The Witzard

Danger Mouse & Black Thought (CREDIT: UNCANNY, George Muncey & Elliott Elder) Danger Mouse (Brian Burton) & Black Thought (Tariq Trotter) have been long-time friends and infrequent collaborators. Long before The Roots/The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon emcee ever issued a proper solo effort (now, we're up to Streams of Thought, Vol. 3,) there had been rumblings of a collaborative effort with Danger Mouse cleverly titled Dangerous Thoughts . By most accounts now found online, that was around 2005-06 with The Roots steadily releasing Game Theory, Rising Down, How I Got Over, undun, and ...And Then You Shoot Your Cousin in the years since. They became the house band for Fallon's Late Night with Jimmy Fallon in 2009 and transitioned along with him to The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon in 2014. Danger Mouse has been far from inactive himself since 2005-06, releasing The Mouse & The Mask & Occult Hymn EP as DANGERMDOOM with MF DOOM, St. Elsewhere ...

When we last spoke with Phoenix-based/Philly born and raised rapper, producer, wrestling super-fan, and former teacher Raheem Jarbo AKA Mega Ran, he was preparing to unleash his DJ DN3 & Fresh Kils-produced Biggie tribute, Notorious R.A.N: Ready to Live. Ran's since "[taken] on a rigorous touring schedule, [hosted] a wrestling podcast Mat Mania , and [made] high-profile appearances on WWE television" and "returns to release the introspective and enlightening album, EXTRA CREDIT." His latest collection, EXTRA CREDIT—which even I had absolutely NO IDEA about until about 2-3 weeks prior to its release—is effectively a "greatest hits" collection made up of equal parts new tracks, old tracks, and re-imagined versions. Anchored by a few RNDM left-overs, EXTRA CREDIT features production work from K-Murdock (mixing & mastering,) The Rockit Scientist, Charlie Mumbles, ECID, Kaito Kobayashi, RandomBeats & Middle East Modern, DIBIA$E, Wann Sklobi, Y...