The Witzard

"I made "Sunday Candy," I'm never going to Hell . I met Kanye West , I'm never going to fail. He said, let's do a good-a** job with Chance three . I hear you gotta sell it to snatch the GRAMMY . Let's make it so free and the bars so hard that there ain't one gosh darn part you can't Tweet," Chance The Rapper ferociously rhymed during his show-stealing verse within Kanye 's The Life of Pablo opener "Ultralight Beam." He's of course referring to his long-awaited and currently still untitled Acid Rap (2013) follow-up, since last year's SURF as actually a Donnie Trumpet & The Social Experiment -helmed project. It's quite a daring, and almost unheard of, feat that Chance The Rapper has garnered so much wide-spread fandom and critical-acclaim without ever having released an album or even single song for purchase; ultimately culminating with Chance 's appearance last year on SNL , becoming the first unsigne...

"Just premiered "Somewhere In Paradise" [featuring] @Jeremih & @rkelly on @nbcsnl . Go get it for FREE at chanceraps.com," @chancetherapper exuberantly Tweeted just mere minutes after his hyper-energetic Saturday Night Live debut; reportedly the first performance of its kind for a 100% unsigned independent artist during SNL 's 40-year tenure. "Thanks so much to Chris [Hemsworth] , the entire SNL cast, Lorne Michaels , and Phil Hynes for a great week. Hope to be back soon," Chance continued following Hemsworth's closing credits sign-off. Founder and creator of Chicago -based Hip-Hop publication Fake Shore Drive , Andrew Barber shared a list of "every rapper to play SNL in 40 years," which includes major label-backed heavyweights like Run-D.M.C. Snoop Dogg, Eminem , Beastie Boys, OutKast , Pharrell/N*E*R*D, Nicki Minaj , and Kanye. "From the moment Chance stepped onstage for his first performance on SNL , it was clea...

Purity Ring have kept a relatively low profile since releasing their major label Dream-Pop debut, Shrines , nearly two years ago; aside from a handful of Electronic -tinged remixes crafted for everyone from Soulja Boy to Lady GaGa and non-album tracks recorded with Danny Brown and Jon Hopkins . Purity Ring have reportedly been working on their as-yet-untitled second album for about a year or so no and then, all of a sudden, without any rhyme or reason, they quietly uploaded a brand new track late Wednesday night. "push pull" was crafted at the hand of in-house producer Corin Roddick and has seemingly already won over the approval of frequent collaborator, @xdannyxbrownx , who ecstatically Tweeted, "nothing short of amazing!!!!!! ... I love these guys." It really seems like the next logical natural progression for Purity Ring as a band, a little less murky and lo-fi, but still just as glitchy, jittery, and eerily beautiful as their early material; "You...

Fool's Gold Records co-founder and sometimes club-ready DJ Nick Catchdubs recently took it upon himself to conjure up a Danny Brown/Sleigh Bells mash-up couplet, dubbed Brown Bells . It's in honor of the slightly odd pairing's 2 upcoming gigs at Terminal 5 (New York), November 22-23rd. While I'm not really the biggest mash-up champion, unless it's either Girl Talk of Danger Mouse , Catchdubs did it right; releasing a 2-track EP complete with cleverly-titled "Diggin' Demons" & "Grown Up Rivals," which sound more like a tried-and-true in-studio collaboration! Nick Catchdubs of course left in plenty of recognizable fragments from "Dip/Demons" (Diplo Remix) and "Grown Up/Bitter Rivals." When you consider Danny Brown 's guest-list of fairly unexpected collaborations on his recently-released OLD album (ie: Purity Ring , Charli XCX, BADBADNOTGOOD , etc.), an anthemic full-fledged Sleigh Bells team-up doesn...

