UBIQUITY RECORDS
2008
Tell Me Something
About This Album
On their second record, funk and soul revivalists Connie Price & the Keystones (aka Dan Ubick and a bunch of friends) decide to branch out from the pure instrumental music they had displayed on their debut, Wildflowers and add the talent of top West Coast MCs (an exception being the Bronxite Percee P, but as he's signed to Stones Throw, an imprint of which released Wildflowers, and whose founder Peanut Butter Wolf appears here on background vocals, the reasoning is clear). What results, Tell Me Something, is an excellent album that bridges the (small) jump from funk to hip-hop, how the urban blaxploitation soundtracks from Isaac Hayes and Curtis Mayfield tie in so seamlessly to rap. During the tracks that feature vocalists, the band lays off on heavy horn riffs and B-3 chords, approaching the pieces from a more hip-hop perspective, where drums and bass are most important, the rest of the instruments only coming in as accents or to fill out the hook. This careful arrangement then allows the songs that feature both more melodically driven MCs (Blood of Abraham, Mikah 9 from Freestyle Fellowship) -- or the singer Aloe Blacc -- and the more rhythm-oriented rappers to sound equally good.
Track List

Disc 1 (try tracks 1,2,3,5,6 and 7)

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Disc 2 (try tracks 1,2,3,4,5 and 6)

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