Top 25 Most Played Albums of January 2022 (* indicates new album in January)
*Che Noir – Food For Thought
*The Weeknd – Dawn FM
J Dilla – Donuts (2005)
Little Simz – Sometimes I Might Be Introvert
Roddy Ricch – Live Life Fast
Lil Wayne – Tha Carter II (2005)
*Gunna – DS4EVER
Baby Keem – The Melodic Blue
Mos Def – Black On Both Sides (1999)
Nas – Magic
Ghostface Killah – Supreme Clientele (2000)
*Cordae – From a Birds Eye View
Roc Marciano – Reloaded
*FKA twigs – CAPRISONGS
Lil Wayne – Tha Carter III (2008)
Nas – King’s Disease II
Ghostface Killah – Ironman (1996)
Jazmine Sullivan – Heaux Tales
Lil Wayne – SQ4 (2004?)
Adele – 30
Big Boi & Sleepy Brown – The Sleepover
Lil Wayne – Sorry 4 the Wait (2011)
Labrinth – Euphoria Soundtrack (2019)
The Roots – Undun (2011)
Mac Miller – Circles (2020)
The 25 Most Played Artists of January
Che Noir
Lil Wayne
The Weeknd
The Roots
J Dilla
Nas
Little Simz
Ghostface Killah
Roddy Ricch
AZ
Gunna
Baby Keem
Mos Def
Cordae
Roc Marciano
FKA twigs
Mach-Hommy
Westside Gunn
Jazmine Sullivan
Adele
Big Boi
Conway the Machine
Labrinth
Mac Miller
Ransom
Follow me on Apple Music @DarkKnight1717 to add my playlists 2020s Bangers Playlist January 2022 Additions:
AZ, “Jewels for Life” Baby Keem, “trademark usa” Big Boi & Sleepy Brown, “The Big Sleep” Che Noir, “Brains For Dinner” Che Noir, “Communion” Che Noir, “Table For 3” (feat. Ransom & 38 Spesh) Dr. Dre, “Eta” (feat. Anderson .Paak, Busta Rhymes, & Snoop Dogg) Dr. Dre, “Gospel” (feat. Eminem) FKA twigs, “careless” (feat. daniel caesar) FKA twigs, “tears in the club” (feat. The Weeknd) Lute, “Birdsong” (feat. JID & Saba) Lute, “Overnight” Nas, “Speechless” Nas, “Meet Joe Black” Nas, “Wave Gods” (feat. A$AP Rocky) Nas, “40-16 Building” Ransom & Rome Streetz, “Claudine” (feat. Che Noir) Roddy Ricch, “rollercoastin” Roddy Ricch, “don’t i” (feat. Gunna) Wale, “Poke It Out” (feat. J. Cole) The Weeknd, “Take My Breath” The Weeknd, “Sacrifice” The Weeknd, “Out of Time”
Adele – 30 (Pop) Benny the Butcher – The Plugs I Met 2 (Rap) Dave – We’re All Alone In This Together (Rap) Isaiah Rashad – The House Is Burning (Rap) J.Cole – The Off-Season (Rap) Kanye West – Donda (Rap) Nas – King’s Disease II (Rap) Nas – Magic (Rap) Olivia Rodrigo – SOUR (Pop) Silk Sonic – An Evening with Silk Sonic (Pop) Tyler, the Creator – CALL ME IF YOU GET LOST (Rap)
Honorable Mentions (in alphabetical order)
AZ – Doe or Die II (Rap) Boldy James & The Alchemist – Bo Jackson (Rap) Conway the Machine – La Maquina (Rap) Grip – I Died For This!? (Rap) Little Simz – Sometimes I Might Be Introvert (Rap) Lute – Gold Mouf (Rap) Mach-Hommy – Pray For Haiti (Rap) Skyzoo – All the Brilliant Things (Rap) Tash Sultana – Terra Firma (Alternative Rock) Westside Gunn – Hitler Wears Hermes 8: sides A & B (Rap)
Top 25 Most Played Albums of 2021
J. Cole – The Off-Season
Isaiah Rashad – The House is Burning
Dave – We’re All Alone In This Together
Kanye West – Donda
Nas – King’s Disease II
Mach-Hommy – Pray For Haiti
Benny the Butcher – The Plugs I Met 2
DMX – Exodus
MC Eiht – LESSONS (2020)
The Notorious B.I.G. – Life After Death (1997)
Sa-Roc – The Sharecropper’s Daughter (2020)
Tash Sultana – Terra Firma
Conway the Machine – La Maquina
Tyrone’s Jacket – Tyrone’s Jacket (2020)
Tyler, The Creator – CALL ME IF YOU GET LOST
Grip – I Died for This!?
