The Best Minnesota Rap Songs 2016 pt 2 : ZULUZULUU – “Stakes Is High” (prod. by ZULUZULUU)

ZULUZULUU – “Stakes Is High” (prod. by ZULUZULUU)

This immaculate remake of De La Soul’s J Dilla-produced 1996 album track is a fresh take on a hip-hop classic, drawing out the deeper elements of the jazz and funk undercurrents that Dilla sprinkled throughout his work. The original’s variety of vocals and snapping groove remains, but where the song was once grounded in a sample-driven groove, it now floats in outer space, breathing and evolving naturally. The group that seemingly dominated the local scene challenged themselves with their choices of songs on cover album The Cover-Up. This is perhaps their most ambitious and satisfying among a string of winners. By Jack Spencer GoMN95.3

GoMN.95.3

http://www.gomn.com/news/the-best-minnesota-rap-songs-of-2016-part-2/

Radio K Weekly Spotlight: Greg Grease -AstralBeat Theories 3

What does it mean to live free? On the eve of an election day with truly horrid stakes, this question is at the center of Greg Grease's installment of the AstralBeat Theories, the third in a series of solo EPs by members of Grease's Minneapolis outfit ZULUZULUU.

Over the span of five tracks, Grease precisely twists syllables over understated soulful production with a working-mans humility. Through anecdotes and diary-page-like personal dilemmas, his verses take the form of both thoughtful meditations and critical diatribes on Black life, and death in America. And he does what the best art often does, ask more questions than offer answers. Namely, how do you live free when the larger social forces seem hellbent on shortening your life expectancy at all costs?

On the introduction Grease looks to the elders for wisdom, sampling the legendary politically-outspoken comedian Dick Gregory. In so many words, Gregory says that living free means to live without fear, and to maintain that your light shines brighter than the terror brought on by the dark forces of power, what Martin Luther King Jr. called "the plague of western civilization," the "triple-prong sickness" of racism, materialism and militarism.

Green Room Magazine

THEHITLIST

1. GREG GREASE - LFDO

2. AGE COIN - Raptor

3. CHALK - Notebooks

4. LARRY WISH & HIS GUYS - Calendar Year 

5. THE CONTROVERSIAL NEW 'SKINNY PILL' - Slippy Wippy

6. LAMBCHOP - Relatives #2

7. LINA TULLGREN - Watchdog

Listen to the Top 7 hitlist countdown on Rock and Roll Over every Monday morning!

http://www.radiok.org/features/weekly-release-spotlight/greg-grease1/

ZULUZULUU on CMJ Hip-Hop Charts 2016

Minneapolis ZULUZULUU's What's The Price? (Sound Verite Records) placed #37 on CMJ Hip-Hop Charts 2016.

