Get Fresh Batteries If It Don't Rewind

I'll close out this week in old school hip hop by posting the first big hit for LL Cool J, released way back in 1985. It's a testament to him that someone who started out in the mid 80's is still around releasing records. The Kangol hat-wearing hip hop icon has released fast paced tunes like "Mama Said Knock You Out", the famed ballad "I Need Love", and even as of last year has had songs on the R&B charts. Admittedly, I thought "Headsprung" was terrible, but the late 90's jam "Phenomenon" is some good shit. Plus, he's been in TV shows and movies so he has had one hell of a career. He calls himself the "G.O.A.T." (Greatest Of All Time) after an old Muhammad Ali saying, and it's not so ridiculous.

Here is his first song on the chart, "I Just Can't Live Without My Radio," produced by the great Rick Rubin very early in his career. Here all you have is J's vocal, a constantly ticking high hat, a pounding drumbeat, some scratching in the middle of the song, and short blasts of horns, and it's great as he raps about his big boombox that he loves to carry around with him at all times (yes, for you youngins, this is what some people used to hear music before the days of iPods).

LL Cool J-"I Just Can't Live Without My Radio" (7.50 MB, 192 Kbits/second)

http://www.bestsharing.com/files/vVsglc233229/LL%20Cool%20J-I%20Just%20Can%27t%20Live%20Without%20My%20Radio.MP3.html

Oh, and to address something that I read on another website, it'd be inaccurate to portray me as someone who enjoys everything that Missy Elliott puts out. I mean, for example, when she bleated like a sheep on "Gossip Folks" or "Pass The Dutch",that was just terrible (thankfully for the former, the song is saved by Ludacris, something you can't say about the latter). But, she's had some kick-ass songs, such as "We Run This", "Get UR Freak On" (the remix with Nelly Furtado was even better, although the downside is that it gave Ms. Furtado the idea to abandon her unique sound and become another random pop chanteuse, which except for "Maneater" has proved to be a TERRIBLE idea), and "Work It".

I'll be back on Thursday with a rather odd video download.