Toby Ganger – Free Machine (unreleased)
Pink Sweat$ – Pink Planet
Drake – Certified Lover Boy
Lana Del Rey – Chemtrails Over the Country
Ghetts – Conflict of Interest
Eminem – Music To Be Murdered By – Side B
Nyck Caution – Anywhere But Here
Vince Staples – Vince Staples
Courtney Bell – Poverty Stricken (2020)
The 50 Most Played Artists of 2021
J. Cole
Benny the Butcher
Isaiah Rashad
Nas
Eminem
Kanye West
DMX
Scarface
Dave
Kool G Rap
Lana Del Rey
The Notorious B.I.G.
Big K.R.I.T.
Boldy James
Vince Staples
Sa-Roc
Conway the Machine
MF DOOM
Mach-Hommy
KOTA the Friend
Westside Gunn
Drake
MC Eiht
Outkast
Yelawolf
Dua Lipa
Kendrick Lamar
Mac Miller
Tyler, the Creator
Tash Sultana
Jessie Ware
Lil Wayne
Tyrone’s Jacket
Grip
Pink Sweat$
Toby Ganger
Adele
Freddie Gibbs
Ghetts
Nyck Caution
Snoop Dogg
Elzhi
Jadakiss
AZ
BROCKHAMPTON
Courtney Bell
Devin the Dude
Emotional Oranges
Evidence
Kali Uchis
Top 25 Most Played Artist of December (* indicates released new album last month)
Nas *
Elzhi
The Beatles
Lil Wayne
DJ Quik
Adele
Roddy Ricch *
Big Boi *
Dave
Brother Ali
Kanye West
Russ *
Westside Gunn
Benny the Butcher
Boldy James *
Silk Sonic
Porter Robinson
Khalid *
Big K.R.I.T.
Cozz *
LE$ *
Young Thug
Ghostface Killah
Isaiah Rashad
J. Cole
Top 50 Most Played Artists of All-Time (since like late summer 2020) [last year’s ranking in brackets]
Eminem [1]
Benny the Butcher [2]
Nas [10]
J. Cole [unranked]
Conway the Machine [4]
Lil Wayne [3]
Kanye West [unranked]
MC Eiht [6]
Scarface [unranked]
Isaiah Rashad [unranked]
DMX [unranked]
Black Thought / The Roots [5]
Sa-Roc [24]
Che Noir [7]
Boldy James [29]
Lana Del Rey [unranked]
Toby Ganger [16]
Westside Gunn [26]
Dave [unranked]
Kool G Rap [unranked]
Amine [9]
Outkast / Big Boi [unranked]
The Lox / Jadakiss [37]
Dua Lipa [30]
MF DOOM [unranked]
38 Spesh [14]
Spillage Village / Earthgang [8]
Mac Miller [48]
Dueling Experts / Recognize Ali [15]
Ty Dolla $ign [12]
The Notorious B.I.G. [unranked]
Ransom [31]
Tyrone’s Jacket [44]
KOTA the Friend [unranked]
Berner [11]
Big K.R.I.T. [unranked]
Jessie Ware [unranked]
Elzhi [49]
Busta Rhymes [13]
Vince Staples [unranked]
Kid Cudi [46]
The Weeknd [17]
Drake [unranked]
Kendrick Lamar [unranked]
Pop Smoke [28]
Blu [22]
Flip Huston [19]
Mach-Hommy [unranked]
Freddie Gibbs [unranked]
Brother Ali [42]
Dropped Out: R.A. the Rugged Man [18], Big Sean [20], 21 Savage & Metro Boomin [23], Felt [25], T.I. [27], Goodie Mob [34], Ariana Grande [35], CunninLynguists [36], Jaden Smith [38], Dinner Party [39], Future [40], Kaash Paige [41], Deante Hitchcock [43], Rich Brian [45], Dave East [47], Ice Cube [50]
Notable 2021 films I haven’t seen yet: Licorice Pizza, C’mon C’mon, Belfast, The Worst Person in the World, Mass, West Side Story, Red Rocket, The Lost Daughter, The Card Counter, Spencer, The French Dispatch, King Richard, In The Heights, Nightmare Alley, No Time to Die, Swan Song
My TOP FIVE Documentaries/Docu-Series of 2021
The Alpinist (Netflix)
Billie Eilish: The World’s a Little Blurry (Apple TV+)
Summer of Soul (Hulu)
