Tag Archives: hip hop

The Crappy But Amazing Toy Sampling Keyboard That Influenced Legions

SPOTLIGHT: The Casio SK series keyboards, carries great nostalgia for many of us who grew up in the 80s and 90s.

My friend got one for his birthday, and after spending an entire day at his place sampling burps, coughs and farts, I knew I was destined to become an electronic musician. If this is your story too- let us know below in the comments section.

The SK line’s distinctive design and sound evoke memories of early bedroom-made electronic music and hip-hop production, making it a sought-after collector’s item. The SK sound quality is characterized by its lo-fi charm. Everything sampled into it sounds like crap, but in a good way!

There’s a thriving community of musicians and collectors who appreciate the SK-2 , SK-5, SK-8 et al for their historical significance and cultural impact.

Used prominently on my 2008 release of AUDIOCOSM by Jarrod Barker, the SK-8 was used as a sampling beat box and also one or two of its famous presets were used in a loop to create swirling matrices of sound on a number of tracks. I found this keyboard in a thrift store in 2007 buried in the children’s electronic toys. It was $2.99 CAD and even had the battery cover. This fortuitous discovery was the spark that led to the writing and recording (on a boat no less!) of AUDIOCOSM.

The rare white version of the SK-10.

At their absolute basic, the SK line are fun keyboards and a great introduction tool to lo-fi sampling. But there is much more.

After recording a short audio sample (recorded either via the built in monophonic microphone or by plugging in an audio source using the 1/8″ female jack) you can choose from various envelopes (settings that affect how the sound starts, how long it sounds and how it ends) and also select whether to reverse or loop samples. These toy synthesizers are a treat when connected via guitar effects pedals. A good outboard effect can transform these keyboards into something much more powerful and believable. If that isn’t enough you can explore the factory preset sounds some of which sound more realistic than others but all have usefulness in the correct setting.

Most SK’s have a decent enough piano, vibraphone, flute, trumpet and clarinet sounds. There are also built-in speakers that are loud enough for mobile use such as camping or beach hang outs and of course the SK’s run on batteries. They also have line out feature which bypasses the onboard speakers allowing you to record them into your favorite DAW or standalone recording machine….an analog 4 track is a great bedfellow.

The Mod community and the SK (circuit bending)

Due to it’s relative affordability (used prices have continued to rise in the past 10 years) the SK series of keyboards have been embraced by electronic musician modifiers. Their basic construction and ease of internal access makes modifying them a lot of fun. The creativity of modders seems to be endless- everything from MIDI control to individual audio outputs to real time control of sound chips using dip switches or rotary controls.

Join that thriving community by buying this one from our friend at Tone Tweakers today! For the Silo, Jarrod Barker.

Hip Hop Jewelry Like A Rose Gold Jesus With Brown Ice

It's 2013 and "moto's and escapade's" might not be synonymous with Rap Kings (and Queens) these days- but Rose Gold bling is making a comeback. CP

Hip-Hop is a culture, it’s a lifestyle, it’s an artistic expression and yes, it’s jewelry.

Since its inception Hip-Hop has always been edgy, outside the box, and ready to make a statement at all times; not just musically, but also in a fashion sense.

Rose gold, also known as red gold or pink gold made a big comeback in the world of Hip-Hop a few years ago but did you know Rose gold was popular at the beginning of the nineteenth century in Russia, formerly giving it the name “Russian gold”?  This term is no longer used. This type of gold is also often used in making musical instruments.

Christian Jennings is one of the top flute players in the world- she chooses to play a customized flute made out of Rose Gold. CP
Christian Jennings is one of the top flute players in the world- she chooses to play a customized flute made out of Rose Gold.

Companies such as King Ice are selling Hip-Hop inspired Rose gold jewelry, stating that it is reappearing due to artists such as Rick Ross and Kanye West being seen wearing items made from this gold and copper alloy.

Drake can even be seen with an extremely expensive Rose gold watch on the cover of his Grammy award winning sophomore album Take Care .

If you need a bit more convincing about the resurgence of rose gold bling in the hip-hop community- check out this cover from Drake's new album Take Care.

Whether you’re a “Hip-Hop head”, an occasional listener, or never venture into that world at all, Rose gold is becoming a statement piece and doesn’t seem to be disappearing anytime in the near future. For the Silo, Brent Flicks.

Griots And A Strong Sense Of What Hip-Hop Means

Mos def has a strong sense of what hip-hop means

Hip-hop is not rap, although rap is part of hip-hop. Hip-hop is a culture and style that was born in the American city, growing out of the minds and experiences of predominantly African-American communities in late ’70’s New York. But by now it is everywhere. They love hip-hop in India and South America and here where I live in Norfolk, most farmers may not listen to hip-hop, but their kids certainly do.

Hip-hop is also a beat: the beat of rap music, the beat of the city beating here in the country, over the airwaves and out of car windows, vibrating through headphones in the air-conditioned cabs of tractors. It is a beat originally created by isolating the percussion breaks of jazz and funk records and remixing them live for dancing and block party revelry, and later to accompany the flowing, groove poetry of a whole new kind of poet: the rapper, Master of Ceremonies or MC—often poor and disenfranchised, but still creative, soulful and strong. Hip-hop, in its original form, could be considered a kind of technological, urban folk music, in the sense that its early practitioners did not record their sounds, and even resisted recording. Hip-hop was something that happened live.

But was rapping really a new form? There is another part of this story that has always interested me. In many of the African tribes from which slaves were stolen, the griot (pr. gree-oh) was a cultural fixture. Griots were to West-Africa what the bards or troubadours were to Europe: mobile repositories of history in the form of oral tradition; cultural history sung and chanted to the beat of drums. Except in the case of the griot, that beat was African.

Griots were also expected to improvise poetry based on the current social and political scene, and were known for their sharp wit and verbal mastery. In many parts of West-Africa, a party still isn’t a party without a griot.

It is a testimony to the resilience of slaves that, denied the right to speak their own languages, they found other ways to speak, and sing, their true voices. There were the work songs of course,   documented before they disappeared in the field recordings of Alan Lomax. But consider other examples. As blacks embraced Christianity, they injected the forms of church with Africanness. Black preaching became famous for its emotional power, spontaneity and, you guessed it, verbal mastery. Black gospel, blues and then jazz took the existing forms of American church music, folk and brass military music and made them African. Jazz and blues again incorporated the principle of the masterful voice, not spoken this time, but sung through the instrument itself, giving us the improvised instrumental solo. And rock and roll is a whole other subject…

Given this history, hip-hop is seen as an urban innovation on an old theme and a turn, perhaps full circle, back to the centrality of The Word. Rap is not merely poetry to a beat: these words flow with and around beats to create layers of syncopation, tickling the mind while they move the body. They are polyrhythms with verbal content.

At this level hip-hop is an art form, and while we may not always like the content of an artist’s message, if we care about art we can still engage with it on the basis of its merits. And we may consider its context. Some people, even creative people, will respond to poverty and systemic oppression with anger and violence. Some will focus their desire on all the trappings of money and fame formerly denied them. It’s not so hard to fathom.

But there are some, a few, who go another direction for justice. These are the warrior-poets who seek from pain the gifts of understanding, even wisdom. Even love. Hip-hop is known to borrow motifs from kung-fu movies, because there, too,  you find the archetype of the warrior-artist, skills honed to razor sharpness, delivering beat-downs with fists if necessary, but just as often with the mind itself.

Granted, you will not find much of this style of writing on the radio. But it’s out there. To dig deeper, Google “conscious hip-hop” or “underground hip-hop” and see where that takes you. Word.  For the Silo, Chris Dowber.