The Witzard

Haj of dumhi tells us he's been working on Shanti's Rebuttal on-and-off for about two years. We briefly spoke with Haj about Shanti's Rebuttal during our 2020 wrap-up style interview earlier this year. The majority of his beats were completed pre-COVID, but when COVID-19 hit, Haj started working on his 2020 projects with FERMENTED SPIRITS and Charles Only/ShamelessPlug. Some of the beats from Shanti's (and some from 2019's TERiYAKi HAiR.PIECE ) wound up being a part of the 2020 project The Airing of Grievances with Reef The Lost Cauze. Initially, Haj intended to put Shanti's Rebuttal out as an instrumental companion piece to Grievances shortly thereafter, but, then, he started working on video collages and more artwork, etc. the music, also, evolved a little bit. It's about 18 minutes long and is intended to be experienced as one continuous piece of music; an Instrumental Hip-Hop soundtrack, of sorts. Its basic plot involves an unwitting heroine who wind...

dumhi ORIGIN STORY: I started making beats around 2002, I guess. I had no intention of doing anything with it, except having fun. At that point, I, personally, knew no one that did music stuff. 2003-ish to 2005, I started meeting some other folks who did music in various capacities like Shameless Plug/Charles Only, Flud, Mash Comp/Wise, MicheleQJ. A lot of us met through sharing demos and talking sh*t on okayplayer.com. That was such a great place to meet [people,] at the time. A lot of [people] were on there, also, just starting their music and learning and we were all hype to talk to each other about it. This is where I met the Tanya Morgan guys and E L U C I D and I used to send my horrible early beats to Nicolay [The Foreign Exchange], via AOL Instant Messenger and we would sit there doing stuff like that until 3:00am every night. Then, on the weekends, I would get up with Plug, Flud, Mash, and whoever else might be around and we'd drink and make jokes and make songs. I, ...

A Different Cloth, Vol. 1 by Rolled Gold Just last year, Philly 's own beat-twisting producer and multi-instrumentalist Harry Metz AKA Rolled Gold self-released a slew of original projects including "Nite Owl's Theme" Feat. Ai​-​Que & Reef The Lost Cauze , Boogieman Dela's Broken Watch 02: Future Currents EP, Rolled Gold's Healthy A$$ Breakfast , a remix of Career Crooks' "Clock's Ticking" with Wino Willy, and a remix of his own production work on Boogieman 's "Hustler." Now, Rolled Gold has returned with a New Year's Eve/Day release entitled A Different Cloth, Vol. 1 ; prior to release, @RolledGoldBeats himself described it as "100% original Soulful -a$$, Jazzy , dusty grimy-a$$ beats, [and] remix snippets from the homies..." A Different Cloth, Vol. 1 is the first installment in a planned instrumental/remix EP series, which itself, is a quasi-progression of last year's Rolled Gold's Healthy A...

Boogieman Dela - Hustler (Rolled Gold Remix) by Rolled Gold Rolled Gold is the production alias of Philly -based beat-maker, multi-instrumentalist, and charismatic remixer Harry Metz . Over the course of the past year or so, Rolled Gold has become something of a mainstay and frequent collaborator, as you may have already noticed, here at The Witzard . It's been great to personally see Harry's whole sound, style, and musical approach grow and progress since his 2016 EP, The Great Fallback , with fellow Philadelphian , Uncle Crimson . What I have noticed, however, is Rolled Gold 's tendency to continually construct and release easily-digestible "bite"-sized projects, which are generally, very short and concise, yet extremely enjoyable and exceedingly well-orchestrated. For an example of what I'm talking about, I would strongly suggest checking out Rolled Gold 's SALTY (3P) EP, "The Field" Feat. No Headliner, "Nite Owl's Theme" ...

Still riding high on the success of his recent single with Rolled Gold & Reef The Lost Cauze , "Nite Owl's Theme," Ai-Que AKA Ai-Que MCBoogie AKA "The Multi-faceted Rap Machine" has returned with his debut full-length, The American Dream . Ai-Que is a Philly -based emcee "heavily focused on the cultural impact and unification of global communities." Ai-Que also, moonlights as co-host of The BANGERS & MASH PODCAST (@bangersandmashtheshow) along with Ali Miller FKA Truck North of The Legendary Roots Crew . On the eve prior to The American Dream 's Saturday, July 21st release, Ai-Que played a monumentous show with dead prez , Reef The Lost Cauze & DJ ANTLIVE at The Ardmore Music Hall hosted by D.R.E.S. Tha Beatnik . When asked what his greatest sources of inspiration and influence behind The American Dream were, Ai-Que stated he wanted to "create something that was sonically, more contemporary without compromising the...

Nite Owl's Theme (feat. Ai-Que & Reef The Lost Cauze) by Rolled Gold I'm not entirely sure what's the best aspect about Philly -bred producer Harry Metz AKA Rolled Gold : that his name is an allusion to delicious pretzel company Rold Gold , his logo is an upside down cigar-smoking pretzel, or that he makes infectious Jazzy Blues/Soul -inflected Hip-Hop beats. While remaining largely silent throughout 2017, Rolled Gold has returned to dominate 2018 with his unique hard as nails sour dough brand of Hip-Hop . Barely two months into 2018, Harry Metz recently told The Witzard about a slew of beat-twisting projects he currently has in store for this year; already having properly re-released an abridged version of his 2016 SALTY EP re-titled SALTY (3P) and effectively, trimming it back to a concise 3-track collection. Now, not even a full week later, Rolled Gold has already re-surfaced to unleash a vocal-assisted version of his 2016 single, "Nite Owl's Them...