Val (Amazon Prime)
Allen v. Farrow (HBO Max)
Notable 2021 Documentaries I haven’t seen: The Beatles: Get Back, Flee, The Rescue, Street Gang: How We Got To Sesame Street, Tina, Tiger, The History of the Atlanta Falcons, The Velvet Underground, The Sparks Brothers
2021 Movie Stats
Films watched: 244 (including shorts and eligible T.V. series (i.e. Loki, Mare of Easttown, etc.)
Average per month: 20.3
Average per week: 4.7
Most movies watched in one week: 13
Movies I watched twice: Halloween Kills, Minari, The Father, Shiva Baby, Promising Young Woman, Dick Johnson is Dead
Most watched genres: Drama (101 films), Horror (61), Thriller (61), Comedy (46), Action (34)
2021 releases: 29.5% Older: 70.5%
First-time watches: 74.6% Re-watches: 25.4%
10/10 Ratings: Halloween, Terminator 2: Judgement Day, Jurassic Park, 12 Years a Slave
2021 – Most Watched Actors:
6 films: Corey Feldman (Friday the 13th franchise), Samuel L. Jackson (random)
5 films: Jamie Lee Curtis (Halloween franchise), Benedict Cumberbatch (random), Jesse Plemons (random), Carrie-Anne Moss (Matrix franchise), Bill Camp (random)
4 films: Robert De Niro (Scorsese), Keanu Reeves (Matrix), David Dastmalchian (random), Nick Castle (Halloween), Virginia Madsen (random), Benedict Wong (Marvel), Melora Walters (Paul Thomas Anderson), Kane Hodder (Friday the 13th), P.J. Soles (Halloween), Charles Scorsese (Scorsese), Darrell Britt-Gibson (Fear Street), Fred Hechinger (Fear Street), Olivia Scott Welch (Fear Street)
2021 – Most Watched Directors:
4 films: Martin Scorsese, Lana Wachowski
3 films: Paul Thomas Anderson, Leigh Janiak, Destin Daniel Cretton, Wes Anderson, Ridley Scott
2 films: Steve Miner, Sergio Leone, David Gordon Green, Garrett Bradley, Spike Lee, James Cameron, Chloe Zhao, Adam Wingard, Rob Zombie, Steve McQueen, David Lynch, Chris Palmer
All-Time – Most Watched Actors:
Samuel L. Jackson (44 films) [previously ranked 1]
Brad Pitt (36) [2]
Robert De Niro (35) [2]
Tom Hanks (33) [5]
Matt Damon (32) [6]
Morgan Freeman (31) [8]
John Goodman (31) [4]
Bruce Willis (29) [6]
Johnny Depp (28) [9]
Tom Cruise (27) [13]
Robert Downey Jr. (27) [13]
Woody Harrelson (27) [10]
Jonah Hill (27) [12]
Jack Black (27) [9]
J.K. Simmons (27) [13]
Arnold Schwarzenegger (26) [13]
Ben Affleck (26) [13]
Willem Dafoe (26) [unranked]
Phillip Seymour Hoffman (25) [unranked]
Bill Murray (25) [13]
Dropped out: Laurence Fishburne, Jon Favreau
All-Time – Most Watched Directors:
Steve Spielberg (21 films) [previously ranked 1]
Martin Scorsese (20) [2]
Ridley Scott (16) [4]
Tim Burton (14) [3]
Sam Raimi (12) [5]
Ron Howard (12) [5]
Quentin Tarantino (12) [5]
Ivan Reitman (11) [8]
David Fincher (11) [8]
Christopher Nolan (11) [8]
Joel Coen (11) [8]
Michael Bay (10) [12]
Robert Rodriguez (10) [12]
Steven Soderbergh (10) [12]
Jon Turteltaub (9) [15]
Stephen Herek (9) [15]
Wes Craven (9) [15]
Joel Schumacher (9) [unranked]
Peter Farrelly (9) [15]
Jay Roach (9) [15]
James Mangold (9) [15]
Robert Zemeckis (9) [15]
Richard Donner (9) [15]
