Saturday, 27 March 2010

Special Edition - J Dilla Stussy T-Shirt

Stussy and Stones Throw Records have teamed up to produce a limited edition t-shirt in dedication to the late James Dewitt Yancey (aka J Dilla - 1974-2006). The t-shirt is available in black and white, and features the famous photo of J Dilla as pictured by Raph Rashid. This t-shirt was released on Friday and in extremely few numbers, the only place where they are available is the Size? store in Covent Garden (37a Neal Street, Covent Garden, London,WC2H 9PR). The t-shirts are pictured in the two photos below.

For those of you who don't know who J Dilla was, he is considered as one of the most influential hip-hop producer's/DJ's of the last decade. He first came onto the hip hop scene in the early 1990's, where his promising abilities were founded in his productions of works by big name artists such as A Tribe Called Quest (you must give 'Midnight Marauders' a listen, in my opinion the best hip-hop group of all-time), Common, The Pharcyde and De La Soul. This then transferred into opportunities into as a solo artist, which dominated much of his work in the early 2000's. As a starting point I would recommend listening to his album 'Donuts', which is brilliantly created, with 31 hip-hop/soul/funk tracks blended together in a wonderful mix which is considered as the signature mark of Dilla's work along with his great sampling techniques.

Sadly at the age of 32 Dilla died after a prolonged battle with the blood disease TTP, this only three days after the album 'Donuts' had been released. His influence is evident in the music of today, most notably on the alternative hip-hop scene and also having rapidly increasing presence in the electronic genre, with a huge number of new generation electronic artists citing Dilla as a great influence upon their work.


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