EarDrumz
Vinyl Vixens

Listening notes

EarDrumz released Vinyl Vixens on the CrateDiggers label in 2008. The record is a double LP, spanning four sides and fifteen tracks of instrumental hip hop. The format itself feels appropriate given the title, which nods directly to the culture of vinyl collecting that instrumental hip hop has long maintained a close relationship with.

The tracklist runs generously. Side A opens with "On Her Behalf" at four minutes and twenty-seven seconds and moves through three additional cuts, including the five-minute-plus "Shout & I Moan ('til Another Day)" and the comparatively concise "Shootin' 4 Her Heart" at three minutes and twenty-two seconds. Side B follows a similar structure, with "Winter JazzMine" leading at five minutes and ten seconds before the notably brief "To: Sandy Warner (Smoke Ring Proposal)" checks in at two minutes and forty-three seconds. Sides C and D carry the record home across seven more tracks, with the closing stretch on Side D containing three of the longest pieces on the album. ".44 Caliber Love (Comes Down)" ends the record at five minutes and thirty-nine seconds, the longest single entry on the tracklist.

Track titles across all four sides suggest a loose thematic thread around romance and longing, rendered in the playful, idiosyncratic language that instrumental hip hop producers frequently favor. Titles like "Never, My Love," "My Old Flame," "Once Knew (Whut Love Is)," and "Diggin' U, Diggin' Me" carry emotional weight in their naming even without vocals to make the sentiment explicit. "Martian Beauty Pageant" and "Bastard Out Of Carolina (1983)" introduce a stranger register that keeps the sequencing from becoming predictable.

No catalog number has been assigned to this release. The record was pressed to vinyl and is classified under hip hop and instrumental genres. This draft has not been fact checked and should be reviewed before publication.