Usually Wednesday means reviewing a free compilation, but this week has been a busy one and I haven’t had much in the inbox other than Dilla tribute songs. So why don’t we make our own compilation? Here’s a collection of free soundcloud downloads from the past week or so.
Beat nerds far and wide shrieked in excitement last week when Contstrobuz, one of the dopest indie producers active today, dropped the brand new tape Work Hard. This is a delight for myself considering I’ve been rocking with the guy since his Beats Vol. 4 tape basically soundtracked my summer in 2010. So who’s Constrobuz, you ask? I don’t know. From what a I can tell he’s your ordinary beat geek from Raliegh, North Carolina. What can be inferred is the fact he’s one of the more gifted post-boom-bap producers to emerge from the recent online beat explosion and has one of the more intelligent crate digging minds I’ve ever heard. Proof is in the puddin’ and in the last couple years Constro has released a lot of puddin’. 5 25-track beat tapes, a couple remix tapes, a couple collabo tapes, and even a physical tape. Not bad. In addition to his soulful, mega-compressed, ultra-chopped beat composing style he also has an alternate steez which is focused more on synthesizers, glitch, and melodies than samples and is exhibited on projects like his Bleep Blorp Remixes project (“Stoopid” = best Guccie Mane Remix ever) or his Constromoon project with Echomoon.
Work Hard is a 27-song tape that is available on Two Circles Records in both digital and physical formats (Cassette!). It’s one of his fuzzy, choppy sample excursions and is loaded with his patented stuttering grooves and impressive drum programming. Peep it, Cop it, Love it. Also, check out his soundcloud page for all of his past releases including his Beats Vol. 1 -5 which is essential listening for beat freaks.
There’s a lot of sharing going on nowadays. Beat tapes and instrumental LPs are becoming exceedingly easy to find and often turn you on to people, labels and other things you never knew existed. These are 15 (16, actually) of my favorite digital releases that are either free or “name your price”. Shout outs to the people who work hard on their art and give it away. Please support them by buying a record, spreading the word or attending their show. Click the album art for download links.
