The Witzard

We first heard about Vans_Westly right around the time of the release of his 2017 EP, QUILLS , primarily produced by NelWayne with one additional beat crafted by Drew Scott. Vans' next effort, Bubble Boy, was released on fellow Baltimoreons Height Keech's own Cold Rhymes Records. Bubble Boy was entitely produced by Height, again, with one lone beat produced by Drew Scott. Vans_Westly returned in 2020 with his Rapscallion EP entirely produced by Jumbled with profits raised benefitting both Bail Fund and The Baltimore Animal Rescue & Care Shelter (BARCS.) Vans has since released Bandcamp-exclusive songs either covering, featuring, sampling, evoking, or otherwise incorporating the likes of Buddy Ross, Mac DeMarco, and The Backyardigans with assistance from his usual cast of collaborators. Break Stuff (Limp Bizkit cover) by Vans_Westly Vans_Westly (@Vans_Westly) recently teased his most off-kilter concoction on Twitter posting, "Recording the most ridiculous out-of...

CREDIT: Hand-cut "EAST." Art By: John Bachman (@NapalmDef) Happy New Year to all of our trusty readers out there! Let's hope this year will be better than the last! Today, for our first post of 2021, we're back with new music from Vans_Westly & Jumbled. We've previously featured Vans' 2017 QUILLS EP produced by NelWayne & Drew Scott, which was followed up by Bubble Boy (2018) with beats from Scott & Height Keech and released on Cold Rhymes Records. Vans_Westly's latest release, an EP entitled Rapscallion, fully produced by friend of The Witzard, John Bachman AKA Jumbled. Rapscallion was, actually, released on November's bandcamp Friday last year with 50% of the profits raised going towards Bail Fund and 50% towards BARCS or as Vans himself put it, "100 percent goes to good sh*t!" Rapscallion by Vans_Westly Now, as 2021 has kick-started itself into gear, Vans_Westly has returned once more with a proper music video for Rapsc...

August Heat by Ialive John "Jumbled" Bachman was one of the many talented artists, writers, and Beastie Boys super-fans who contributed to our recent 3-part PB30 All-around Breakdown feature and now, he's returned with his second self-released full-length of 2019, AUGUST HEAT . Jumbled 's first long-form project since January 2019's Padre , AUGUST HEAT is just as it sounds: 17 tracks-worth of sweltering instrumental beats and emcee-assisted vocal tracks. "In early June, Jumbled compiled a list of his heat: heavy Boom-Bap beats that meshed together to create an album," explains a press release. John Bachman goes on to define "heat (noun)" as "1. hot beats / raps, 2. oppressively hot or humid weather, 3. pressure" and then, somehow, manages to reference a JAY-Z rhyme from "Light Up" alongside Drake: "Triple entendre, don't even ask me how." Although, originally conceived as a single-emcee affair, AUGUST...

earlytwothousands by Drew Scott Baltimore -based producer and beat-maker Drew Scott had quite a big year in 2018: first and foremost, he got married to his long-time partner and frequent collaborator, Pale Spring . Congrats to Drew & Emily ! Musically, Drew unleashed CRITTER from his "Basement" Pop alter-ego, Giddeon Gallows , as well as remixes from Butch Dawson , HI$TO, and Infinity Knives . Now, Drew Scott has effectively returned with his first proper release of 2019—something I've been hearing about for a while now— earlytwothousands ; just as it sounds, is an 8-track collection of early 2000's Hip-Hop remixes "featuring" Snoop Dogg , 50 Cent, Juelz Santana , Clipse & Pharrell, Ghostface Killah , T.I. Lil' Wayne , and JAY-Z. "It was just something I've been wanting to do. I was a teenager when these songs came out, which was around the same time I first started making beats," Drew Scott told The Witzard , via email. ...

