DJ Screw

[jon abbey]

what I find inspiring as a producer is how amazingly prolific he was in such a short period of time, at such a young age. he was born in 1971 and was dead at the age of 29, but somehow by then had been responsible for at least 400 hours of music (it still seems to be emerging), with a shockingly low quotient of duds, it seems.

a few pix from my only trip thus far to screwed up HQ in 2007 (escorted by our fearless leader)...

[dave quam]

checked this out on my city errand run today, pretty good one, thanks for the tip. it's more than 50 percent freestyles, though, I tend to prefer the ones that are mostly songs.

I get you. The freestyles can go both ways but I'm definitely a fan of the really fucked up drawn out rambling on some of the freestyle heavy tapes.

I forgot what tape it's on, but there is a sweet 10 minute freestyle over a Miles Davis loop on one of em. I'll try to find out which tape.

[hnismokehash]

there are some screw tapes up on here -- not sure if they are the same rips as the ones up on botm or what, but they do come with a little bit of information for those who don't like just grabbing random ones

the So Much Pain tape is one of my favorites, with some great freestyles on it

http://chicken-n-kalinka.blogspot.com/s ... ew%20Tapes

[Gaendaal]

what I find inspiring as a producer is how amazingly prolific he was in such a short period of time, at such a young age. he was born in 1971 and was dead at the age of 29, but somehow by then had been responsible for at least 400 hours of music (it still seems to be emerging), with a shockingly low quotient of duds, it seems.

Do you, or anyone else, know what was actually involved in 'skrewing' some music? I know it's more than just 'slowin' shit down' (especially on heavily chopped tracks) but it's all other folk's music, isn't it?

It is amazing that someone seemingly so obsessed with a drug that slows you down should work so hard.

[Joda]

Do you, or anyone else, know what was actually involved in 'skrewing' some music? I know it's more than just 'slowin' shit down' (especially on heavily chopped tracks) but it's all other folk's music, isn't it?

The content of Screw tapes varies from either other folks records, screwed and chopped, or instrumental records with any of the members of the Screwed Up Click freestyling over it, often a numerous members on one track plus shout outs to/from friends and those in the room at the time of recording the tape. One thing that differentiates a freestyle cut from a produced track is that the flows aren't chopped, just the beats. Plus, of he also features a lot of tracks from Texas based artists, so it's not always obvious whether you're hearing a freestyle or not. I'm not 100% sure how or when the vocals are slowed down on a freestyle track though. Sometimes there's no chopping.

To chop and screw, DJ Screw has two copies of the same record on his turntables, offset by a small margin, so when he slapped the cross fader in either direction the beat 'stutters', or he will often pull part of the track back a few times, for emphasis. Sometimes he lets the instrumental track run for quite some time, before any rapping begins. Of course, the pitch is slowed down as well. His style is inimitable with the chopping and screwing. Very 'organic' approach, you could say. No one else sounds like Screw.

[mudd]

lots of houston rappers from that era developed really slow delivery styles to fit better with the screw beats. i'm the the purple potions helped with that too.

not to say that wasn't in addition to other trickery, but that's part of why the live vox seem slow too.

m

[dave quam]

Yeah I will agree that Screws style is pretty unmatchable, super natural sounding. Most of its done with computers or CDJs now and it sounds a lot more robotic. You can screw and chop tracks super easily in ableton by just offsetting two of the same tracks off by the right margin, and basically use the crossfader or cut them in when you wanna chop. Very easy and fun.

[Dan Warburton]

see Sexism In Hiphop thread for further comments

[Joda]

lots of houston rappers from that era developed really slow delivery styles to fit better with the screw beats. i'm the the purple potions helped with that too.

not to say that wasn't in addition to other trickery, but that's part of why the live vox seem slow too.

m

You know, I was taking this into consideration the other day while listening to some freestyles on 'The Legend' compilation and it's really baffling and neat how in a couple of instances it's nearly impossible to tell if the vocals have actually been treated or delivery super syrupy slow...either way, adds a whole new dimension to my appreciation for this music.

