Scenes Lists & Things – Critical Minded

Rap Songs for Home

mreeves April 26, 2020 No Comments coronavirus

As the coronavirus epidemic continues to roil the globe, home has taken on a new urgency. This playlist assembled around a word is fraught with meaning.

Featured Scenes Lists & Things

First Wave Hip-House: 1988-1990

mreeves March 17, 2020 No Comments 80s rap hip-house

Born in the 1980s, hip-house was a shotgun marriage between two hot springs of black innovation. Its reputation lies somewhere between unalloyed club bliss and pop kitsch.

Scenes Lists & Things Spotlight

Star Wars Funk

mreeves February 12, 2020 No Comments 70s Funk disco-funk P-Funk

George Lucas’ Star Wars hit America like a pop culture meteor in the summer of 1977. The R&B scene wasn’t immune from the impact.

Scenes Lists & Things Spotlight

Sunshine Rap

mreeves February 17, 2019 No Comments Indie Rap Jurassic 5 West Coast Rap

Revisit a time when West Coast rap musicians embraced chunky funk and soul loops while rejecting the corporatist “bling” era.

Scenes Lists & Things

Stanley Crouch on jazz and Negro Americans

mreeves March 18, 2018 No Comments Quotes swing jazz

“Negro Americans are not predisposed to follow people. They really aren’t. That’s why there’s always a certain element of chaos in the Negro world, because,…