Recently in Dilla Category

Now available for the first time digitally is 1st Down A Day Wit The Homiez EP via iTunes. For anyone that doesn't know 1st Down was a duo structured like Gang Starr with Phat Kat on the vocals and Jay Dee (J. Dilla) on production. 1st Down was signed to Pay Day Records back in 1995, but the 12" single for "A Day Wit The Homiez" b/w "Front Street" was the only release to come from the deal. Now it's available again with a few added 1st Down bonus tracks now included on the original release. All production from Jay Dee aka J. Dilla.

PURCHASE: iTunes

The time has come. Next Tuesday, June 2nd is the release of J. Dilla's Jay Stay Paid on Nature Sounds, musically coordinated by Pete Rock and executive produced by Ma Dukes. Here's a few more tastes from the album.

LISTEN: J. Dilla - "Reality TV" (featuring Black Thought)

LISTEN: J. Dilla - "24K Rap" (featuring Havoc & Raekwon)

LISTEN: J. Dilla - "Jay $tay Paid Sampler Mixed by J-Rocc"

One of Detroit's next upcoming emcees Danny Brown just laced me with his track from the forthcoming J. Dilla album Jay $tay Paid, dropping on Nature Sounds next month. Enjoy.

LISTEN: J. Dilla - "Dilla Bot Vs. The Hybrid" (featuring Danny Brown)

LINK: DANNY BROWN MYSPACE

Back in 2006, Public Media Group created a commemorative 24 x 36 poster as a tribute to the career of J. Dilla. They used over 3000 pictures, including everyone who has ever worked with Dilla to create this iconic image remembering him. It was limited to a 1000 pieces and sold out in days. Ma Dukes found a stack of the posters in the her basement so they have them available again, each one signed & numbered by Ma Dukes.

PURCHASE: Over A Billion Served Limited Edition J. Dilla Poster

Courtesy of the German-based Splash Mag, here's a video interview with Detroit's Frank-N-Dank.

(source: press release) - By now most everyone is familiar with the story of musical legend J Dilla. The quiet, prolific producer collaborated with everyone from Eryka Badu to Common to Janet Jackson to Prince. Dilla was just beginning to capitalize on his cult status when he sadly passed at age 32 due to Lupus-related complications. Jay Stay Paid is a 25 track collection of unreleased Dilla beats mixed and arranged by Pete Rock. While mostly instrumental, "J$P" also offers a few guests vocals from artists that Dilla worked with or admired including Black Thought of The Roots, MF DOOM, and M.O.P.

Curtailing any notion of jumping on some sort of Dilla bangwagon, Jay Stay Paid was executive produced by Dilla's mother Maureen Yancey (aka Ma Dukes) along with the musical supervision of Dilla's only real musical idol, Pete Rock. "It wasn't rushed and it wasn't haphazard," explains Ms Yancey. "This album combines what he did in the beginning of his career, what he did in some of our early hospital stays, which was very deep, and some stuff pulled from old floppy disks & DATs. Its mind blowing...this is like the missing links to Dilla's legacy."

The format of the album plays like a radio show with Pete Rock as the program director. With regards to Pete's involvement, Ms. Yancey gets very excited, "Dilla wanted to pattern himself behind Pete. His dream was to become as close as possible to what Pete stood for. Pete meant everything to him. Dilla would have just been flabbergasted! " Pete's sentiments were the same toward Dilla, "Dude was amazing. He just kinda came outta nowhere and the more you heard his beats the better they got. He may not be here with us, but it's all good we're going to keep his music alive and well."

In the late 80s, Dilla founded the seminal rap group Slum Village and put Detroit hip-hop on the map, while the 90's saw him playing a major role in the production team The Ummah with Q-Tip and Ali Shaheed Muhammad doing extensive work on Tribe Called Quest's last two albums.

Jay Stay Paid will be released on June 2nd on Nature Sounds.

This clip features their rendition of "Hoc N Pucky" ft. Kareem Riggins on the drums from Suite For Ma Dukes.

Illa J, 2dopeboyz.com, Delicious Vinyl, and Audible Treats have joined forces and are proud to bring you the Illa J Remix Contest. After downloading the hook-included instrumentals of "R U Listening" and "Showtime" (found at the links below), contestants will have two weeks to rap their best verses based around the concept of Illa J’s hooks and submit their versions of the songs to be judged by Illa J and Delicious Vinyl. For information at the link below.

MORE INFO: Illa J Remix Contest @ 2DopeBoyz.com

LINKS: ILLA J MYSPACE

My homie DJ Buckwild put together this video with highlights from Shine On at StoopidFresh from February 10th. Again, this was such an amazing night.

From what I heard was an amazing night, here is some video footage from the Suite For Ma Dukes performance last night in Los Angeles of the finale & encore. There were numerous cameos throughout the night but this video features Posdnous of the great De La Soul and Talib Kweli performing "Stakes Is High" and Illa J doing adlibs over "Fall in Love".

Stones Throw is now taking pre-orders for the vinyl release of Carlos Niño & Miguel Atwood Ferguson's Suite For Ma Dukes EP, their orchestral tribute to J. Dilla. The vinyl is being released in April by Mochilla, but Stones Throw will have them early for an expected March 10th ship date.

MORE INFO/PRE-ORDER: Suite for Ma Dukes EP

LINKS: STONES THROW | MOCHILLA | CARLOS NINO | MIGUEL ATWOOD FERGUSON MYSPACE