The Witzard

Despite the fact, or maybe because, he looks like a modern day hippie burn-out, Asher Roth is easily one of the most talented and criminally under-rated emcees in all of the Boom-Bap land. While I've been a fan since "I Love College," I'll be amongst the first to admit that Roth's mixtapes have always been infinitely stronger than his lone radio-friendly album, Asleep In The Bread Aisle (2009). But with that said, all of Asher Roth 's non-album projects have sufficiently spotlighted his lyrical progression and sense of zen-like calm, cool, and collectiveness during an ill-fated and now severed deal with Def Jam ; Seared Foie Gras with Quince & Cranberry , RAWTH EP, Pabst & Jazz , and The GreenHouse Effect (Vol. 2) are therefore the missing creative links between Asleep In The Bread Aisle and his upcoming sophomore album, RetroHash . Although there's really no way of telling if it's even the same collection of songs, Roth's perpetual

"The way to my heart: the Vanity 6 shuffle, @HAIMtheband ," Tonight Show bandleader and Roots drummer Questlove Tweeted mere hours after "If I Could Change Your Mind"' s late night release. Multi-instrumentalist sisters Alana, Danielle & Este Haim did in fact work alongside esteemed choreographer Fatima Robinson and director Warren Fu . For those of you who have been living under a rock these last few years, HAIM could essentially be likened to a Hip-Hop & R&B -infused all-female version of Fleetwood Mac ; they've previously collaborated with A$AP Rocky , Childish Gambino, and Kid Cudi on wax [record]. The fifth commercial single pulled from their debut Days Are Gone , "If I Could Change Your Mind" is a moody oftentimes dimly-lit affair, which kinda resembles an old Soul Train sound stage. Inter-splicing back and forth between synchronized dance sequences and two separate performance clips, Warren Fu has effectively created

The self-proclaimed "Greatest Band In Late Night," The Roots have really come a long way since busking for pocket change on South Philly street corners back in the late 1980's; now in their sixth year with Jimmy Fallon as his show changes hands from Late Night to The Tonight Show , the on-screen band has been augmented to include two horn players borrowed from The Dap-Kings . What initially started as a brief behind-the-scenes vignette, okayplayer in-house videographer Jake Remington ended up filming a 2-part mini-documentary. Part 1 effectively shadows ?uestlove , who'll soon appear as a crusty afro-corpse on Law & Order: SVU , as he goes through his pre-show rituals and morning routine before Fallon #970 ; Hashtag-savvy fans get an inside look into ?uestlove 's New York high-rise apartment, his coveted sneaker and T-shirt collection, his breakfast-scented cologne cabinet, boxing with a personal trainer, and 20 minutes of electric relaxation on the

Pharrell arguably had one of the most successful years of his career last year with the combined mega-success of "Get Lucky," "Blurred Lines," and countless other chart-topping hits. Late Tuesday night, news broke that Pharrell 's long-rumored second solo album, now titled G I R L will see a March 3-4th release. Pharrell himself described the album as "the difference between [age] 30 and 40" during a career-spanning Complex interview and in stark contrast with both In My Mind (2006) and N*E*R*D , G I R L will supposedly feature "no rapping" whatsoever. While I've always thought Pharrell was a pretty impressive rapper-producer, he's a damn awesome singer and hook-man, as well. "Happy," the first single of the album's 10 currently untitled tracks, is a prime example of Skateboard P 's singing chops; it was originally composed for the Despicable Me 2 soundtrack and almost functions as a modern day all-a

For the sake of cohesive clarity, maybe it should be duly noted that the majority of this very post was written down in my parents' basement earlier tonight while I was listening to Dope Body 's latest Sludge-Punk album, Natural History , and drinking midair-smuggled German beer: While I can't exactly say that I'm a huge Kelis fan, and you may not be either, but let's be totally honest... who isn't at least vaguely familiar with "Milkshake" or even "Got Your Money" (ODB)? TIME further notes that Kelis has essentially bounced all over the place during her 15-year career; "she made strange, funky Pop songs like "Milkshake" [with Pharrell ] that took over American radio. She was more forceful still with clanging, dissonant R&B tracks like "Bossy." Then, she transformed into a spaced-out Electro-House diva on her last album, 2010's Flesh Tone ." Now the ex-wife of legendary Queens emcee Nas , K

