Music Roundup for 4/22/08

Time for a blog about today's world of music...

We'll start with what I have been listening to lately, which is mainly the new Atmosphere album, When Life Gives You Lemons, You Paint That S*** Gold, a cool name for an album I would say. Anyway, Atmosphere is pretty much one of the more known underground hip-hop / rap artists around even though the first time I knew about this album coming out was that it was on the pre-order section of the iTunes Music Store (that cover above is not the retail cover). Other than that, it is a pretty chill album to listen to with the fellas rapping and such with the chill beats compared to all the mainstream hits out there (most of them being crap, but still catchy). Atmosphere, to me, is about the rapping first, beats and melodies second, and it shows in their latest album. Basically, this is underground hip-hop and rap at its finest, and if you're looking for a chill album to listen to escape such songs as Ray J & Yung Berg's Sexy Can I and Lil Wayne's Lollipop, Atmosphere's latest is worth checking out.

I also happened to listen to a little bit of Madonna's new album, Hard Candy, which is out next week. I guess some of the tracks I downloaded weren't the real versions, so I have to go back and try again on that. If you like her last album, Confessions on a Dance Floor, it is basically a familiar vibe with Hard Candy. The productions actually do take center stage themselves rather than Madonna herself so far with the album divided up to productions from two of the best producers now, Timbaland and Pharrell Williams. Of course, you have your first single and current club banger, "4 Minutes", with Timbaland and Justin Timberlake, but then u listen to other songs like "Give It to Me," her newest single, and it is surprisingly good for what it is (that is produced by Pharrell). There's also a song called The Beat Goes On with Kanye West, but it is not as good it could be especially with someone like Kanye. If you're into new banging productions from Timbo and Pharrell, Madonna's Hard Candy is worth a listen even though Madonna herself is not that as worth it. Plus, I rather listen to this than Mariah Carey's E=MC2 album, which is odd for my tastes.

Okay, this is a little related to games with Judas Priest's album, Screaming for Vengeance, out on Rock Band today. This is not bad for a first album to choose to start up the albums for Rock Band, with such hits as "Electric Eye" and "You Got Another Thing Coming." Most of the songs have ridiculous solos, specifically the title track, "Screaming for Vengeance" (Notechart video below thanks to YouTube user Npaeen), and I barely passed that (good thing I had Overdrive ready for it just in case). Overall, the whole album is worth the download (15 bucks or 1200 Microsoft Points) for the challenge and accepting the fact that albums finally made it to Rock Band.

Lastly, this pic above may seem weird at first, but yeah that's Busta Rhymes and Linkin Park together. I first read about this mash-up or collaboration at IGN which is basically Busta's first single called "We Made It" for his new album, Blessed. I happened to like Linkin Park's mash-up with Jay-Z a lot with Collision Course with "Numb/Encore" being the smash hit it is and the fact the mash-up actually worked. I don't know if this Busta / LP song will work since I haven't listened to it, but it is interesting to say at least.

That's it for My Music Roundup for this week, maybe more next week, who knows if there's something good worth mentioning.