Lil Wayne
Tuesday, December 20th, 2005 by Paul Irishhip hop // neo-soul remixed
I’ll admit it’s odd for me to be writing on a fairly popular dirty south rap star, but this track “Shooter” has been on solid rotation since I first peeped. The casually dope bassline vibes underneath syncopated soul lyrics from Robin Thicke. Weezy gets in his breathy interjections every couple seconds until he lays into it heavy, nearly 90 seconds after the track starts. Tommy B describes it eloquently, “He’s got an easy drawl on this song, not the playful rasp from the rest of the album but a laid-back, unforced stream-of-consciousness that matches up perfectly with the track’s back-porch sunny-Alabama-afternoon lope.” Thicke’s 2003 soul track “Oh Shooter” bore that addictive lope, only it had Robin’s vocal crooning instead of Lil Wayne’s loose lyrics.Firey southern rap dropped into a soulful riverboat groove.
In 1997, Brighton-based duo Smoke City released “Underwater Love”, a Brazilian-flavored trip-hop tune which landed a great number of fans and ended up on over fifty compilations. The dreamy, sweet-tongued voice of vocalist Nina Miranda created the sharp allure and addictive quality of the track. Now, after some collaborations with Bebel Gilberto, Nitin Sawhney, and Da Lata, Nina joins eclectic producer Dennis Wheatley as Shrift. Together they create a seductive sound that transports you halfway between South America and wind-swept fantasy. Off their upcoming album, “Floating City” spins around you in a genre-fusing 6/8 rhythm and “As Far As I Can See” nails beautiful melody with little, deliberate instrumentation.
A little while ago, 
While jazz sirens like Ella Fitzgerald and Sarah Vaughan had voices that made doves cry, Carmen McRae had a rhythm in her song – a bebop-style phrasing that could make Max Roach swoon. Her take of “Just a Little Lovin’” was first released in 1965 on Atlantic’s Great Moments in Jazz compilation. Earlier this year a mysterious producer named GB took McRae’s precise and casual vocal line and crafted a chilled, soulful track directly around it. Since then he’s gotten his paws into one of Ninja Tunes’ latest releases by 
Havana’s prodigy, Jesús Alemañy, tightens these fifteen wildly talented musicians into a combustible knot of chart-topping latin rhythm. They lay down some flying trumpet riffs and fabulous bongos in the classic Cuban style, throwing in mind-blowingly high solos and firey dance grooves. This group was a key component of the Cuban musical explosion into the States in the late nineties, joining alongside the globally popular