
Oliver Wang
Oliver Wang is an culture writer, scholar, and DJ based in Los Angeles. He's the author of Legions of Boom: Filipino American Mobile DJ Crews of the San Francisco Bay Area and a professor of sociology at CSU-Long Beach. He's the creator of the audioblog soul-sides.com and co-host of the album appreciation podcast, Heat Rocks.
Person Page
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The iconic group's early music releasing online at last comes with a renewed interest in its career arc. Take a guided tour through one of the most distinguished runs in hip-hop history.
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Trugoy brought skill and care-free charisma to De La Soul's innovative music, which helped to usher in a new age of hip-hop. After years of legal disputes, that music will soon be available again.
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Valerie June has just released a new LP called The Moon And Stars: Prescriptions For Dreamers. The album foregrounds her distinctive voice and mixes reassurance with a yearning for engagement.
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In 1968, the British singer flew to the U.S. after signing with Atlantic Records. Her acclaimed recordings from this period are collected in Dusty Springfield: The Complete Atlantic Singles 1968-1971.
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The Gospel Truth was a subsidiary of the famous soul label Stax Records. A new anthology, The Gospel Truth: The Complete Singles Collection, revisits its brief moment in gospel soul history.
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These songs take on some of the ugliest stories in our history and reflect the commitment of Black musicians to telling the truth of how Black people have been wronged, and survived, and fought back.
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Rampart Records documented L.A.'s Eastside Sound during a fertile period of interracial collaboration from the 1960s through the early 1990s. Now, some of that music has been reissued.
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Hip hop duo Gang Starr broke up in the mid-2000s and in 2010, MC Guru died. So fans were surprised by the announcement of a new, posthumous album called One Of The Best Yet.
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This German group delivers steel drum covers of Mary J. Blige, Mobb Deep, Gang Starr and more.
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Listening to Cut Chemist's latest album is like looking under a microscope at a drop of ocean water. The longer you examine, the more life you find.
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The 1972 concerts at The Apollo were recorded but, inexplicably, never released — until now. They show a side of Brown content to turn the show over to his collaborators.
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Maybe this is all part of some performance-art piece we've been unwittingly sucked into. But either way, it seems to be working.