Following on from last year’s interview with former Beatnut Al’ Tariq, I finally got a chance to speak with Psycho Les about the ups and downs of one of rap’s greatest groups. Turns out that Les’ history foes back even further than I thought, as he revealed he worked at Music Factory during high school…
Category: Hydra Ent. Special
Read The Label: The Hydra Entertainment Story
The independent hip-hop resurgence of the mid-90’s seems great in retrospect, but in the days before widespread internets access it was often a case of pot-luck when ordering the latest batch of vinyl via fax from Beat Street or Mr Bongos. While most artists were releasing one-shot singles on their own imprints, there soon emerged…
Kyron aka Solo (Screwball) – The Unkut Interview
Best known as a member of Screwball and for the controversial ‘Who Shot Rudy?’ single, Queensbridge legend Kyron is plotting his return to the rap game after an extended hiatus (due primarily to being on the lam for several years). Despite the sudden, tragic loss of his long-time rhyme partner K.L. earlier this year, Kyron…
A Salute To Kenny Lou of Screwball
This is the worst news I’ve heard in a long time – K.L. from Kamakazee/Screwball has passed away after an asthma attack. Kenny Lou might have seemed like “the other guy” from Screwball, but he was really the heart of the crew since the beginning. When they finally dropped the Y2K album in 2000 after…
Joell Ortiz Interview
This is a little something I put together from my two brief interviews with Joell – one from his album release and something from a couple of months back. The way he’s going right now, 2008 is going to be another great year for dude. Robbie: You recently got an XXL cover. That’s a good…
Hydra Special – Mike Heron Interview
A little while after I posted an article on Hydra Entertainment on this site, I received an email from Mike Heron, who as it turns out started the label with Jerry Famolari in 1997. Their debut release, “Screwed Up/They Wanna Know Why” was also the first of many dope records from Queens super-group Screwball, in…
Hydra Special – Jerry Famolari Interview
The next couple of weeks here at Unkut Dot Com are dedicated to the mighty Hydra Entertainment label, the Queens-based indy that brought us Screwball, Godfather Don and Gab Gotcha – street-loved underground records that delivered everything that Rawkus wanted to be but never really achieved (but more on that later). To set it off,…
The Best That Never Did It – Blaq Poet Interview
Despite having maintained his position as one of hip-hop’s most enduring tough guys for the last twenty years, Blaq Poet refuses to be stuck in the past. As he proclaims on “Bang This” (the opening track on his latest album): “My mindstate is ’88. but my style is ’09…I’m an OG, but I’m gettin’ that…