While it might not exactly be the righteous ear-piercing RAGER you'd expect from a Trash Talk/Flatbush Zombies team-up, "97.92" is a pretty legit-sounding thankfully Nü-Metal -less Rock -tinged Hip-Hop banger; frontman @LeeSpielman notes that it's first-time beat-maker(s) and fellow bandmate " Garrett [Stevenson] and Kellen on the beat." Even though Trash Talk are signed to Odd Future Records , they really haven't dabbled too much into Hardcore Punk/Hip-Hop hybrids, aside from two Spielman-assisted tracks on Hodgy Beats' quick-strike Untitled EP 2 (2013). Stereogum premiered "97.92" mid-Monday morning, which Trash Talk & Flatbush Zombies collectively recorded together at Converse 's own Williamsburg -based Rubber Tracks studio recently. If The Internet -propelled rumor-mill is to be believed, both groups are currently working on new music; Flatbush Zombies leaked a new track, "LiT" from their upcoming I

"I asked your boss for your number. I never wondered which way it would go. You woke me up from my slumber. Now let me break your work flow. It's not a lot, but all I wanna do is skip town on a weekend with you. There's still so much to discover There's still a lot we don't know," read a recent suspiciously rhythmic-sounding Craigslist missed connections posting. It's actually a thinly veiled album release announcement for Chromeo 's new album, " White Women (title) 05-12-14 (date) - m4w," which also includes the Retro-80's album artwork. The FADER dually notes that the address listed with the posting, 701 1st Ave. N , was actually the location of First Avenue , Prince 's favourite hometown Minneapolis venue, where Purple Rain 's concert sequences were filmed. White Women , a self-described Larry David Funk album, is rumored to house a few choice cuts assisted by frequent collaborator Solange , Toro Y Moi, Vampire Weekend

"Birthday Sex" crooner Jeremih has teamed back up with LA -based Electro/Hip-Hop producer and beat-maker Shlohmo to release "No More" just in time for inclusion on your nearly-finalized Valentine's Day playlist. NPR of all places premiered the latest Future-R&B track from the pair, which they further described as "the first single from their forthcoming [WEDIDIT/Def Jam] joint EP, and it's edgy, 3am, come-down-after-the-club music... more Avante-Garde than club-friendly." It's definitely amongst a recent crop of Kanye -inspired sinister-leaning love songs; Shlohmo initially remixed Jeremih 's Late Nights mixtape track, "F_ck U All The Time" around late 2012 and then linked back up for "Bo Peep (Do U Right)" for Yours Truly and Adidas' Songs from Scratch collaborative video-series. While Jeremih & Shlohmo 's long-rumored Untitled EP was previously slated for a February 2014 release, whi

While it's a pretty painfully disoriented sequence of events, Wu-Tang Clan 's recently unearthed "Y'all Been Warned" music video is more or less the sheer epitome of everything good, bad, or indifferent about late 90's-early 2000's Hip-Hop all rolled into one; a simpler time when you could just book a hotel room, rent a few strippers, invite some buddies over, and coincidentally film the whole thing with a department store handy-cam. Acting as the proper 12" B-side to "Uzi (Pinky Ring)," "Y'all Been Warned" simultaneously features sharp-tongued swordsmen Method Man, RZA, Inspectah Deck, Raekwon , and Masta Killa , Sugar Factory Films seemingly produced a set of companion lo-fi visuals back around 2001. It's pretty uncanny, yet surprisingly awesome that an unreleased video-single from a group of this caliber has just sat locked up in "the vaults" somewhere in unreleased form for nearly 15 years! "That

"A group of three hippies on a road trip through the backwaters of 2013's rural music scene fall prey to a murderous cannibalistic band making, including a leather-masked, guitar-wielding Avey Tare , his knife-wielding keyboard player Angel Deradoorian , and their cannibal chief drummer and decaying grandfather Jeremy Hyman ," Dave Portner vaguely attempted to describe his then newly-formed project, Avey Tare's Slasher Flicks upon their April 2013 formation. An Indie Rock super-group of sorts or even a self-described " Jazz power trio," Slasher Flicks features former members of Dirty Projectors and Ponytail , along with Avey Tare who's seemingly on a brief hiatus from his main band, Animal Collective . Domino Records will release the band's debut album, Enter The Slasher House on April 7-8th and paired with the Monday morning album announcement, came Avey Tare's Slasher Flicks' first pre-release sonic-appetizer, "Little Fang.