Notes: Basically no movement here. I have multiple directors I’m focusing on right now, but Scorsese is the only one I watched more than three films from and only one of those wasn’t a re-watch. Ridley Scott is the only director in my all-time top 20 that I saw more than one new film from last year.
Every Movie I watched in November & December
Notes: This is the time of year I really start digging into the 2021 movies with Oscar chances, but this past month was kind of weird because of snow. I ended up cancelling multiple movie theater trips because we only have one 4WD vehicle and Dina was using it to go to work. Also, the vast majority of my film-watching is a solo adventure, but over the last ten days of 2021 Dina and I watched 14 movies together! She let me pick out two of them. Needless to say, my focused watchlist is now overflowing with 2021 movies I still need to see. The good news is I will have almost three full months to catch up on everything before the Oscars air on March 27th. Plenty of time!
I also went crazy and made a best films of the year list for every year from 2020 to 1982, the year I was born. I ranked 25 films for 2000 and later and 10 films for 1999 to 1982. I started fizzling out on my lists in the early 90s as I just haven’t seen most of the important films from those early years when I was a kid. I have all the lists on my blog here. Enjoy!
T.V. Shows (Ratings out of 5)
Finished:
Succession season 3 (2021, HBO) – 4/5
Curb Your Enthusiasm season 11 (2021, HBO) – 3.5/5
Better Call Saul season 5 (2020, FX) – 3.5/5
The Sex Lives of College Girls season 1 (2021, HBO) – 4/5
Note: These albums are NOT ranked in order of preference; they are ranked in order of number of songs listened to (scrobbles) over the past month.Previous ranking in brackets. Year of release in parentheses if it’s not 2020 or 2021.
**indicates November release
Isaiah Rashad – The House is Burning – 7+
Kanye West – Donda – 7
Nas – King’s Disease II – 8
Dave – We’re All Alone In This Together – 9
Grip – I Died for This!? – 7
Drake – Certified Lover Boy – 5+
Mach-Hommy – Pray For Haiti – 6+
Travis Thompson – BVLD BOY – 6+
Big K.R.I.T. – It’s Better This Way
Boldy James & The Alchemist – Bo Jackson – 6+
AZ – Doe or Die II – 7+
Little Simz – Sometimes I Might Be Introvert – 7+
Olivia Rodrigo – SOUR – 7
**Adele – 30 – 8+
DMX – Exodus – 6
Baby Keem – The Melodic Blue – 5+
Benny the Butcher – Pyrex Picasso – 6+
Big K.R.I.T. – A Style Not Quite Free
*Silk Sonic (Bruno Mars & Anderson .Paak) – An Evening With Silk Sonic – 8+
Westside Gunn – Hitler Wears Hermes 8: Side B – 6+
D Smoke – War & Wonders – 6
Skyzoo – All the Brilliant Things – 7+
Lute – Gold Mouf – 7+
Tyler, The Creator – CALL ME IF YOU GET LOST – 7
Westside Gunn – Hitler Wears Hermes 8: Sincerely Adolf – 6+
The 25 Artists I Listened To the Most last three months
Below is a list of every movie I’ve watched over the last two months. I haven’t reviewed a movie since I’ve been in Vegas, but any film with a blue link is to a review I wrote for it.
