PHILL’S RANDOM RAP PICK FOR THE WEEK OF 7/02/07: LEGION OF DOOM "LIVE BAIT"

What’s good… hope y’all did it right for the 4th and HOPEFULLY you didn’t blow off any limbs when you set off those M80’s yesterday. I did what I usually do for the fourth of july… ate some ribs and wiped my azz with the constitution. No, wait… actually, that’s what George W. did to celebrate the fourth of july. I just ate ribs and listened to Cold Crush tapes (so necessary).
My apologies… i’ll leave the political humor to Colbert and them. My forte is THAT REAL SCHITT and imho politics is about as far away from the real schitt as you can get. Today I want to clarify my position on “random rap” (by the way, who was it that coined the term “random rap” anyway? Chairman Mao? Dave Tompkins? Eddie Catto? Rare Dave? Inquiring minds want to know). Don’t get it wrong at all… I LOVE RANDOM RAP!!! Not everything, of course. But look at all the hot schhhhhittt that has been found and unearthed (and in some cases reissued) in the past few years. All the lost yet bangin’-with-that-1212-sound Paul C productions, mad early Keith Murray… uhh, excuse me, Keefy Keef raps, so on and so forth. I’m not gonna get into a whole HISTORY OF RANDOM RAP thing here… I’ll save that tome for someone else (or just cop the Freddy Fresh book if it’s still around anywhere). But I WILL drop one of my all time favorite random raps, and this one is straight from Philly: Legion Of Doom’s “Live Bait”.
Now, some of y’all may have heard ya boy Phill say that back in the 80’s he wasn’t feelin’ a lot of Philly rap. Well, that is 100% true. I liked a lot of the beats and of course the dj’s were killin’ it, but the rap portion of the program? Oh, HELL to da naw! Growing up 30 mins from the Bronx and being fed a steady diet of Mele Mel, Caz, Moe Dee and all the great NYC rap pioneers, I just couldn’t f**k with basically any Philly rapper seriously back then. It wasn’t until EST and 3X Dope came out that I was ready to give a Philly dude much props on the mic (I later learned to appreciate dudes like Fresh Prince and others).
There were a few exceptions, though, and this Legion Of Doom 12″ was one of them. I remember hearing this just one time on the radio when it first came out… I was like OH SNAP! Recorded it live off of Power 99, but the deejay never said what the name of it was. I rocked the radio dub for awhile, but it soon got lost amidst the hundreds of other radio tapes I have in boxes and laying around wherever. Once the random rap craze hit a few years ago I heard the song again a few times, one time at a record show where I was deejaying with Tony D (fabled hip hop producer and the KING of all Ebay random rap sellers). I asked him what it was, but he thought I was asking about a different record so I didn’t get the correct info. Of course that ain’t gonna stop a legendary digga like myself, so I quickly found out all the info. Did I then spend the $500+ to cop an OG 12″? Nah, I’m too cheap to do that, especially since I have a 320 kbps MPfree! And it is that same MPfree which I will now share with you.
Fast raps over James Brown breaks, ILL programming (much as i tried to front on Philly, dudes were CRAZY nice bangin’ out beats in this town, for real), an emcee with a somewhat Will Smith-ish sound to his delivery but the bol TL is real nice with it (“just cuz you grew a few inches and a couple of hairs / sprouted out on ya chest, boy, you still ain’t a man / I bet’ not never catch you standin’ up usin’ the can / anymore, or I’m-a smack ya ass down to the floor / and when I pull up in a limo, punk, open the door”). Overall I’m personally giving this jam an A… y’all may not agree with such a high grade, but so what- this is my blog and I’m always right here. DEAL WITH IT. lololol!
BTW, I know I have a scan of this 12″ but have no idea where it’s floating around at on my external HD. If anybody out there has a scan they can send me so I can add a pic, please do so- either hit me with a comment that includes a link right here or shoot something over to my e-mail, soulmanworldofbeats.com and I will be your BFF. I promise. ALSO, if anybody knows the Legion Of Doom and / or “where are they now” hit me with that info too. They might live three doors down from me for all I know!

And one last BTW: I see y’all ain’t shy with the downloads, so please don’t be shy with the comments either. Give me some feedback before I have to start reporting on the trials (literally) and tribulations of Lindsay Lohan and Paris Hilton in order to elicit some sort of response. If you make me stoop so low I’ll never forgive you, I swear it.

DOWNLOAD:

LEGION OF DOOM “Live Bait” RE-UPPED: http://www.zshare.net/audio/575149770da46866/