Owen Ross is a singer, song-writer, multi-instrumentalist, and producer originally hailing from Brooklyn, New York, who now resides in Berlin, Germany. Ross spent years on the road as a touring guitarist and has played and written many styles of music with an emphasis on Soul, R&B, Gospel, and Hip-Hop. He has worked with Baltimore emcee and producer Drew Scott on a number of projects including Luvaducious with Al Rogers, Jr. ILL VESSEL, Giddeon Gallows' CRITTER, and as Warmest Regards with BLACKSAGE's Josephine Olivia. Prior to releasing music under his own name, Owen Ross recorded and released three EP's as goste between 2013-14. Since retiring the "goste" name last year, Owen Ross has written, performed, produced, and released three EP's: 2017's Fluorescent I , it's 2018 follow-up Fluorescent II, and his latest EP, Greyscale, released on Berlin-based imprint Finest Ego. Owen Ross further explained: "I started seeing myself as a producer ...

"Navel gazing in my basement for a decade plus / I f**kin' lied when I said it wouldn't take long / Hope you got all day maybe two / It's work, it's hard work / It took two weeks to climb down this hole," Drew Scott sings on "Avoidant" from his debut as Giddeon Gallows, CRITTER . I've been hearing about Scott's Giddeon Gallows side-project for about 6-8 months and now, it's finally out in the world and I'm able to write about it; to my ear, it sounds something like a stylistic mix of Kanye's "Auto-Tune album" 808's & Heartbreak, The Postal Service's Give Up, and early TV On The Radio à la Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes. "Giddeon Gallows is basically, just a pen name, it's not an alter-ego or anything. I have a deep appreciation for Pop music, not in a mainstream sense, but more as a vehicle," Drew Scott wrote, via email, describing CRITTER. "While I was finishing ILL VESSEL , I was ...

Trunks EP. by UncleRussie Baltimore -based producer and beat-maker UncleRussie describes his latest EP as "the follow-up to The Bulma Tape series, the Trunks EP. sequences and highlights various timelines of Trunks Brief - Past, Present & Future (?)" He's of course, referring to 2016's The Bulma Tape and The Bulma Tape: Side B from last year, a Hip-Hop/Anime trilogy, which will likely close with Trunks EP. successor #TheBulmaTape3 . UncleRussie 's Trunks EP. takes inspiration, as well as direct samples, and influence from Dragon Ball Z 's "Future" Trunks, Androids , and Cell Sagas . UncleRussie single-handedly edited, arranged, and produced his Trunks EP. with assists throughout from beat-making buddies Action Bastard , Benjamin Banger, Bito Sureiya , Drew Scott, Jumbled , TEK.LUN, Swellthy , and UncleRussie himself. Trunks EP. features three sparse, yet fitting vocal assists from emcees Dot Com Intelligence , ONLY AKA @GwapSinatra, ...

"Nowadays, I'm more influence by the artists around me making making music here in Baltimore. We probably take that for granted a bit, but we're really lucky. When I [first] started making beats at 16-17, I was pretty much just biting DJ Premier and every producer on [Nas'] Illmatic, sampling the hand-me-down vinyl I was given from my friend's weird uncle. As I got older and more fascinated with Pop and Alternative music—especially, the really depressing stuff—my production was shaped by hearing this handful of albums in my early beat-making days. Honestly, it's really hard to narrow down [to] under 10 (I wish I could pick a Prince album or Madonna's first album) but I'll keep it at six." - Drew Scott (AKA Giddeon Gallows) Forbid feat. Al Rogers Jr. by Giddeon Gallows I. OutKast - Aquemini (1998) "First CD I bought with my own money; hearing the 808's and that guitar on "Rosa Parks" at 10 years old was a moment. I alread...

POWER MISSIONS: Selected Guest Spots by Height Keech "This is POWER MISSIONS , a collection of Height guest spots from 2002-present featuring @maniacmeat , @DrewciferScott, @TheMahogany , @cexmang, @kingrhythm , @emceeineye, @NapalmDef , @mickeymistakes, + more," @HeightKeech wrote within a recent Tweet self-promoting POWER MISSIONS: SELECTED GUEST SPOTS . POWER MISSIONS marks the fourth Height release of 2017 on his Cold Rhymes Records imprint, following self-produced album MIND MOVES THE MOINTAIN , Shark Tank 's Height -produced Dan's House , and ialive & Height 's collaborative TIMEWAVE ZERO album, as well as Height -compiled We Can't Go Back Now: The Cold Rhymes Collectio n from prolific oddball rapper-producer Jack Topht . POWER MISSIONS: SELECTED GUEST SPOTS consists of hand-selected Height features recorded and (un)released from 2002-17 with the likes of Grand Buffet , TOBACCO, Drew Scott , AK Slaughter, PT Burnem , Bow n' Arrow AKA M...