Now that his long-delayed Fool's Gold debut, OLD , finally has a proper release date (Sept. 30th), Danny Brown has unleashed it's Dirt McGirt -referencing lead video-single, "ODB." The self-proclaimed "dirty old man with a pill in his mouth and his dick in his hand" skillfully recruited frequent collaborator Paul White and [director] RUFFMERCY for "ODB," as well as A$AP Rocky , Purity Ring, Charli XCX , Freddie Gibbs, ScHoolboy Q , Rustie, A-Trak , and SKYWLKR, who also contributed to OLD 's currently unspecified tracklist. Let's just fuggedabout Kendrick Lamar 's recent #rapgame-rattling verse on Big Sean left-over "Control," Danny Brown easily out-raps and most likely terribly embarrasses nearly 3/4's of Hip-Hop 's so-called "top emcees," usually over jittery almost un-rappable Electro-Trap beats. Danny Brown and his genre-blending buddies Action Bronson & Trash Talk are soon headed out o...

Every year around this time, XXL Magazine releases a slightly jaded, misguided XXL Freshmen list. It's kinda dumb because it usually features seasoned guys like Action Bronson (29) right alongside "young bucks" like Joey Bada$$ (18) and the term Freshmen generally connotes fresh meat. XXL 2013's Freshmen Class: The Mixtape includes 17 previously released/rare tracks from Bronson, Ab-Soul, ScHoolboy Q , Joey Bada$$, Trinidad Jame$ , angel haze , Logic, Dizzy Wright, Kirko Bangs , and Travi$ Scott. It's a damn good thing the DJ Drama -hosted mixtape's up for free download online; aside from Action Bronson 's "November Rain" (Party Supplies), a Joey Bada$$/Bronsolino team-up, ScHoolboy Q 's recent single "Yay Yay," angel haze freestyling over Purity Ring , and Ab-Soul/Harry Fraud 's "Back Then," its' pretty fucking terrible! A former top chef, Action Bronson is hands down one of the most skilled emcee...

It seems as though Danny Brown & A$AP Rocky 's new-found friendship is based around a shared love for middle-aged women with "big tits and curvey asses" ... kinda like Kathy Griffin , for example; The 2 young emcees seem to have met while taking part in Noisey/VICE 's 5-part Back-and-Forth interview series. It was here that they first lamented about Miss Griffin 's dangerously delicious curves: "Who dat - The lady from Family Guy !? Kathy Griffin got a fatty, n*gga! The silly, goofy bitch" Once she heard they were both DTF, Kathy Griffin was surprisingly flattered and had A$AP Rocky, Danny Brown , and Russell Brand appear on her Bravo TV show, "Kathy" (Valentine's Day) . But anyways, while they have yet to trade bars on a LEGIT label-sanctioned track, looks like that'll all soon change with Old (Brown's rumored August album). Danny Brown leaked a partially unfinished version of "Kush Coma" late Tuesday a...

Purity Ring - "Belispeak II" (Danny Brown) While Danny Brown has already worked with non- Hip-Hop cats like The Big Pink and The Streets The D.O.T. , he recently Tweeted : "Everybody I wanna work with don't wanna work with me, so I gave up on asking people to do songs with me a long time ago." Mr. Brown then proceeded to list The Weeknd and Purity Ring amongst his dream collaborators. Nearly 1 month later @ 12 midnight Oct. 9-10th, Purity Ring quietly debuted "Belispeak II" online, which just so happens to feature Danny Brown ! Back in August, Corin Roddick mentioned to Pitchfork that his production work's influenced by Soulja Boy, Justin Timberlake, Clams Casino , and that he'd "really like to get into producing for Hip-Hop and R&B artists." " [Danny] Brown , who first saw Purity Ring on their summer tour, expressed interest in wanting to work with the band via Twitter and the two then exchanged ide...

Purity Ring are a band that have easily been on my "radar" for a good for a good 6 or 8 months-1 year. I've simply been captivated ever since Chris @ Gorilla vs. Bear posted "Lofticries" up on his music news website. But with little band info, sheer musical content, or visual accompaniment, I had a hard time trying to figure out an angle for a [possible] Purity Ring -themed blog post... especially since Hulkshare banned me from uploading mp3's. Earlier this afternoon, Megan James & Cornin Roddick finally decided to drop a band-sanctioned music video for their genre-blending track, "Belispeak." Along with "Ungirthed" and new track "Obedear," it will appear within Purity Ring 's long-awaited debut record on Last Gang/4AD , Shrines (July 24th). While it's very difficult to describe the band's unique brand of music, here goes a shot @ some [descriptive] adjectives: Future Pop , glitched out, man-made, Hip-...