Doomtree's false hopes ring true

I don't know why I hadn't heard of Doomtree before, but I am glad they joined T61. One listen and I was hooked. A few repeat listens and I was a believer. Now, two days later, I have been telling everyone I know about them, and am anticipating getting a handful of their discs in the mail.

Released just over a month ago, Doomtree's crew album is rife with tracks that will have your head nodding and your finger reaching to hit repeat. The writeup on T61 and their own site is comprehensive enough, but to summarize, Doomtree is a hip hop collective based out of Minneapolis, and they are all very good, and even better together.

There is currently one track from the crew album available to listen to on T61, while the samples on their official website are all selections from previous releases. Savvy and with a sense of humour, Doomtree also has a YouTube channel which includes clips of the crew "working hard", which is mainly them goofing around. The track for the following music video is also on the crew album. It gives props to fixie bike culture while featuring emcees Cecil Otter, Mictlan, Dessa, P.O.S. and Sims over a sick beat by producer Lazerbeak.



The collective's members got to know each other as teenagers, and most were involved in music already: some were in punk bands, others were rapping. Producer MK Larada said that "we [Doomtree crew] just started putting on shitty little shows and putting out shitty little CDs and then it just got less and less shitty." Now, half of the crew lives together in one house, constantly pushing each other on their separate work, but also collaborating in the true sense of a hip hop crew.

Doomtree members are always performing shows, but every year they get together for the annual Blowout, where the entire crew is together on one stage. In "MPLS", "DTR" has a large enough following that they also held a Blowout Jr. ONLY for people under 20, as the larger show is generally 18+.

Reinforcing their ethos of striving to better their music, Doomtree Records have four CDs all entitled "False Hopes". These EPs feature songs they felt were good, but not the best that they could offer. They claim to have saved the truly great ones for the self-titled crew album released July 29th. Emcees P.O.S., Sims, and Cecil Otter all have full albums available at the Doomtree store, while you can expect a Mictlan disc to drop at the end of this month and Dessa's solo album to be out in late October.

In any case, it's not my place to decide what you think about Doomtree. Take a listen to Dots & Dashes, check the Drumsticks video, and finally the samples on their official site. You might just agree with me that this is some of the most infectious, smart and well produced hip hop you've heard in ages.

As DTR say of their crew album:

"Hate on it. Love on it. We certainly do both, and couldn't be more excited for you to feel feelings with and all over us. Yikes."



Some impressive numbers from their news page:

3 weeks at #1 on the CMJ hip hop charts.
#23 peak on the iTunes rap charts
#7 on Billboard's regional Heatseekers chart
Top 100 peak on Youtube music
Top 100 peak on CMJ, all genres
Top 100 peak Mediaguide's AAA Album charts

Official site: http://www.doomtree.net
DTR YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/DoomtreeRecords

Getting worldly with Ecos de Portoalegre

Bonjour, hi! I go by the username of iWoo on T61, and this is my first actual post on Max Bumps. AnnieB posted my "Get to know..." entry back on April 26th, if you'd like to see some recommends. Of course, you can always visit my somewhat neglected playlists on T61.

I recently moved to Montreal, in part because of all that is going on with the music and art scene. Summer here is known as festival season, and I've already found that there is so much going on that it can be hard to keep up. Last month saw the completion of the 29th annual Festival International de Jazz de Montréal, aka simply the jazz fest". I was too slow on getting tickets to Ladytron and TV On The Radio, but I was able to see Bran Van 3000 play a free show downtown as part of the admittedly low-key Canada Day celebrations. I had just moved into my apartment that day, and I was so busy (and stressed) the next few days that I didn't catch anything else at the Jazz Fest.

About two weeks later, I was walking through the splendid Parc La Fontaine on the way home one afternoon. I saw a poster for a free show in the théâtre de Verdure, which is an open-air ampitheatre with a covered stage, situated in the park. The group was Ecos de Portoalegre, a Latin-American band that was part of the jazz festival lineup. I'd heard from a few people that I missed out on a very good thing by not catching them at the jazz fest. After groceries and making a quick dinner I walked back to the park, just in time for the concert.

I was very impressed. Even though it had rained ten minutes prior to the show, the band was on time, and the seats were more than three-quarters full. They played an hour and a half set that had people clapping along and standing at their seats to dance. A few couples were brave enough to salsa just below the stage. The crowd was very diverse, and quite appreciative despite the wet benches.

Anyway, I am not too familiar with Latin-American music in general, but here's what I've learned about Ecos de Portoalegre.

This 7-piece Montreal band has two members hailing from Canada, and the rest from Colombia, Ecuador, Argentina, Mexico and Bolivia. They have only been together as a band for three years, but their Latin-American rhythms are very popular in this city. Their style is a blend of different traditional Latin styles, and they mix together salsa and jazz with the sultry vocals of Anamaría Gonzalez (pictured right). The musicians have all been playing for a much longer time than the band has been around, and their skill is evident, with a very crisp and full sound.

The latter part of the group's name is Porto Alegre, a city in Brasil. The meaning of their name relates to the fact that the city has hosted the World Social Forum four times. The WSF is an annual meeting of activists and academics getting together to discuss issues and share ideas. Pablo Castro--guitar and piano player for Ecos--said their mission is to create "music that people can listen to and dance to, but also to say something about what's going on in the world. We're trying to echo everything that the forum was for."

Their website paraphrases this well: Ecos de Portoalegro is "making audiences dance, think and dream." Their music represents a diverse group of individuals able to share and celebrate their respective backgrounds rather than point out their differences. The result is a statement of anti or alter-globalization that just happens to have infectious rhythms and a spicy summer vibe.

Listen to four of their songs off their website.

So far they only have these four tracks available on a demo CD available at their shows, but they are apparently working on their album. If you happen to be in Montreal in August, they have another show on the 10th and 23rd. (Details at the site linked above.)