Masterpieces – 10
Halloween (1978, re-watch, personal collection)
Amazing– 9
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly – (1966, re-watch, HBO Max)
I also went crazy and made a best films of the year list for every year from 2020 to 1982, the year I was born. I ranked 25 films for 2000 and later and 10 films for 1999 to 1982. I started fizzling out on my lists in the early 90s as I just haven’t seen most of the important films from those early years when I was a kid. I have all the lists on my blog here. Enjoy!
T.V. Shows (Ratings out of 5)
Finished:
The Sopranos season 1 (1999, HBO, re-watch) – 4.5/5
Ted Lasso season 2 (2021, Apple) – 3.5/5
Nine Perfect Strangers mini-series (2021, Hulu) – 3/5
Actively watching:
Chucky season 1 (2021, USA/SyFy)
Better Call Saul season 5 (2020, FX)
What We Do in the Shadows season 3 (2021, Hulu)
Curb Your Enthusiasm season 11 (2021, HBO)
Succession season 3 (2021, HBO)
Started but on indefinite pause:
The Sopranos season 2 (2000, HBO, re-watch)
What If…? season 1 (2021, Disney+)
Big Shots season 1 (2021, Disney+)
Loki season 1 (2021, Disney+)
Rick & Morty season 5 (2021, Adult Swim)
Music
I have listened to almost no new music the whole time I’ve been in Vegas.
It’s been about three months since my last poker results post and something really notable has happened: I’ve completely transitioned from limit Hold’em to no limit Hold’em cash games. In my first update this year, about 39% of my live hours were in 1/3 NL games but over the past three months, almost 90% of my live cash game hours have been in no limit cash games. Technically, they are 3-300 or 5-300 spread games, but for simplicity I will always and forever refer to them as no limit games. To me, it’s only important to differentiate between the two types of limit when the spread is relatively small (i.e. 2-20) – especially when compared to the maximum buy in. Even when the effective stacks are $500, a 1/3 game will almost always play like a no limit game (except in preflop 4-bet situations).
Truth be told, I haven’t played a real limit Hold’em session in the last three months. My longest LHE session is less than 3.5 hours and I’m always playing at least 8 hours when I show up for work. I have played a couple of slightly longer 5/10 mix sessions in a home game, but overall, limit cash games have accounted for about 10% of my overall volume this past summer. It’s a stupid small sample, but I did run at 2.57 big bets per hour in these games.
I’ve played 275 hours of no limit cash games since my last blog post and as surreal as my results seemed at that time, they haven’t slowed down much over the last three months. I was at 24 big blinds per hour in 1/3 in my first three months this year and over the last three months I’ve played more than double the hours and my hourly has only dipped to 16.67 big blinds per hour over that span. I still feel like that’s really good but also much more realistic. Overall this year, I’m making $58/hour playing 1/3 NL and that is just utterly insane to me. I’m still convinced something in the $30-$40 range is an hourly I should be happy with at these stakes and I wouldn’t be surprised to regress to that mean as the games get more reg heavy and a lot of the weak players go broke, go back to limit Hold’em, or *GASP* get better at the game.
I have experienced some rather crazy winning streaks since switching to mostly big bet cash games. From June 13th to July 7th, I rattled off ten straight winning cash game days (I was in Vegas playing tournaments during that stretch also). After a single losing session, I put together another six session winning streak, giving me one losing day in a 17 session stretch. I’d be willing to bet I’ve never done that in my limit career. The sick thing about this win streak is that I started off down $300-$500 in more than half of those sessions.