Also wondering if anyone in Texas attended the exhibition opening or musical performances of David Dove / Lucas Gorham's 'Screwed Anthologies'? Any insight to share as to how it went down ?

[rlrds]

I found a random megaupload DL for Weed and Hennessy but there's no information in the track titles(just trks 1-12). Does anybody have the info/link for the tracks being mixed on this one?

[jon abbey]

I found a random megaupload DL for Weed and Hennessy but there's no information in the track titles(just trks 1-12). Does anybody have the info/link for the tracks being mixed on this one?

mine doesn't have titles either, and since that's not one of the official D.O.T.O. 'Chapter' releases, it's going to be hard to find.

[rlrds]

thts what I thought.
This guy who sells em on ebay, he gets them from the official store or what? Anybody know?

[jon abbey]

thts what I thought.
This guy who sells em on ebay, he gets them from the official store or what? Anybody know?

yes, I'm sure, he's based in Texas also. I know that Other Music tried to get some a few years ago to sell, and the Screwed Up Store wasn't interested in distro.

[jon abbey]

bump, because those of us who had our external HD die last week were happy to learn that the first 231 volumes of D.O.T.O have been put on The Pirate Bay, 20 at a time:

http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/5364334 ... 001-020%29

I have yet to confirm quality.

[free math]

quality seems to be 192, though might vary across the collection.

[O'Grady]

I found a random megaupload DL for Weed and Hennessy but there's no information in the track titles(just trks 1-12). Does anybody have the info/link for the tracks being mixed on this one?

A little late, but worked out these:

1. Juvenile - Solja Rag
2. UNLV/Bad Ass Yellow Boy - Drag Em Thru The River
3. Rita Marley - One Draw (I Wanna Get High)
4. Ice Cube - We be clubbin'
5. Silkk the Shocker feat. Destiny's Child - Just be Straight With Me
6. Fat Pat - Superstar
7. AllFrumTha I - County Jail
8. Timbaland & Magoo w/ Missy Elliot and Aaliyah - Luv to Luv Ya
9. Mystikal - Man Right Chea
10. Fat Pat - Peepin' Me
11. - (not sure about this, maybe someone can help, mystikal - ghetto child is in the mix)
12. Busta Rhymes - Dangerous

Definitely worth the download, from track 5 onwards it's all classic.

[splityourwig]

HARD TIMES is the best.

[daviddove]

Major exhibition and academic archive on DJ Screw at University of Houston. If you're a screw-head, this is well worth a trip to Houston. Pretty amazing:
http://info.lib.uh.edu/p/djscrew-and-houston-hip-hop

. . . and an associated conference on Houston hip hop presented by University of Houston and Rice University:
http://lws.lib.uh.edu/hiphop/

[ryansupak]

I've got a few hundred Chopped & Screwed albums probably. My personal favorite of the genre always comes back to one track that's actually mixed by Michael Watts.

It roams around filesharing as "Kappa Classic". I've got it on a couple of compilations under other names. It's about 8 minutes long and a rapper named 50/50 Twin has the best screwed verse I've ever heard on it. Sounds like a homegrown original backbeat, not anything borrowed from a major market as far as I know.

It's my favorite on the strength of the beat and also that it perfectly captures the spirit of Houston in the late 90's/Early 00's, before it was a "hip thing" to listen to that music. It's a song about going to the legendary (now-banned) Kappa Beach Party in Galveston, which was basically 100,000 black people flooding Galveston and playing Screwed music. I-45 would be a parking lot about 3 miles out of town, so people would just party on the bridge as well. (According to service industry people I've talked to, none of the local businesses could make money on it, since apparently there was a lot of shoplifting, fighting, vandalism, and walking on checks. I DJed it once and got paid, at any rate.)

Anyway, the song also features Paul Wall in his prime ("change the Sea Wall to the See Paul Wall"), and namechecks the now-defunct Flagship Hotel (which used to be my hideaway of choice), which was condemned as a political move by one of the kingpins of Galveston after Hurricane Ike.

rs