Download Mack10 the Letter Album the Recipe
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download mack10 the letter album The Recipe. It became commonplace during the mid- to late '90s for rappers to litter their albums with a small nation's worth of guest stars, both for commercial purposes and for all-important sonic variety. At its worst, this tactic can lead to albums where the ostensible star ends up sounding like a guest at their own party. But at its best, the more-the-merrier formula can result in stellar albums like Mack 10's The Recipe, an unambitious but enormously satisfying slice of pop-savvy late-'90s gangsta rap that features a slew of the hottest names in hip-hop, from Eazy E to Master P to ODB and many, many more. Mack 10 got his big break from mentor/gangsta rap pioneer Ice Cube, who not surprisingly lends his gruff presence to two of the album's standout tracks: "Should I Stay or Should I Go," a borderline sacrilegious but effective reworking of the Clash classic, and "Ghetto Horror Show," a similarly cheesy but enjoyable slice of gangsta rap gothic featuring a scene-stealing turn by the underrated Jayo Felony. Snoop Dogg trades verses with the laconic but authoritative Mack 10 on another of the album's highlights, "LBC and the ING," driven by a familiar but undeniably infectious sample of "Heartbeat," one of the greatest and most-used loops in the history of hip-hop. "Money's Just a Touch Away," the album's Gerald Levert-assisted first single, is a too-slick attempt at radio-friendly crossover success, but Mack 10's sole solo showcase, "The Letter," is a surprisingly eloquent and well-reasoned defense of gangsta rap. The Recipe probably won't convert many non-believers, but for fans of straightforward, late-'90s gangsta rap, it's about as good as it gets. Foe Life: The Best of Mack 10. Foe Life: The Best of Mack 10 rounds up a decade's worth of highlights from the West Coast gangsta rapper's career to date, spanning Mack 10 (1995) to Hustla's Handbook (2005). The outright hits Mack 10 enjoyed came early in his career, up until The Paper Route (2000), his first album to fall short of either platinum or gold sales status, and his first to not spawn a significant hit. Accordingly, 11 of the 19 songs on Foe Life come from Mack 10's mid- to late-'90s heyday: four from his self-titled debut, "Foe Life," "On Them Thangs," "Chicken Hawk," and "Mozi-Wozi"; two from Based on a True Story (1997), "W/S foe Life" and "Only in California"; three from The Recipe (1998), "Money's Just a Touch Away," "The Letter," and "Get Yo Ride On"; and a pair of 1996 soundtrack contributions, "Nothin' But the Cavi Hit" and "Hoo-Bangin'." The Paper Route, the turning point in Mack 10's career, is represented by three songs ("From the Streetz," "Hustle Game," "Tha Weekend"), and though none was a significant hit, all are good songs worthy of inclusion here. The oddest album in Mack 10's discography, Bang or Ball (2001), his one-off album for Cash Money Records, is represented by two songs ("Hate in Yo Eyes," an elaborate Dr. Dre/Scott Storch production; "Do the Damn Thing," like much of the album, produced by Mannie Fresh). Beyond this point, Foe Life skips past a couple independent releases (Mack 10 Presents da Hood, 2002; Ghetto, Gutter & Gangster, 2003) to Hustla's Handbook (2005), a major-label effort for Capitol that is represented by three songs ("Like This," "The Testimony," "My Chucks"). Foe Life: The Best of Mack 10 is sequenced non-chronologically, front-loading many of the best songs and thereby balancing out Mack 10's post-'90s descent. A couple glaring omissions hobble the collection somewhat, above all the absence of "Backyard Boogie" (Mack 10's highest-charting solo hit). Another absence is any of Mack 10's work with Westside Connection (a West Coast gangsta supergroup also including Ice Cube and WC), particularly the hit singles "Bow Down," "Gangstas Make the World Go Round," and "Gangsta Nation," which rank among his most popular singles. Mack 10 Is Releasing His 1st Album In 10 Years & It Has His Old Sound (Video) This coming September marks a decade since Mack 10 released a solo album. The Inglewood, California veteran and Westside Connection co- founder made 2009’s Soft White , which involved Rick Ross, Anthony Hamilton, and former Cash Money Records label-mate. Since then, the founder of Hoo-Bangin’ Records self-released a joint-effort with Glasses