Davis the Dorchester Bully isn’t rapping too fast—you’re listening too slow. As the Chicagoan says on “Virginia,” a track from his new album with Detroit producer Foule Monk, “Life is as simple as it seems.” And so are his rhymes, even when he serves them up with moments of head-whipping banter. That collaborative album is […]
Tag: Defcee
Posted inMusic
Underground rapper Defcee connects with Closed Sessions producer BoatHouse on For All Debts Public and Private
If you need an introduction to Defcee, you haven’t been paying attention to underground hip-hop in Chicago. The rapper had a banner year in 2021, thanks to three collaborative releases that nudged him further into the national spotlight: June’s We Dressed the City With Our Names, a collaboration with beat maker August Fanon; September’s Sunday […]
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Chicago underground rap roundup
Amid the wall-to-wall media coverage of Kanye West’s promotional events for Donda in August, you could be forgiven for imagining that the only notable new Chicago hip-hop release had come from a billionaire who hired crews to rebuild his childhood home in the middle of Soldier Field. That’s far from the case, of course, though […]
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Fundraisers help music writer Scott Morrow recover from a gunshot
Fundraisers help music writer Scott Morrow recover from a gunshot, Lorna Donley and David Thomas’s post-Da band, the Veil, posthumously release an LP of 1980s recordings, and more.
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August Fanon and Defcee go back to hip-hop’s graffiti roots on their new EP
The new EP by Defcee and producer August Fanon, We Dressed the City With Our Names, ties Defcee’s history in Chicago’s rap and poetry scenes to the primordial hip-hop culture of New York graffiti artists depicted in the 1983 documentary Style Wars. The first track opens with a sample of a young graffiti writer explaining […]
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A new Zoom opera honors the health-care workers fighting COVID
A new Zoom opera honors the health-care workers fighting COVID, country cat Lawrence Peters leads a workshop for aspiring record collectors, and more.
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Decades of friendship enrich a new collaboration by rapper Rich Jones and producer Montana Macks
Rapper-singer Rich Jones and producer Montana Macks have been friends for nearly two decades, which surely helps explain how the Chicagoans’ new self-released album, How Do You Sleep at Night?, hits so smoothly. For the past few years, Jones has leaned into the downy plushness of his voice, more and more often rhyming in a […]
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Machine Wash Music’s new compilation shows the many dimensions of underground Chicago hip-hop
Chicago has many independent hip-hop labels, but few maintain rosters as multigenerational as that of Machine Wash Music. Rapper Daryl “Decay” Stewart cofounded Machine Wash after he had an unsatisfying experience putting out his 2008 album, The Unlikely Hero, through Molemen Records—he wanted a more mutual artist-label relationship. “The process wasn’t the same and I […]
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West-side rapper Musa Reems dazzles with a weekly single series
West-side rapper Musa Reems dazzles with a weekly single series, college radio stations WHPK and WNUR fill the weekend with festivals, and more.
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Chicagoan Defcee raps with purpose and zeal on A Mixtape as God Intended, Vol. 1
Chicago rapper and educator Defcee is one of the great talents in this city, and he so actively supports the local music community that you’re even more likely to catch him rocking in crowds than performing in front of them. As he raps on the sprawling 2018 Soundcloud single “Summer Courses,” atop a thin, funky […]
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The best overlooked Chicago hip-hop of 2018
Chicago’s hip-hop scene overflows with such variety and abundance that it’s impossible to show enough love to every great release—but that’s no reason not to try.
Posted inBlogs
Reader’s Agenda Wed 3/27: West Town Bikes, Kevin Coval, Feminism Flatlined
What’s on the Reader’s Agenda for Wednesday, March 27, 2013