gonjasufi – MU.ZZ.LE
4. CityBeat: Album Review: Pedalay The Boss – Issue #1

Seth Combs went in on Gonjasufi’s MU.ZZ.LE album, which just dropped this week. You can read the review in this week’s CityBeat. I’m not sure about him conflating “comforting familiarity” with catchiness though. I mean, if Gonjasufi had indulged his weirdness more to pander to critics who loved A Sufi and a Killer, that would’ve been another sort of comforting familiarity, right? I wonder if the muzzle represents people that want to put him into an “artsy-fartsy weirdo” box.

Anyway, just some thoughts. Snippet below. Click here for the full review. Not sure if I’ll review it myself yet but I do have plans for something way more baller, eventually.

Now, we have a follow-up in MU.ZZ.LE, a 10-track mini-album that was produced by Sufi and local producer Psychopop. The distorted, trademark voice is still here, but the sonic experimentalism is dialed down a bit. He sounds like Mos Def at his most loose—indeed, “Venom” and “Blaksuit” sound like outtakes from the emcee’s 2004 release, The New Danger.

I can see fans of Sufi, who now lives in Las Vegas, embracing just about anything he puts out (the weed helps), but I can’t help but feel that Sufi has lost a bit of his edge. Songs like “The Blame” and “Nikels and Dimes” are downright catchy! I know, it’s weird that I’m bitching about a song being catchy, but you know what? Give me adventurousness and inaccessibility over retreads and comforting familiarity any day. I may not like it immediately, but I’ll at least commend the novelty.

Reading be fun though:

1. SD CityBeat: Album Review: Black Mikey – The Cold Summer EP
2. SoundDiego: Album Review: Gonjasufi – The Ninth Inning EP
3. CityBeat: Album Review: Pedalay The Boss – Issue #1
4. CityBeat: Album Review: Room E – Penguin Child

DOWNLOAD: Nature of the Beast (Markmywords & DJ Sinn) – Homeland Security

Not gonna get that deep but I kinda had to throw this up, even if I’m a couple years late.

I remember trying to listen to this all the way through a few times in the past and passing on it. Recently though, I randomly threw it on my mp3 player for no real reason that I can remember. And I’ve accidentally found that it sounds really great in Shuffle mode when mixed with all my other music. I’ve been having all these head-turning, Oh word? Let me check what I’m listening to moments lately. The majority of the time, I discover I’m listening to something from this album. It’s happened often enough in the past few weeks that I needed to post something about it. Fortunately, the album is available for free download from the Nature of the Beast site.

Haven’t really thought about it too much but, for what it’s worth, I have similar reactions to albums from Tech N9ne or Twista. I can’t listen to either artist for very long but I think they’re extremely potent in small doses. The same could be true for Markmywords, or at least for this album. Check it out and let me know what you think.

Reading be fun though:

1. Brother Nature – A Very Brother Nature Christmas EP
2. Markmywords – Wage War
3. Brother Nature – Grama’s Cooking
4. Video: Brother Nature – Just Do It

DJ Third Rail Looks is back with another Third Degree Burns show. This time, he’ll have Nothin’Less from Old English in the studio with him. This goes live tonight at 8:00pm PST. You can check out the Ustream when it does go on. Just hit the jump.

Streaming video by Ustream

Not sure if this Ustream was working or not. Here’s the Livestream too.

Reading be fun though:

1. Old English on Third Degree Burns
2. ‘Third Degree Burns’ Mixshow w/ Masters of the Universe
3. Third Degree Burns “Best of SD Guests” Show
4. Third Degree Burns with Formula Abstract/Jewelz Infinite

I liked this song from Issue #1 as well. It’s good to get a more rounded out image of Pedalay. I also liked the video, which works because of its simplicity. It should prove that you don’t need much of a budget to shoot a good video. You just need someone with a little bit of skill behind the lens.

Apologies to Pedalay and Scatterbrain. Pedalay tells me he didn’t mention Scatterbrain on Issue #1 as much as I thought he did. I was just an ass inciting beef like that. Sorry dudes!

Reading be fun though:

1. CityBeat: Album Review: Pedalay The Boss – Issue #1
2. Pedalay The Boss – Voices
3. Mixtape: Pedalay The Boss goes from rapper to artist on ‘Art: The Inspiration’
4. Video: Grind Time Battle: Scatterbrain vs. Endr Won

A good lineup in its own right. But the Reader’s Gonjasufi article this week said Sufi’s record release party for MU.ZZ.LE is the same night. Does that mean he’s making a surprise appearance? Anyone have the scoop?

