Church Remix - Slum Village, Skyzoo, Focus prod Young RJ

With two of three founding members of Slum Village passed (Baatin and Dilla) and Elzhi no longer fleshing out the new lineup these days Slum Village= T3.  And frankly T3 is a goof.  This is not simply a personal opinion, beyond his vaguely passable flow there is a sense in various interviews that T3's lazy style was a source of frustration to the more serious members of the group particularly Dilla. 

Here the highlight is the production of the consistently deft and melodic producer Young RJ (at one time half of BR Gunna with Black Milk) and Focus' verse deserves a nod too.

True Story/ Dub Rock (Will Sessions vinyl)

It's very difficult to appreciate the sincerity and breadth of Detroit 'funk' band Will Sessions recent voluminous vinyl output unless you're as versed as they are in both Funk and Detroit Hip Hop.

As their name suggests they're a backing band for hire for fellow Detroit hip hop artists like Elzhi, Guilty Simpson and Black Milk.  They're also fully capable of backing actual Detroit soul heavyweights like Dennis Coffey who was one of Motown's original Funk Brothers studio band as well as having a substantial soulo career.

They're output of late (available on their bandcamp) represents intricate efforts to replicate live the productions of various hip hop producers; as they did on both Elzhi's recapitulation of Nas' Ilmatic as Elmatic with note perfect re-workings of beats by Pete Rock, Large Professor and L.E.S, or their Mix Takes One and Mix Takes Two which crams musical cues like a DJ set from the pillar of Detroit hip hop and neo-soul legend J Dilla, to his protege Black Milk, Guilty Simpson as well as rare funk cuts (and epochal hip hop samples) like Bob James Nautilus.



Here though on True Story they've truly out done themself.  True Story (moreso True Story Part 2 from Phat Kat's Carte Blanche)  is one of the most beautiful hip hop songs ever created with lyrics and vocals by Phat Kat (Ronnie Cash) and production by the notoriously underlooked and gifted producer Young RJ who with Black Milk were briefly BR Gunna .

In referencing the history of their contemporaries so flawlessly and with such reverence they are both doing something truly unique and making interesting statements about live music culture and sample based music culture.  Will Sessions are winking at the DJ, winking at the bedroom purist, the music writer and the crate digger.  More importantly they're winking.