After having what I was hoping was a breakthrough 3/5 session (+$1405) on July 28th, I followed that up by immediately erasing that progress with my second worst loss (-$1727) of the year on my birthday (July 30th). I didn’t take another stab at 3/5 for three weeks. In fact, I was so demoralized after rage quitting a poker session on my born day that when I got home I just sat in my car in the driveway for an hour and a half before going inside. This probably seems like an overreaction considering July was still my best month of the year, but a) it never feels good to have a huge losing session; b) my accumulated tilt at the 3/5 level is a real thing; c) how am I gonna book a massive loss on my birthday?! and d) any time I quit a session early because my emotions are so out of control that I can’t think straight I just feel like a massive failure. Granted, while it’s a good thing to have the discipline to eject myself from the casino when I have a malfunctioning mind, it’s also rather embarrassing and feels like something that should never happen to me at this stage of my career – especially at the stakes I normally.
Fortunately, I rebounded from that low point by going on a massive rush to start August. I booked seven straight winning days to start the month, including a mind-boggling streak of five consecutive wins of $1000 or more at the at the 1/3 level. As absurd as that is, it gets crazier. On August 6th, I won $1600 for my best 1/3 session of all-time. In my next session, I set a new record of +$2076. And in my next session? Another new record: +$2155. What. Prior to August 6th, I had played 84 sessions of 1/3 in my life and I’d never won $1600+ in any of them and then I did it in three straight. Crazy.
After the first two weeks of August, I was up almost $8.5k and thought I had a chance to challenge my best cash game performance in a single month, but I inexplicably played only six sessions over the final 18 days of the month and the results were pretty breakeven.
Volume has still been a bit of an issue for me. I have been playing softball on Monday nights in Bremerton, so a day that I usually spend entirely with my wife is being cut in half and, because of that, I haven’t been pushing to play poker on Saturdays or Sundays. This adjustment has resulted in me mostly playing only three days a week. I try to play 10+ hours most days though, so even though I’ve been taking four days off a week, I’m still able to get 75-80% of my desired hours in at the tables. I usually spend Thursdays studying while Dina is at work and then we have quality time together when she gets home, so when I include those study hours in my overall work hours, I can live with the somewhat lackluster volume I put in. I only have three games of softball left so when that’s over, we will have two and a half days for quality time life balance and I can go back to playing four days and 40+ hours a week, hopefully with little pushback.
After my three week hiatus from stabbing at 3/5, I have jumped back in the pool over the last few weeks, with 5 of my last 8 sessions spent mostly in 3/5 games. After going +$578, -$692, -$734, +$918 over the first four of those sessions, I finally had my coming out party at the 3/5 level with a monster +$3240 session. My volume at this level is still so small that a single massive win was enough to change me from a lifetime loser to a lifetime winner at 3/5 NL. Hopefully I will never be in the red in this game again. More importantly, with the majority of my sessions over the past few weeks coming at the 3/5 level, I miiiiiiight be establishing that as my regular game going forward. I did pass on 3/5 last time I played (and it was a juicy game) because I was already down multiple buy-ins at 1/3 and then I ended up almost setting a record 1/3 loss instead. My decisions will still be mostly lineup dependent and I’m not ashamed to drop down in limits if the 1/3 games look better.
Interestingly enough, even though I have been playing primarily no limit cash games this year, I still find myself gravitating towards mix game tournaments as I outline my schedule for the World Series of Poker next month. I just prefer playing mix games and I still do. If Palace had a regular red chip mix game, I wouldn’t even be playing no limit. The good news is, if I do decide to play some NL events (and I’m almost certainly playing the Main Event), my NL game is as good as it has ever been right now.