Malone, 2011’s Money Music . In recent years, Mack has maintained a relatively low profile in Rap. In the mid-2000s, Westside Connection disbanded, with Ice Cube and WC continuing to perform and record together. As for Mack, he tells The Soren Baker Show that he has been focused on the Southern California real estate market. Like the MC’s passion for building custom lowriders, he has enjoyed fixing up properties for profitable flips out in the same West Coast that he represented so hard during the 1990s. However, Mack 1-0 admits that he cannot leave music alone, simply based on enjoyment. At the close of the nearly one-hour interview, the artist tells host Soren Baker that he is releasing an album modeled after celebrated releases like 1995’s eponymous debut, 1997’s Based On A True Story , and that “Connect Gang” sound. “My new album [is called] The Redprint ,” the artist says at the 50:00 mark. “I’m just havin’ fun. I have a different approach to doing this record. I don’t need to do a record; I don’t have to turn my record in [to fulfill a label agreement]. It’s just, I’m just havin’ fun. I call it The Redprint because I just want to do it through Mack 10’s lens again. Since I’m havin’ fun, I want to make the kind of records that I miss. You don’t really hear those kind of records that we made then, now. So I’ma give you a couple of those, ’cause obviously, we was pretty good at those. Really, I’m just doin’ me…so anybody that ever liked Mack 10 is gonna be very pleased with this project, because sometimes you’ll get a dude’s record and be like, ‘I wish he was like the old [version of himself].’ All of that that you’re lookin’ for, that’s on The Redprint .” The title also nods to Mack’s longtime Inglewood ties to a street organization, which made Westside Connection history, juxtaposed with WC’s ties to another set entirely. All three of Mack’s first albums (also including 1998’s The Recipe ) achieved gold certification. Westside Connection’s 1996 Bow Down debut went platinum, with 2003 follow-up Terrorist Threats scoring gold. Elsewhere in the interview, Mack 10 reveals that Fat Joe’s part of “Lonzo Medina” in 1999’s Thicker Than Water was originally intended for another Rap star. The film featured Mack and Joe, Ice Cube, Big Pun, MC Eiht, Krayzie Bone, Flesh-N-Bone, Bad Azz, CJ Mac, and Tupac’s former girlfriend, Kidada Jones in its cast. In discussing how he and Joe Crack had a lot of commonalities in their coast-crossing film, Mack says, “A lot of people don’t know that Thicker Than Water , at first, was really gonna be me and Snoop.” He continues at the 27:30 mark, “It just didn’t work out right. Snoop was goin’ to No Limit [Records], and all that kinda stuff. I guess the timing just didn’t work out right. But at the end of the day, me and Crack made a classic.” “ Bow Down went double-platinum on an independent. We had an answer for [the resistance from press and radio]. Over the years, I’ve met some real solid dudes from the East Coast [in] New York and around [it]. I feel like they more than made up [the love] on the second album.” Soren Baker also points out that in 1997, “Mack 10, Mack 10” played off of U.T.F.O.’s “Roxanne, Roxanne” single. U.T.F.O. were early Brooklyn, New York Rap stars. “U.T.F.O. was the sh*t; they was knockin’. But of course [‘All The Critics In New York’] was never about those kind of people. It was about the [music] critics and program directors and stuff like that. The only people we went at with Westside Connection was whoever went at us. But we didn’t put the record together aiming at artists…but I had a problem with who didn’t think we was fresh or who didn’t think we was deserving of spins or whatever. Because Soundscan didn’t say that; we sold a lot of records.” In the mid’90s, Westside Connection beefed with Common and Cypress Hill. Both issues were later squashed. Baker also recalls W.S.G. stating in an interview at the time that they never had a beef with Pete Rock, who produced Common’s diss track, “B*tch In Yoo.” Soren Baker recently published The History of Gangster Rap: From Schoolly D to Kendrick Lamar . The book includes a Foreward by Xzibit. Snypa Muzicc. Dedrick Rolison (born August 9, 1971) is an American gangsta rapper and actor best known by his stage name Mack 10. Born in the city of Inglewood, California. He was a member of the hardcore rap trio known as the Westside Connection, along with Ice Cube and WC.