" Share My Bed = MJ & Dilla 1st track, "Player Has Butterflies" ...wait [for] the rest," read a vague 2009 Stones Throw post. Beat Junkies co-founder and former Black Star & Jaylib DJ J. Rocc has seemingly been working on some sort of unspecified J Dilla/Michael Jackson mash-up project for the past 5+ years. Dilla was a known Jackson (5) super-fan and even sampled "Dancing Machine" for Q-Tip 's solo track "Move" (2008), originally appearing on his Beat CD '05 #3 web-bootleg. I can vaguely remember downloading a copy of my first J Dilla album, Champion Sound with Madlib (2003). It falls right between what I would consider his two greatest works, Ruff Draft EP and his magnum opus, Donuts . Little did I know, at the time, that Dilla's health was slowly failing because of lupus complications and a rare blood disorder; he ultimately passed away on February 10th, 2006. I didn't realize til a few years later, bu

Not since Interpol frontman Paul Banks unleashed his semi-awkward Everybody On My D*ck Like They Supposed to Be have I heard a more un- Hip-Hop sounding mixtape; But with that said, Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr. uploaded their long-rumored PRODUCE (Vol. 1) mixtape mid-Wednesday afternoon. It's an oddly endearing juxtaposition of Weezer -indebted Indie Rock and Underground Hip-Hop with a little help from their friends, Asher Roth , Murs, Chuck Inglish , 112 crooner Slim, King Chip , Quelle Chris, and more. While it's actually a pretty legit-sounding Hip-Hop affair, there are still in fact flavors of Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr. 's deeply-ingrained Pop tendencies subtly inter-woven through out PRODUCE : a light-hearted Beach Boys/Biggie mash-up, a cover of Nina Simone covering Randy Newman , and even decades-old interpolated P aul Simon lyrics. The 16-track mixtape is flanked by two album tracks remixed by Absofacto and Jon Zott (Goldenboyz), brother of co-frontman Daniel

"We had been kickin' the horns idea around for a little while, thinking about Fun House by The Stooges , Exile On Main Street by The [Rolling] Stones , and all those old classics Stax and Motown records," The Men singer-guitarist Mark Perro recently told Rolling Stone . It seemingly exemplifies the most Punk Rock , rebellious quality about The Men ; their ability to effortlessly switch genres... whether it be Punk Rock , Country, Classic Rock , Surf-Rock, Folk-Acoustic , and now Bluesy Rock "N" Roll. "Another Night" kinda sounds like some retro Springsteen melded against a righteous-sounding Blues-Jazz high school band. Although The Men are a former Post-Punk Noise band formed in Brooklyn around 2008, who most recently released New Moon and Campfire Songs EP , somehow both issued through out the course of 2013. After a few solid repeated listens, I'd guess that "Another Night" is about a failing relationship on the rocks

Well, since Super Bowl XLVIII was more or less a televised blood-bath (43-8), Red Hot Chili Peppers/Bruno Mars' halftime team-up was expectedly cringe-worthy, and the million-dollar commercials were pretty sub-par, the real winner of the night was comedian Jon Daly aka RHCP2014 . Last week, Daly unleashed a legit-sounding new "Chili Peppers" track titled "Abracadarbafornia" upon the unsuspecting Internet . It's essentially a note-perfect re-hash of an old Comedy Bang Bang sketch written by Jon Daly and buddy Zach Galifianakis , centered around their fake Pepper Men fan club theme song, "Abracadarbafornia." Daly and multi-instrumentalist Cyrus Ghahremani (King Cyrus King) single-handedly duped one terribly unsuspecting Yahoo Music writer who preemptively lamented, "the song is classic Peppers , so much so, it almost sounds like a parody... with a slightly melancholy guitar riff before sinking into the prototypical Peppers groove.&q

Fresh off their recent Best Alternative Music Album Grammy win, Vampire Weekend bassist Chris Baio has announced a six-date Drake -referencing wordy-titled "Would You Be Interested in a Mira Tour? Tour 2014." BAIO , who's actually the second cousin of Happy Days teen-actor Scott Baio , released his second Electro-Dance EP (Mira) back in October; and to coincide with the tour web-announcement, Chris Baio uploaded a 41-minute DJ mix titled, "Would You Be Interested in a Mira Tour? Tour 2014 Tour Mix" to Soundcloud late Friday morning. While it's currently without a proper tracklist, BAIO 's mega-mix includes plenty of unreleased music, off-kilter Dance tracks, Tribal beats, semi-dated House rhythms, etc. But after Shazaming a few random sonic-moments, I was able to identify a handful of interesting artists: Dense & Pika , Bjørn Torske, Meramek , and an extended remix of BAIO 's very own Future Classic EP title track, "Mira.&qu