As a fol­low up to their pre­vi­ous EP, HelloGoodbye, Stik Figa & D/WILL bring us their lat­est project, Alive & Well. With their last release being themed as a sui­cide note to Stik Figa's son, Alive and Well pro­vides a much dif­fer­ent per­spec­tive on life, yet equally thought pro­vok­ing. The EP is filled with sub­stan­tial lyrics, and serv­ing as a true concept-related project, each song is sig­nif­i­cant to the over­all mes­sage: Stik Figa & D/WILL are alive and well. Entirely pro­duced by D/WILL, the beats on the EP show expan­sive vari­ety, equipped with unique flips on soul sam­ples and steady loops as a sound­track to Stik Figa's thoughts. "Alive and Well picks up right where the last one left off," says D/WILL, con­tin­u­ing, "then it leads into a blast of soul­ful feel goodness!"

Alive & Well is avail­able for free down­load here: http://www.mediafire.com/?r2ykj2d2sdct441

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"Seasons," the lat­est Apollo Brown sin­gle off of The Reset, is very much an exer­cise in melan­choly. "I really wanted to hear some­thing on the sad side, some grasping-onto-life type music," Apollo explains of his vision for the track. The old-time radio crackle, sparse gui­tar work, and echo­ing hook pro­vide the per­fect back­drop for the wist­ful lyrics of ris­ing Kansas City emcee Stik Figa, cur­rently work­ing on a full length with pro­ducer Oddisee. A long­ing to escape his home­town and make it big flows through every syl­la­ble and the rap­per uses sea­sonal imagery - win­ter in par­tic­u­lar - to rep­re­sent the stark and unfor­giv­ing emo­tions that can accom­pany such lofty goals. Still, both Apollo Brown and Stik Figa have achieved a level of suc­cess that only comes through per­se­ver­ance, no bet­ter stated than in the line, "With the sun still shinin' / It doesn't seem as cold." "Seasons" explores sen­ti­ments we can all relate to and its sad­ness proves cathar­tic when cou­pled with the achieve­ments of the song itself.

Building antic­i­pa­tion for his debut album, The Reset, out May 25, recently signed Mello Music Group pro­ducer Apollo Brown re-releases a mix­tape done in 2007 named Skilled Trade. Raw in its sound, Skilled Trade is a col­lec­tion show­cas­ing Apollo Brown's honed craft through the 30 tracks of instru­men­tals included in the album. "Really, the inspi­ra­tion behind putting this project out was to get a lit­tle bit of my sound out of the bed­room and into the streets," says Apollo.

A true dis­play of tal­ent, not only did Apollo pro­duce and arrange it him­self but also cre­ated the phys­i­cal album through his own means, then dis­trib­ut­ing them the same exact way. But it isn't just tal­ent that makes Apollo a good pro­ducer but also the hard work he is will­ing to devote to his craft. "The dirty boots on the cover sig­nify work. That's all I do," Apollo says, "I'm always work­ing hard to bet­ter my craft and make sure my music sounds as good as it can." On The Reset, Apollo's hard work and tal­ent will mix with the likes of accom­plished emcees such as Rapper Big Pooh, Stik Figa and fel­low label mates, Diamond District to bring the debut album to most excited fans.

Download Apollo Brown - Skilled Trade here: http://usershare.net/fuvndby4cxmu

Apollo's "Streets Won't Let Me Chill" remix is avail­able on iTunes now.

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The multi-talented emcee and pro­ducer Oddisee is back to the boom-bap with his "Kansas Bay (South Central Remix)". After find­ing suc­cess with the cel­e­brated Diamond District crew, Oddisee has stepped back out on his own with a new 24-track instru­men­tal album, Traveling Man. Inspired and informed by his jour­neys to Australia, Europe, Asia, Africa, and South America, Oddisee has cap­tured the sounds of hip-hop the world over on Traveling Man, out now dig­i­tally and avail­able as a lim­ited edi­tion vinyl press­ing on February 23rd. The sonic voy­age con­tin­ues with the "Kansas Bay (South Central Remix)" fea­tur­ing Kansas City native, Stik Figa. The Midwest meets the West Coast in this re-imagining, which finds Stik Figa rid­ing the wave of a beat steeped in G-funk and drip­ping with bass best suited for a low rider. As Oddisee explains, "Bay Area hip-hop has been pop­u­lar in Kansas for years, and Stik Figa uses a Too $hort-esque flow to tell the comedic story of an out-of-towner's unfor­tu­nate luck on 'Kansas Bay'." Prepare your­self for your sonic trav­els, and let Oddisee guide you on this aural adven­ture from the heart­land to the left coast and back again.

Oddisee's Traveling Man is avail­able dig­i­tally, on cd, & vinyl via Mello Music Group.

Oddisee is back with another exclu­sive for fans with the third install­ment in his season-themed series Odd Winter. The gifted emcee is ener­gized at the prospect of show­cas­ing his lyri­cal dex­ter­ity on the upcom­ing project. "This series has forced me to look at the sea­son and time in a dif­fer­ent way," says Oddisee. "They're like theme music." Not slow­ing down after a year that saw the release of the crit­i­cally acclaimed Diamond District album In The Ruff, Oddisee is also prepar­ing to drop a new instru­men­tal album, Traveling Man on inde­pen­dent hip-hop pow­er­house Mello Music Group. The album will be hit­ting dig­i­tal retail­ers on January 26th and will be fol­lowed by vinyl and lim­ited edi­tion slim­line releases, avail­able exclu­sively at UndergroundHipHop.com, on February 23rd. Be sure to visit Oddisee's new band­camp page to down­load Odd Winter for free, and let the man with the mic be your guide through the sounds of the seasons.

Odd Winter Track List

01 Ci'iy Life Feat. Tranqill
02 Frostbit
03 Winds From The North
04 Black Broadway Feat. X.O.
05 Brain Wash Remix Instr.
06 Riiight Feat. Stik Figa
07 Carry On instr.
08 The Warm Up Feat. Homeboy Sandman
09 Queue With No Coat
10 60901 Instr.
11 All Because She's Gone Instr.
12 It's Over Feat. Tranqill
13 Blizzard Of 09

New joint ,cour­tesy of Kenny Fresh, off of Oddisee's Mental lib­er­a­tion EP which is drop­ping next week.