Some Year-To-Date numbers: 1/3 NL: 19.33 big blinds per hour 3/5 NL: 3.7 big blinds per hour Limit Hold’em: 1.59 big bets per hour Mixed Games: 1.57 big bets per hour
Here’s the first draft of my WSOP schedule outline:
WSOP Schedule OutlineHoward, the tomato faceHammy super excited for hikingFirst time seeing Edgar statueSo close to catching Seager’s homerGrandma with grand dogs Naches Loop TrailFamily Mariners game
I also went crazy and made a best films of the year list for every year from 2020 to 1982, the year I was born. I ranked 25 films for 2000 and later and 10 films for 1999 to 1982. I started fizzling out on my lists in the early 90s as I just haven’t seen most of the important films from those early years when I was a kid. I have all the lists on my blog here. Enjoy!
Note: These albums are NOT ranked in order of preference; they are ranked in order of number of songs listened to (scrobbles) over the past month.Previous ranking in brackets. Year of release in parentheses if it’s not 2020 or 2021.
*indicates June/July 2021 release
*Dave – We’re All Alone In This Together
J.Cole – The Off-Season
*Tyler, The Creator – CALL ME IF YOU GET LOST
*LLoyd Banks – The Course of the Inevitable
*Evidence – Unlearning, Vol. 1
DMX – Exodus
*Vince Staples – Vince Staples
Scarface – My Homies (1998)
Kool G Rap – Return of the Don (2017)
*HRSMN (Canibus, Kurupt, Killah Priest, Ras Kass) – The Last Ride
*Isaiah Rashad – The House is Burning
BROCKHAMPTON – ROADRUNNER: NEW LIGHT, NEW MACHINE
*King Blitz – THINGS NEVER GO AS PLANNED
Yelawolf & DJ Muggs – Mile Zero
*H.E.R. – Back of My Mind
*IDK – USEE4YOURSELF
Kool G Rap – Riches, Royalty & Respect (2011)
Kool G Rap – The Giancana Story (2002)
*Smoke DZA – The Hustler’s Catalog 2
*Sy Ari Da Kid – Sy Ari Not Sorry
Kool G Rap – Roots of Evil (1998)
Wu-Tang Clan – Wu-Tang Forever (1997)
*Emotional Oranges – The Juicebox
Kool G Rap – Live and Let Die (1992)
Kanye West – Late Registration (2005)
Comments: Recent albums that are absolutely must listens: J. Cole, Tyler the Creator, Isaiah Rashad, and I think Dave just dropped the 2021 Album of the Year so far.
The 25 Artists I Listened To the Most in June & July
Kool G Rap
Scarface
Dave
J. Cole
Yelawolf
Tyler, The Creator
Lloyd Banks
Evidence
Benny the Butcher
Vince Staples
DMX
Wu-Tang Clan
Isaiah Rashad
Kanye West
Ransom
Lana Del Rey
Eminem
HRSMN
Sa-Roc
BROCKHAMPTON
H.E.R.
King Blitz
Pop Smoke
IDK
Smoke DZA
Sy Ari Da Kid
Comments: My biggest focus over the past couple months was going through the discographies of a couple of hip-hop legends: Kool G Rap and Scarface. I’ve always been a casual fan of KGR, but I have to admit I’ve never really dug into his music too much and it’s hard to have a valid opinion on someone’s place in hip-hop history if you don’t really know what you’re talking about. Old school heads love to put G Rap in their top 20 so not being able to debate that claim intelligently is something I felt like I needed to fix. After listening to basically every project he’s ever made, I think KGR is a great rapper that deserves more credit from the current generation, but I’m not really seeing someone I’d seriously consider for my top 20. He’s vocally nice and lyrically great, but I wasn’t blown away by his discography – it just doesn’t have the versatility or emotional depth I’d like to see from someone I’d consider in my all-time favorites. Scarface, on the other hand, is a fringe top 10 rapper of all-time. His discog is amazing and he’s someone that has evolved with the times and was still completely relevant as recently as the mid-to-late 2010s. The Fix is an absolute masterpiece of a rap album. Every song is a pure banger. It really looked like Covid and the pandemic might take Scarface away from us, but he fought through it and survived and hopefully he will bless us with more great music eventually.
