The Witzard

Happy New Year to all of our trusty readers! 2020 marks 10 consecutive years of The Witzard, which is a little hard to believe, even for me! It's been a great ride thus far and we greatly appreciate everyone that visits and supports our site on a regular basis! I'm hoping to do a full site re-design in 2020 (something I've wanted to do for a few years!) but my wife and I are expecting our first child this Summer... so, we'll just have to see what happens, honestly. Hope everyone had a happy and safe holidays season! Here's a selection of new singles that were released over the holidays; let's just call it a best of 2019 year-end/2020 kick-off singles feature. Truth be told, these are some of our favorite artists here at The Witzard and we're excited to see/hear what they have in store for 2020! Festive Beastie Boys artwork courtesy of Pollywog Crew (@pollywogcrew.) Sincerely, Matt "The Witzard" Horowitz It's A New Year, Wavy Baby! ...

Inner Space - side B taster by Tom Caruana Remix Projects Many of our readers may unknowingly know Tom Caruana from his work on genre-shaping remix/mash-up albums, such as Wu-Tang vs. The Beatles - Enter: The Magical Mystery Chambers , Black Gold - Jimi Hendrix vs. The Wu-Tang Clan, and An Adventure to Pepperland Through Rhyme & Space . Caruana has, also, received critical acclaim (especially, here on The Witzard ) for his band, Son of Sam 's 2017 album, CINDER HILL , Black Gold: Spare Nuggets 2xLP, and 2018 self-titled EP with Detroit emcee Boog Brown . I've been frequently emailing back-and-forth with Tom Caruana and it appears as though, he has a handful of as-yet-unannounced/unreleased projects currently in-the-works or nearing completion; although, until very recently, I had not personally heard a peep about Carauana's latest project, Inner Space . It will artfully incorporate and remix samples culled from iconic Krautrock/Prog-Rock band Can 's storied dis...

It all started just a few days ago, when I saw a post on F*CKED UP frontman Damian "Pink Eyes" Abraham 's Instagram page ( @leftfordamian .) He was teasing a then-upcoming episode of his weekly podcast, Turned Out A Punk , featuring Chris Dodge from "The Beastie Boys of Hardcore," SPAZZ . A photograph of @mrchrisdodge was surrounded by images of No Use for A Name , NOFX frontman Fat Mike, CROSSED OUT , Kool Keith , Southern Lord Records , Melt Banana, and The Melvins . I ( @sharpcheddar856 ) posed an exclamatory question through comment, "Woah, now, what's Chris ' relation to Kool Keith !?" Fellow Instagram Punker @bengonzales815sl soon Replied: "@sharpcheddar856 Kool Keith did a guest spot on a SPAZZ record," which I soon learned, was in fact, SPAZZ's 1997 album, La Revancha . Later, Damian Abraham himself, actually, Replied back, as well: "@bengonzales815sl @sharpcheddar856 they are also name checked on Dr. Oc ....

"Hey, what's up? I'm Darko The Super AKA Doc Heller , an Experimental Hip-Hop artist from Philadelphia , by way of Jupiter. These are a few albums that have influenced my production [work]. There's much more, but these were the ones I found easiest to write about. Obviously, Frank Zappa is the greatest musician of all time and has affected me in greater ways than just sonically, but I found it too difficult to choose just one of his albums to mention from his massive catalog. Also, Camu Tao 's King of Hearts (2010) was on my list, but I couldn't think up something good enough to do it justice. Anyway, here's my Beat-maker Bedrock ." Watered Down Demon Fuzz by Darko the Super Charles Hamilton - My Brain Is Alive mixtape (2009) " Charles Hamilton 's my favorite producer and an artist who doesn't get nearly the credit he deserves for influencing a whole generation of rappers. Out of the 200 or so albums he's released, I chose My...

Mannequin Eater by MANIK|NETER "Loud. Abrasive. Mental. Music; a four word preface into the sound of MANIK|NETER , the side-project of Carl Kavorkian . Bringing together the essence of various adrenaline-inducing genres, this Noise-Rap project is described as an evolving experiment in crushing drums, heavy sounds, manipulated vocals, and translucent streams of consciousness. Lyrically, putting less emphasis on "bars" and more concentration on stirring emotions and simply rocking the f*ck out. Live cats to the front, wall flowers to the back when MANIK|NETER hits the stage," reads a fragmented chunk of Philly -based emcee, producer, engineer, and DJ Carl Kavorkian 's recent email blast. MANIK|NETER (pronounced: "Mannequin-Eater" ) is the new Noise-Rap -leaning side-project from Kavorkian, who described his latest Mannequin Eater EP as sonically reminiscent of Sleep Beggar or Noise Lock ; "the intensity of all those artists and all the new m...

"Today, New York -bred emcees Wiki & Your Old Droog are sharing a new collaborative EP. What Happened to Fire? is a 5-track joint effort that demonstrates a chemistry between Wiki & Droog that could only come from both artists growing up in New York City ; narrated by found samples of Kool Keith , the focus of the EP for Wiki & Droog was having fun while putting down the best bars possible," read a press release I received late last week from Nick X Dierl at Orienteer (formerly Liberal Arts and Life or Death PR ). What Happened to Fire? EP was recorded in tandem with an art installation under the same name, which ran at Romero Gallery in late 2016. " What Happened to Fire? was recorded at Wiki 's Chinatown apartment as the installation was being formulated and displayed and the art that accompanies the EP contains imagery from the gallery." Your Old Droog was compared to Nas early on in his career and was even believed to be some sort ...