If you have ever heard G-Side’s music before, this is probably one of your most anticipated releases in recent memory. If you haven’t heard G-Side’s music, well, it’s never too late to start. You can stream their new album The ONE… Cohesive as a preview, and buy it if you like what you hear. Go ahead, press play up above, and let the music do the talking.
There used to be a time where putting live concert recordings on your album was a familiar practice. Marvin Gaye and Bob Marley did it, and something about the sound of a crowd would put you in a different, almost elevated, place as a listener. Fast-forward to 2010, where crowd sounds meant samples of crazed chanting, as in “OMG” or “Power”. Forever setting himself apart from the pack, DJ Burn One’s use of cheers at the start of “Live” are a throwback to the energy of those old-school live recordings.
If you’ve been paying attention to Burn One and production collective The Green Machine (including Ricky Fontaine, Walt Live, and The Professor), then you know to expect an ensemble production, with bass, guitar, keys, and samples laced into, out of, and all over the fabric of a slick ass beat. With the releases of “Bobby Cox” and “Live”, we’re starting to see a distinctive sound emerge. It’s different from each artist’s individual work, and it seems like the sum is even greater than the total of the parts. The Ashtray will be released in January, a complete instrumental album in this vein. For those of you who absolutely have to have some rap to go with your beats, The Green Machine will also be handling the majority of the production of Rittz’s upcoming project, White Jesus. That’s a one-two combo that will knock the sleep out of a lot of motherfuckers’ eyes. As the national scope on southern rap continues to widen, The Green Machine sonds like they’re poised to remind us why Atlanta is still a rap powerhouse.