Chill music...

[Al B. Sure!]

and some guy triple-tracked into obscurity.

the multi-tracking is a necessity of the genre for many rappers. breathless deliveries are demanded and though most of the rappers who are known for them can do them, its a better idea to have them rap a few lines straight... pause... rap the next few lines, etc. and have a multi-track effect. for example, Cormega has an extremely noticable multi-tracking (i mean where he sounds like he's coming from a different direction every 5 seconds) but on his freestyles, he raps straight through with relative ease. it's just a matter of preventing rushing and cracking due to lack of oxygen, etc. on the album tracks.

[self biased]

nonono... you mistake what i'm saying. that's not multi-tracking. or at least what i was thinking at any rate. you've got four tracks of vocalsin the same spot. most rappers don't actually hit distinct pitches, so when you lay three or four tracks of not quite the same thing over each other, it sounds like ass.

[Al B. Sure!]

you mean tracks over each other? you sure you're not thinking of reverb? i can't think of too many rappers who rap over what they already said in the studio. on the one-word punchlines, they do that but those are occasional just to stress a clever pun or something.

[The Emperor Fabulous]

Bon Jovi, Coldplay, Our Lady Peace, Queen, StainD, and certain monster ballads are good.

Air (band's name) is one of my favorites.

[self biased]

i know of exactly what i speak of. unfortunately i can't think of any examples off the top of my head.

wait.

remember mase?

[Nubclear]

North Korean anthem, USSR Armenia, Azerbaijan, China, Russia, Germany, France, South Korea, Japan, Australia, India.

[Combat Ingrid]

3rd and the mortal, The Gathering, Within Temptation, Opeth, Dead can dance, Haggard, Ayreon, Tiamat, Therion etc etc

Most of these bands could be described as "soft metal" if you want to generalize

[molly bloom]

To enter my chill out zone I listen to:

jazzwise/soulwise/funkwise:

Jhelisa, especially the Friendly Pressure e.p. . It's a lovely sunny summer groove, cool beats to bliss out to.

Attica Blues, the divine voice of Ms. Dionne Warwick, especially the Burt Bacharach songs, Morcheeba's Big Calm album, and the Trigger Hippie and Tape Loop singles, Kitty White, Abbey Lincoln and Shirley Horn, and Cassandra Wilson, especially her version of Tupelo Honey, because her voice is so mellow and sweet, it could be honey pouring in your ears. D.J. Shadow's Endtroducing is also great wee small hours music.
Alpha's first album is marvellous to relax to, and also makes a fine background for intimate moments...
Isaac Hayes' Hot Buttered Soul and Black Moses are mighty fine.

Soundtrack/ambiently, I like Michael Brook, his Albino Alligator soundtrack is luscious. Craig Armstrong's album The Space Between Us is worth checking out too, as is Caroline Lavelle's Moorlough Shore. William Orbit's Ngram label released a series of albums in the late 90s that are all chill out zone contenders, as are his Strange Cargo series. It's worth checking out Brian Eno's series, Ambient 1-4, and the releases on his Obscure record label from the late 70s, especially his pioneering first ambient album, Discreet Music. Harold Budd's album on the Obscure label, Pavilion of Dreams, combines ambient with jazz sounds and rich almost operatic vocalizing.

The more vocal oriented relaxing music I like is people like Badly Drawn Boy, Beth Hirsch, Beth Orton's first album, the trippier remixes of St. Etienne (for that retro sixties film moment when you're cruising down a sun bleached empty stretch of highway beside the sea) and Sheila Chandra.

If you want to relax in a classical vein, the old standby is Erik Satie, but Abbess Hildegard of Bingen is well worth a listen, and for a classical fusion try Jan Garbarek and the Hilliard Ensemble's albums, Officium and Mnemosyne.

Peter Gabriel's Passion soundtrack and the Passion Sources album are great to unwind to, as are other releases on his Realworld label- the Michael Brook/U. Srinivas collaboration and the Djavan Gasparyan album being two stand outs. Brook's work with Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan on Night Song and Mustt Mustt is also worth checking out too.

[Starchild]

Radiohead, Muse, Alanis Morissette, Life After Marvin (local band), and the Moulin Rouge soundtrack.

[Spec]

Cypress Hill (Cant get anymore chill that that)
Eric Clapton
Dave Mathiews Band

That relaxes me.

Spec.

[Spec]

Originally posted by molly bloom
To enter my chill out zone I listen to:

jazzwise/soulwise/funkwise:

Red hot Chili peppers?


SPec.

[Theben]

Originally posted by Albert Speer
it still boggles me how yall can listen to rock music. there's no beauty in it. it's just loud.

You're just close-minded.

Trance, specifically Thievery Corporation.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Spec


Red hot Chili peppers?


SPec.

Doubleplusgood.

But no, just laziness and the effect of rereading 1984 yesterday.

Forgot-

Cocteau Twins: Echoes in a Shallow Bay and Tiny Dynamine and Treasure.

Dead Can Dance: Spleen and Ideal and Into the Labyrinth

and Everything But The Girl: Walking Wounded

and Jon Hassell: Dream Theory in Malaya and Earthquake Island

[Al B. Sure!]

selfbiased:

well mase overdid the punchline thing i was talking about. most rappers just use it everytime they say something notable but mase did it just about every line but i think he's a bit of an exception.

though to make mase' case worse was puffy who chats all along the songs of just about every rapper he got on his label. you'll always hear puffy saying, 'oh yeah', 'i like this', etc. all along the songs of any Bad Boy records artist.

[Kaak]

portishead, mazzy star, massive attack...