You can click the link above to see my most recent additions to either playlist, but I’m not going to list them here because it’s the middle of June and I don’t which songs I added in May and which ones I’ve added in June, so I’ll just post them all in my next writeup.
Movies – As I said in my last movie post, writing has become one of my bottom priorities and here we are three months since I last made a movie post. Oh well, here are the reviews and/or ratings for every movie I’ve seen over that time. I’ve been going to the theaters at least once a week and Dina has even jumped back on the movie theater going experience as we’ve started taking our niece and nephew to a movie every other weekend. This has been a pleasant surprise as I’ve been seeing movies in theaters mostly by myself for years now. I still seem to be reviewing only about 33% of the movies I watch. The best movie I watched that I’ve never seen was Captain Fantastic. It was just a complete joy to watch. I think it is still streaming on Netflix and if you happened to miss it like I did, it’s time to make up for that mistake. Also, I think horror fans should check out the Fear Street trilogy on Netflix. It’s based on the kids book series by R.L. Stine (which I never read — I was a “Goosebumps” kid though), but it’s actually a pretty hard-R experience. I admittedly did not like the first movie, but I always had my eyes on the second one anyway because it looked like an homage to 1980s campsite slasher flicks and that horror sub-genre will always have a special place in my heart. Of course, I enjoyed that one, but I was surprised to also like the third movie and I think the last entry makes the whole trilogy substantially more enjoyable as a whole. It almost made me want to re-watch the first one.
I also went crazy and made a best films of the year list for every year from 2020 to 1982, the year I was born. I ranked 25 films for 2000 and later and 10 films for 1999 to 1982. I started fizzling out on my lists in the early 90s as I just haven’t seen most of the important films from those early years when I was a kid. I have all the lists on my blog here. Enjoy!
T.V. Shows (Ratings out of 5)
Best Wishes, Warmest Regards: A Schitt’s Creek Farewell (2021, Netflix) – 3.5
Spin Rate: heaps Average Song Rating: 4.1/5 3.5+ Percentage: 93% Skips: 0.5 Bangers: 10
Thoughts: This album is an all-time classic and the debut project of one of the best rappers to ever pick up a microphone. I have to admit I didn’t appreciate this album when it originally came out – I was 12 years old and my musical preference was transitioning to grunge, alternative and metal at this time and even when I did start to get back into rap music, I was a Tupac fanboy and since I was an ignorant and easily influenced 14 year old, that meant I hated Biggie.
Over the years (and decades) though, Ready to Die has become one of my favorite albums of all-time and the data here supports that claim. With an average song rating of 4.1, Ready to Die now has the highest average song rating of any full length album I’ve posted a review for using this system. No surprise there. “Juicy,” “Everyday Struggle,” and “Big Poppa” are absolutely perfect songs. The only song I even think about skipping on this project is “Me & My Bitch” – it’s not bad, but i don’t think it’s good either. Also, this album has 10 bangers in 15 songs and I wouldn’t blame anyone for suggesting I underrated a few other songs here.
I don’t include bonus tracks as part of my overall rating or in my number of bangers since they aren’t really meant to be part of the album, but it’s worth noting that all three 1994 era Biggie tracks that I tacked on to the end of this album are all fire and would only improve Ready to Die’s already lofty esteem.
I think perhaps the most impressive aspect of this album is that Biggie is not a polished rapper here. When he was recording Ready toDie, Biggie was more of a crack dealer than a hip-hop artist. This was his side gig and it sounds like this? Good grief. This is why people don’t hesitate to list Biggie in their top 10s despite a limited discography due to his murder in March of 1997 – he had more natural ability than basically any rapper that has ever lived and the two albums he did record while he was alive are both legendary. It’s crazy to think what he would have accomplished in music if he was still alive today.