Baltimore-based singer, multi-instrumentalist, producer, and web/multi-media designer Emily Scott has recently released her second, aptly-titled Pale Spring EP2. Wenker is a classically-trained pianist and has been tickling the ivory keys since she was five. She mostly played Beethoven & Chopin for the better part of her musical upbringing and took guitar lessons in high school, but always felt like she was "bad at it." It took several years, but Emily Scott says she had to essentially un-learn everything she had amassed during her classical training in order to be able to make her own music. It wasn't until Scott met frequent collaborator and fiance Drew Scott about two and a half years ago that she learned how to use ProTools and attained a new outlook on the world of music-making and production. Since first meeting Scott, Emily Scott has recorded and released two now-removed Anna Notte albums (her rapping alter-ego) and two EP's-worth of "genre-fluid...

Quills by Vans_Westly I was attending a wedding reception here in South Jersey at The Little Red Schoolhouse this past weekend with my fiancé, when I received a Tweet from @DrewciferScott tagging me in a previous Tweet from @Vans_Westly , which simply read: "Yo, I really want someone to review Quills ." Westly was of course, referring to his latest Quills EP , which was completed and released just in time for his Quills Release Party this past Saturday, June 24th at Baltimore 's The Windup Space with "special guests" Height Keech, Drew Scott, Raymond Strife , and Lt. Headtrip —nearly all of whom I've previously worked with and covered here at The Witzard . Drew Scott , who produced "Spring Sh*t" on Quills , road tested a few new tunes from his upcoming "weirdo Psych-Pop EP," which soon after The Windup Space show, he said "felt real sexy and pathetic;" in addition to Vans_Westly 's Quills EP , Scott also released ...

I recently heard about rapper-producer Drew Scott after fellow Baltimore beat-maker John "Jumbled" Bachman shared his latest single from then-unreleased ILL VESSEL, Hemlock Ernst, Eze Jackson & 83cutlass-featuring "Porcelain." I immediately reached out to Drew Scott, simply on the strength of "Porcelain," and we quickly began emailing back and forth. Before too long, he sent me a pre-release copy of said album, ILL VESSEL along with this fitting, extremely descriptive statement: "So, it's kind of a solo album/collaborative project I've been working on for about three years in-between the last BLACKSAGE album and Luvadocious with Al Rogers, Jr. Predominantly Baltimore artists, aside from PT Burnem (Richmond, VA,) Mike East (Rhode Island,) and Jaws That Bite (Detroit.) I did almost all of the beats, aside from contributions from Berlin-based producer Owen Ross , the Jumbled-produced track, the Mike East-produced track, and collaborating wi...

"Are you havin' a bully day? I'm havin' a bully day! Is everyone havin' a bully day? Bully! Bully! Yes, bully!" Peter Griffin 's great-grandfather Turn of The Century Take On All-Comers Griffin proclaimed during a boxing match with a kangaroo within a 2007 Family Guy episode titled The Tan Aquatic with Steve Zissou . John "Jumbled" Bachman , Baltimore engineering teacher by day and cartoon-loving beatsmith by night recently utilized the aforementioned bit of Family Guy -culled dialogue and expertly turned it into the introductory sample for "Bully Kong" from his newly-minted rapper-producer group, Bully Preston with long-time collaborator Dwell . "Bully Kong" —billed as "[the] new single from the Bully Preston project"—serves as the second release from Bully Preston , preceded by fittingly-titled "Bang The Bongo" from Jumbled 's recent Action Shots EP ; Jumbled & Dwell first worked togethe...