Rank  Peak  Weeks  ARTIST & TITLE  LABEL

1114 DE LA SOUL And The Anonymous Nobody A.O.I.

2122 AESOP ROCK The Impossible Kid Rhymesayers

319 DANNY BROWN Atrocity Exhibition Warp

412 1LITTLE SHALIMAR Rubble Kings: The Album Self-Released

5126 KAYTRANADA 99.90% XL

6116 KOOLEY HIGH Heights EP M.E.C.C.A.

7116 ATMOSPHERE Fishing Blues Rhymesayers

8116 DJ SHADOW The Mountain Will Fall Mass Appeal

9119 COOKBOOK AND EVIDENCE A Whole New CookJ ust-Us Movement

10325 ANDERSON .PAAK Malibu Steel Wool

11118 LIZZO Big Grrrl Small World Self-Released

12217 OPEN MIKE EAGLE AND PAUL WHITE Hella Personal Film Festival Mello Music

13115 J DILLA The Diary Mass Appeal

14218 ASTRONAUTALIS Cut The Body Loose SideOneDummy

152141 0ISEE WILLIAMS Gorilla Warfare Self-Released

16218 MR. LIF Don’t Look DownMello Music

17525 CHANCE THE RAPPER Coloring Book Self-Released

18218 HOMEBOY SANDMAN Kindness For Weakness Stones Throw

19310 A TRIBE CALLED RED We Are The Halluci Nation Radicalized

20317 ARLO MAVERICK Maybe TomorrowMusic For Mavericks

21218 BADBADNOTGOOD IVInnovative Leisure

22413 JACKSON TURNER The Foundation [EP]No Play Concepts

23213 KOSHA DILLZ What I Do All Day And PickleOy Vey!

24416 KANYE WEST The Life Of PabloG.O.O.D.

25618 KENDRICK LAMAR Untitled Unmastered.Interscope

26313 TRAGIC HERO My Own Worst EnemyHometown Hero

27514 SAUL WILLIAMS MartyrLoserKingFader

28312 KONCEPT AND J57 The Fuel [EP]KON57

29518 NXWORRIES Link Up And Suede [EP]Stones Throw

30313 SADAT X Agua Tommy Boy

3115 NXWORRIES Yes Lawd! Stones Throw

3237 WAX TAILOR By Any Beats Necessary Le Plan

33310 MAC MILLER The Divine Feminine Warner Bros.

34919 BLEDJON The Popular Loner Self-Released

3548 DEREK MINOR ReflectionReflection

36414 ROYCE 5’9″ LayersInGrooves-Bad Half

3729 ZULUZULUU What’s The Price Sound Verite

38923 RJD2 Dame FortuneRJ’s Electrical Connection

39614 CHIMURENGA RENAISSANCE Girlz With Gunz [EP]Glitterbeat

40212 REL MCCOY Gas MoneyGamma Delta

41215 ROOTS MANUVA Bleeds Big Dada

42412 FUDGE Lady Parts Lex

43715 SAMIYAM Animals Have Feelings Stones Throw

44312 PAUSEMC Blue [EP]Permanent Vacation

45413 JONNY OCTOBER Prisoner’s CinemaSelf-Released

46210 MARCO PAVE PerceptionRadio Rahim

47310 BANKS AND STEELZ Anything But WordsWarner Bros.

48311 LOX CHATTERBOX How To Sell Your SoulIlluminati Killers

49511 KWEKU COLLINS Nat Love Closed Sessions

50512 JONATHAN EMILE The Lover/Fighter Document MindPeaceLove

https://www.cmj.com/cmj-year-end-charts-2016-hip-hop/

ZuluZuluu edges out Haley Bonar in our best-of-2016 Minnesota album poll

Twin Cities Critics Tally 2016: The cosmic hip-hop sextet's debut record edged out Haley Bonar in our year-end poll. 

Between P-Funk’s and Sun Ra’s spacey ’70s jams and more recent albums by OutKast and Janelle Monáe, Afrofuturism is nothing new in music. But it felt like a fresh and timely art form within the Twin Cities music scene in 2016, thanks to ZuluZuluu.

A collective more than a band, the psychedelic neo-soul/hip-hop sextet dropped in traces of all those aforementioned artists and our musical patron saint Prince in a seven-song, 29-minute debut EP that local music writers have collectively declared the best Minnesota album of 2016. While ZuluZuluu’s “What’s the Price?” was loaded with infectious cosmic grooves good for tuning out the din of 2016, the lyrics offered an alert, visionary, utopian exploration of African-American identity and art in a year that saw race issues boil up locally and nationally.

ZuluZuluu is only the second act to top both our 14th annual Twin Cities Critics Tally — a compilation of 24 music pundits’ year-end top 10 lists — and City Pages’ Picked to Click poll as the best local newcomer.

The first to do so was Minneapolis singer/rapper Lizzo, for her classic debut “Lizzobangers” in 2013. No surprise, Lizzo pops up again in TCCT 2016. She was named best live performer, while her feel-good summer jam, “Good as Hell,” was voted song of the year. Critical props also were showered on TCCT mainstay Haley Bonar’s album “Impossible Dream,” an unusually close runner-up, earning more votes than many of our past No. 1 albums.

While those artists deservedly shared the spotlight in 2016, critics overwhelmingly agreed that the biggest reason the Twin Cities music scene seemed so alive this year was the communal, hopeful, artful reaction to Prince’s death. These albums do his legacy proud.

1. ZuluZuluu, “What’s the Price?”

At first an unusual and wee bit untidy assembly of local hip-hop/R&B visionaries — including falsetto-slinging singer Proper-T, rapper Greg Grease, DJ Just Nine and singer/producer MMYYKK — ZuluZuluu impressively coalesced in the studio. “What’s the Price?” boasts ethereal beats and synths but earthy lyrical/vocal tones. While there’s no lack of noteworthy songwriting, from the big-pictured title track to the provocatively quirky romp “Bicycle Seat,” the EP opens with a cover that perfectly sets the tone: “Black Maybe,” which Stevie Wonder wrote for his late ex-wife Syreeta Wright. “You’ve seen the way they’ve done your boy,” Proper-T sings, “and the boy’s still down after 300 years.” While the music continually leaves you guessing, there’s no mistaking the mission here. (192 voter points)

http://www.startribune.com/zuluzuluu-edges-out-haley-bonar-in-our-best-of-2016-minnesota-album-poll/408613325/

ZULUZULUU What's The Price on Bandcamp's The Best Albums of 2016: #60 – 41

#58

ZULUZULUU, What’s the Price?

Part of the strong tradition of Minneapolis synth-funk, this six-piece group of multi-instrumentalists have captured the sound of their city with their exuberant live shows, and are now poised to take on the world. The Afrofuturistic ideals What’s the Price? arrive on the heels of the group’s recent mixtape of covers, which boasts a tracklist full of Black household staples. That same appreciation of their roots carries through in passion and power on What’s the Price? Whether indicting police brutality on the title track or getting sensuous and crushed-out on “Bicycle Seat,” ZULUZULUU keep the past close while pointing the way to the future.

Alesia Pullins

https://daily.bandcamp.com/2016/12/06/the-best-albums-of-2016-80-61/