J-Swift's...Bizarre Ride...It is not only a tad ironic, but immensely sad that J-Swift produced a song called 'Pack The Pipe' on Pharcyde's classic 1992 album Bizarre Ride II...and after some personal shit with the Cyde and narcotics ended up falling victim to the crack pipe and homelessness and in the end winning his life and music career back and this was filmed for a documentary titled 1 more hit is due for release this year.
http://1morehit.com
J-Swift (born John Martinez) was one of those producers that made making beats seem easy,his formula was tight drum loops (often familiar breaks), interesting samples (often dusty jazz samples),horns, bass lines and ill track construction, his work for The Pharcyde, The Wascals and Quinton had a style and sound all it's own, so it was incredibly distressing to hear that one of the greatest producers of the 1990's had sold his production equipment, was broke, a crack addict and living on the streets, after falling out with the crew he took to great heights, J-Swift's decline is a tragic and long story and I have included some links below the supplied music...as that is what this post is about J-Swift and his (no pun intended) dope music.
So many questions do remain unanswered though, what ever happened to The Wascals-Greatest Hits album?, is it still collecting dust and cobwebs in locked storage somewhere?, what really went down with The Pharcyde crew?, there were rumours that the fall out was over the 'Cyde claiming credit over J-Swift's beats but I think it was possibly something deeper, and where did Quinton ever go?, will the Pharcyde ever do another album with J-Swift(he did 2 tracks with the only 2 'Cyde members and a remix for 2000's pretty average Plain Rap EP) lastly how many unreleased tracks or remixes has J-Swift not let us hear yet?.
Lastly, while doing some research, I have noticed that a lot of people seem to think that The Wascals was an a.k.a of The Pharcyde, this was not the case at all, The Wascals was Buckwheat (aka Buc Fifty),Spit-Anky, Al-Phie & St.Imey ( all named and based on the classic characters from the Little Rascals TV series) these kids were poised to do big things but alas politics and bullshit got in the way.I'm not a huge fan of Buc Fifty's hardcore/gangster shit and was quite surprised when I first heard his first 2 Alchemist produced tracks, but it's good that he is still doing his thing,
Enjoy this comp if you haven't heard some of these tracks and remixes.
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=USWC2264
1-pharcyde -pack the pipe
2-pharcyde_ft_buckwheat -on the dl
3-quinton_ft_darkskin-quintons_here
4-the_wascals - the dips
5-utd- manifest destiny remix
6-pharcyde - passin' me by
7-the_wascals_class_clown_(album_version)
8-massive_attack-protection (j swift mix)
9-pharcyde-otha fish.mp3
10-the_wascals - hard rhymes
11-pharcyde - 4 better or 4 worse
12-quinton-im_not_an_mc
13-wascals_class clown (fatlip_remix)
14-pharcyde- trust [remix]
15-pharcyde_ft_buckwheat - i'm that type of n----
http://www.discogs.com/artist/J-Swifthttp://www.massappealmag.com/article.php?id=218
NB: I couldn't find a good version of the The Wascals-Dream & Imaginate 12" or The Dips (On My Jammie Mix), if you have these please leave a comment.
Thanks for reading and visiting this blog, I appreciate it.
Peace
12 comments:
thanx! wanted more wascals for a long time.
peace.
thanks for the knowledge.
wonder if fatliip had something to do with swift's addiction, or vice versa.
not sure if it's you, but there's a post on bustthefacts with like 60 comments, and the wascals and a gang of artists are brought up, and sme people are posting there lost & found shit.. maybe wascals is one of 'em?
I was wondering if this movie was ever coming out? I got a promo blast about it and posted the trailer on my blog some time last year, or maybe the year before? Can't remember it was so long ago. Shit's crazy.
I don't have the CD in front of me, but I'm pretty sure J-Swift produced a couple of tracks off Fatlip's solo album 'The Loneliest Punk' that came out on Delicious Vinyl a couple years ago. I think he might have been in the DVD that came with it too. I haven't really seen his name on anything since then though. Sadly, I can't say that the beats he dropped were of the same quality or even in the same sort of style he made famous so many years before either.
That first Pharcyde LP was incredible though. Him and LA Jay ( with some help from Tre ) laced that record. It always bugged me that they never did much of anything else other than that and the two Pharcyde spin-off projects, Wascals and Quinton. The only other thing I ever remember seeing LA Jay's name on was the first Yo-Yo album or something like that.
As for Buckwheat, I thought his guest verse on 'Bizarre Ride' were fucking awesome. And I didn't mind that first 12'' he put out as Buck 50 too much either. Since then, ehhhh...
Thanks for the knowledge JAz, comprehensiv shit. Is Buc Fifty the same guy that went on to have a track on that Battle Axe 'Defenders OF The Underworld' comp.? Couple of good cuts on there although not a big fan of the label.
We need to get out grubby little hands on some more Wascals...
Peace
Dan
Think I jut posted twice Jaz, forgot about you approving them. Feel free to get rid of one of them.
thanks a lot for this post.
I wondered so many times what happened to this guy...
He is (was ?) so gifted !
i'm sure you got bucweed's rethuglican album. swift produced the entire thing, i enjoyed it a lot. .
j-swift didnt do the beat for otha fish, slimkid tre did.
if anybody got "the rethuglican" and/or "nigga heaven", please let me know. I would be soooo grateful. Thx Bros!
ufmischer@hotmail.com
This is way old, I kno. But... I'ma fan of the producer and would really love to see the one more hit documentary... whatever happend to that movie? It just seemed to disappear out of existence.
Mr-Richie
Thanks for your comment, unfortunately I know as much as you about this documentary, maybe they couldn't get the money to get it distributed it or something?, I just hope that J-Swift is clean now.
Post a Comment