Sunday, March 29, 2009

A.C.D. -- THE WORLD TERRORIST

M-O-B-B D-E-E-P, A.C.D. burn somethin
Let's get lifted, Queens is you wit me?

Prodigy's first 2 lines from "Street Life" left my brain scarred back in 1996. The Mobb Deep, L.E.S. and A.C.D. team up track from the AIDS benefit album "America is Dying Slowly" has always been one of my favorite Mobb collabos. L.E.S.'s production sounds like he was using the same William Cooper schematic Havoc referenced for "Hell on Earth". Another eerie, paranoia inducing street banger from The Bridge. But just who were A.C.D. and what did it stand for? I wouldn't come across anything else by them for quite a few years.
Fast forward to 2000something: While digging around on th'bay I discovered a sealed copy of an A.C.D. 12" from 1998. I won the record and when I finally got a chance to listen to it I was amazed I'd never heard the 2 tracks before. Vintage late 90's QB material that, while not as dark as "Street Life", contains enough grimy record scrape to send 41st side addicts scrambling out into the cold night, ceremoniously gutting dutches. A-Dog and C. Sonfiorenzo (What is his real MC name? Dude is so gully you can only lift his publishing credit!) bring that real QB house science. This was the first release on the short lived Hit List Records label out of Corona, NY. The only other Hit List release I could find is another A.C.D. single titled "Kings of New York" which features fellow QB resident, Nature (hit me if you got one to trade).
The Rick Rude and Megabucks co-produced A side, "In the City", lifts the breakdown from The Lovin' Spoonful's "Summer In The City", which you can find on "Hums of The Lovin' Spoonful" (Kama Sutra, 1966) as well as various 45 issues. This grim piano loop sets the tone for ACD's grim portrayal of inner city street life.
The B side is the A-Dog produced "Mos Niggaz" which is based on 2 bars from Henry Mancini's version of "Theme from 'Love Story'" (RCA Victor, 1970). If it sounds familiar to you, Immortal Technique recently used the same loop (although lifting 4 bars instead of 2) for his track "Dance With The Devil". A-Dog's use of only 2 bars creates a tense, snowballing effect that really keeps the track moving along and leaves IT's endeavor sounding a bit like he's rapping over his grandma's favorite soap opera theme.

TRACKS

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

do you know of a track that might be mr.lif or def jux related or not, it was a single from several years back, the main samples are narration about the word fuck and the phrase fuck you

post cobra mcees blow this town!!!!!!

do you have the perspective or pallas records sampler with toxic urb by the almighty arrogant ny hobo-junction affiliate

proper dues on the blog

i'm rocking a housecoat sewn out of the original lyrics to cold blooded blitz from schooly d's notebook

Eons One said...

sounds like you're deep enough in the mire to be contributing to the blog. don't have any of your requests to rip but that cobra mcees shit is ill. hope to own one someday.

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

the first thing i ever sampled in my life was that piano thing from lovin spoonfull.... the record was sitting near my knee the first time i used an MPC and the piano part is real accessable .. never did anything with that but always wondered if and who else did, cuz that was a radio song and surly someone else noticed...looks like u answered the question.. i wonder if more people sampled it ?? id be willing to bet there are 1 or 2 more songs out there with that sample

Smooth Triumph said...

nice breakdown
1)how you found out about them
2)the records you got/want by them
3)the records they used to make those records, it's the ROBME formula!!!
GoogleEarth Queensbridge Housing Project then open another window and rock this gully ass shit:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qcwFWdjzr08

Smooth Triumph said...

I think a lot of the acd songs from this era were off their Korner Klaimers album/cd/mixtape???thing: peep:
http://www.queensbridge.info/en/readarticle.php?article_id=67

ApocalypseWestCoast said...

Holy shit!!! I'm so stoked on this A.C.D. joint and the fact that you take the time to detail as much information as you can about it. I mean, I love all of that Q.B. shit and you dug something I slept on. Your the kind of dude that when somebody talks about Texas you bring up DOPE-E and K-RINO and shit. Your blog fucking rules!!!! I linked you right off the bat.