Reading be fun though:

1. Hip Hop Is Dead With Odessa Kane, Piff PCH, Old English, Parker & The Numberman and more
2. Brother Nature – A Very Brother Nature Christmas EP
3. Saviorself ft. Nothin’less, Odessa Kane – Switch Up
4. Odessa Kane, Sojourn at Lyrical Skoolyard, April 21

Photo: Antonio Maristela / Star In The Sky Photography

I wrote an article on Mr. Brady from Deep Rooted for this week’s issue of CityBeat (though I’d like to be clear that I hold no responsibility for the title, hah). Brady just released an EP with producer AbJo, Welcome To The City, which you can stream above. Thanks goes out to Brady, AbJo, and Christie for making this article possible. Full interview transcript to follow soon. For now, you know the drill. Read a snippet below and check the full article here.

When most 9-to-5ers are brushing their teeth before resting for the next workday, Brandon Crowel is just punching in. A rapper and producer better known as Mr. Brady, he sits in his makeshift bedroom laboratory late into the night, poring over stacks of records, chopping up samples, tapping out drum parts on his samplers and writing rhymes on a notepad.

“I wouldn’t know what to do with myself if I didn’t make music,” Crowel says in an email interview. “It’s a lot of days I don’t even leave my spot and just make music all day and night. That’s pretty normal for me, honestly.”

A member of the popular local hip-hop group Deep Rooted, Crowel calls himself a “labaholic.” Deep Rooted has been on recent hiatus, but he’s kept busy. From July 2010 to May 2011, he released two full-length albums and two EPs. Now, he’s working on six more releases, including a second full length collaboration with LMNO, a member of L.A. hip-hop crew The Visionaries. He’s also working on the next Deep Rooted album, which he says will be completed this year.

This month, Crowel will drop Welcome to the City, a self-released digital EP that finds him collaborating with a young, untested local producer named AbJo. They see the EP as an ode to their hometown.

Reading be fun though:

1. Video: Mr. Brady – Let It Go
2. Mixtape: Mr. Brady serves more ‘Leftovers’
3. Album Review: LMNO & Mr. Brady’s ‘Banger Management’
4. SD CityBeat: ‘American iD.’ Profile on iD The Poet

Free show. Acey The Aceman, Blame, Dannu, Odessa Kane, Nomis, Aaron Evans, too many more reasons. It’s all the way up in North County but this is pretty damn good as far as local lineups go. If I can find a ride up there, I’m there.

Reading be fun though:

1. Odessa Kane, Sojourn at Lyrical Skoolyard, April 21
2. Lyrical Skool Yard One Year Anniversary with Sojourn, Blame One
3. Giveaway: TheBREAX, NomiS, Dannu, Fonzworth Bentley at HOB
4. Video: Aaron Evans (The Green Brothers) ft. DJ Deprave – Jazz is Freedom

Is MU.ZZ.LE following in that vein?

That one’s all singin’, you know. Anyone who follows my older shit, MU.ZZ.LE is more like Sumach than anything. I feel like this is my first record. I love this shit, man. I have my wife on two songs with me, and I’m working on her record right now [BlackHaleMary]. All the production on MU.ZZ.LE is me and Psychopop from Daygo. He’s part of a group called Skrapez.

But, essentially, at the end of the day what I want to be able to do is put out my own records the way I want to put ’em out without having to conform to anybody’s box. And in order to do that — and I love Warp, I nurture that relationship — but I can’t allow any label to box me in and suffocate my expression. Know what I’m saying? So as far as Warp putting out the record that I want, ultimately, the complete me, I don’t know… That’s what I’m working toward and I’m hoping that they’re open to that shit. I’ve turned in a lot of songs lately and they’ve shown interest toward piecing together another record to follow up after MU.ZZ.LE. So, we’ll see, man… I don’t want to have to make up an alias and shit, and this is this style and this style. I just want people to grab my record and know it’s all kinds of crazy, different shit, and that’s why they love buying the shit, because it’s just whatever the fuck.

Reading be fun though:

1. Gonjasufi Interview @ Passion of the Weiss
2. Interview: CJ, President of Wrongkind Records, pt. 1
3. Interview: ICB of Vicious Beat Posse talks SD Rap History, pt. 2
4. Interview: Black Mikey & San Diego Rap History, pt. 2

Gonna try to put up these live mix streams. My bad about the late notice, this is already going on. DJ Fillmatic spinning right now, V-Rock after him.

Reading be fun though:

1. Ticket Giveaway: Rock The Bells San Diego with Raekwon, Ghostface, Mobb Deep
2. ScatterBrain The Acid Atheist x V-Rock… The Beatsmith – Black Paint (freestyle)
3. ‘Third Degree Burns’ Mixshow w/ Masters of the Universe
4. Video: Johaz & Exile (Dag Savage), i.e. How To Rock A Live Show