TOWN LOVE is an online art museum dedicated to celebrating the vibrant past and present of Northwest Hip-Hop. You can browse by artist or browse by year.

This gallery page is organized to highlight the creative work of

Tag: Jazz Digga

As you scroll, items are sorted from most recent to earliest.

A film about Northwest hip-hop from

Byrd's Eye View

Byrdie was a unique talent in the Seattle rap scene who was taken from us far too soon. Byrdie got his start in the late 1990s as a gangsta rapper on Street Level Records. He was a member of F.T.S. on their second album Money Motivated, and Byrdie stood out from the nine members of the group as a hard-working rookie with heart and a lot of hustle.

Byrd’s Eye View was released in 2015 as a tribute to the life of this notable 206 artist. After a voicemail intro, the album begins with the orchestral “Lift Off,” produced by D-Sane and featuring scratching by Bean One. Radio-ready “Cool Wit It” featuring the T-Pain of Seattle, Roc Phizzle, is breezy and easy. The sexy “Keep It On The Hush (Remix)” puts a new lens on a sultry hit from Byrdie’s first album, Poetic Epidemic.

R&B singer Jazz Digga is featured on six different songs, and I think my favorite Jazz Digga cut is “Lord Knows I Try,” for its realism and drama. “You can’t try to hide from life,” Byrdie instructs on this somber cut. Another standout song is “Talk Of The Town” produced by Funk Daddy, and featuring rapper Livio. The album’s title track, “Byrd’s Eye View,” is the last full song on the album. D-Sane reminisces about knowing Byrdie, “since Mercer Middle School,” as he puts it.

D-Sane organized a Byrd’s Eye View release party at Nectar to celebrate Byrdie’s life in 2015. It included performances by Jazz Digga, Jewels Hunter, Certified Outfit, Clockwork, and Grynch. The whole video is available on YouTube, and I recommend checking it out. Rest in peace to Jesse “Byrdie” Watson, 1978-2013. Written by Novocaine132

Byrd's Eye View was created in and features appearances from:

Did we get it wrong? It happens. Send us an email and let's get it corrected right away!

A film about Northwest hip-hop from

Graffiti Post Mixtape

Graffiti Post by Soul The Interrogator dropped in 2010, six years after his debut Beyond All Meanz in 2004. This compilation album is in a mixtape format with excellent scratching and cutting by the host, DJ Peg. One track from Beyond All Meanz made it onto Graffiti Post, titled “Back The Track Up.”

The mixtape also contains many of Soul’s greatest hits from his second album Prawdukt which was released in 2008. “Game Face” is upbeat and motivational, and it’s the perfect song to play for a workout or when you just need to get mentally pumped up. “Been Waitin” is a sweet love letter describing having feelings for someone special. Soul wants to share his feelings with a girl but he also doesn’t want to ruin the friendship, it’s very relatable to anyone who has ever felt shy about approaching a crush. “Duck Down” features local Seattle rapper Grynch who rhymes, “And I’m skilled so Soul and me are killing it, you’re so so I just don’t be feeling it.”

There is plenty of new material not found on either of his albums, one standout is “Love And Happiness.” This track samples the famous Al Green song, and gives it a funky new modern flavor. “Pity Pot” is also new, and it’s one of Soul The Interrogator’s funniest tracks. In “Pity Pot” Soul laments the difficulty of trying to get famous, and how hard it can be to make a name for yourself as a rapper. My personal favorite track on the Graffiti Post mixtape is “What Is Life,” which examines the role we play in our communities. Soul wonders why materialism is so rampant in rap. He reminds us that helping others should be our primary mission in life. It’s a powerful song. Overall, Soul’s messages are heavy on positivity and all about chasing your dreams.Written by Novocaine132

Graffiti Post Mixtape was created in and features appearances from:

Did we get it wrong? It happens. Send us an email and let's get it corrected right away!

A film about Northwest hip-hop from

Prawdukt

In 2004, Seattle’s Soul The Interrogator put out his debut album titled Beyond All Meanz, which featured production from Jeff Brooks, A-Won, and Soul himself. Four years later in 2008, his second album Prawdukt arrived. This project, executive produced by Nickels, contains more of the same flavor that Soul brought on Beyond All Meanz, but adds some bigger names to the roster this time. The very first song on Prawdukt, “Game Face,” has a fun, hype beat by the talented Apollo, and it’s an electric way to kick things off. “I ain’t trying to lean with it, rock with it, go pop with it, you need to stop, you can drop cause you’re not committed,” Soul raps. Title track “Prawdukt,” also produced by Apollo, gets autobiographical from the very first line, “I’m a product of the block and the Blade.”

“Been Waitin” featuring Jazz Digga is one of the strongest tracks on Prawdukt. The BeanOne beat is classy like a crystal chandelier, and Soul’s lyrics really find a groove. The song is a moving look at what happens when you develop a crush on someone, and can’t decide whether or not to tell them. Jazz Digga makes me look forward to each chorus, and Soul makes me look forward to each verse.

There are a couple of things that don’t quite work for me. “Haterville” is a tight four minute song, but it gets lost between the butt-dial-sounding one minute intro and one minute outro that drain the track’s momentum. The hardest track on the album is “What Happened?,” but Soul puts so much gravel and volume in his voice that the loud, angry tone could distract from the message. The theme of the album is struggle against adversity, and there’s no better example of this than “The Ropes,” featuring Indijinis, which tells how Soul fights to stay positive, especially under difficult circumstances. Prawdukt shows musical and lyrical growth compared to Beyond All Meanz, and to complete a second album is no small achievement. Well done. Written by Novocaine132

Prawdukt was created in and features appearances from:

Did we get it wrong? It happens. Send us an email and let's get it corrected right away!

A film about Northwest hip-hop from

Reigncraft, Volume 4: The Labor

After three successful compilations, Reigncraft series founder KNDNM could have just thrown in the towel and decided that the innovative Seattle rap series had run its course. Thankfully for rap fans across the Northwest, that’s not what happened. This Reigncraft Volume 4: The Labor compact disc dropped at the end of 2004, and it is yet another action-packed assembly of varied hip-hop talent from the 206.

“Questions” by Unexpected Arrival presents a number of deep thoughts to chew on, set to a compelling, stark beat. “Dammit all to hell, my life feeling like a jail. We won’t win the war if we’re still fighting amongst ourselves,” goes a heartfelt line. “Questions” was also featured on Unexpected Arrival’s third album, My Life For Sale in 2005. Bad Luk is a Reigncraft veteran who had a track featured on each of the first three CDs. His cut here, “Expectations” is excellent, and it shows that his hard grind really paid off. Bad Luk’s voice carries a devastating urgency, and the lyrics are very personal. “I wish you had to wear my shoes, so you felt my scars, so you could deal with real life when you was dealt my cards,” he raps.

The strange, zippy Kuddie Mack beat on “Dents In The Trunk” is intriguing. Stretch uses a conversational tone in his lyrics, which makes his voice approachable and familiar sounding, removing the distance between listener and performer. Because of the subject matter, “Dents In The Trunk” reminds me of the 1988 classic “Cars With The Boom” by L’Trimm.

“Pick Me Up” by Cyphalliance and “Stomp” by A-OK both bring the backpack, freestyle-circle vibe. These two songs explore the “metaphorical oratorical” to use a line from “Stomp.” The whole point of Reigncraft is to place tracks from the wordplay world against other more gangsta-oriented type of joints. Now, twenty years later, the genre of hip-hop continues to expand into a splinterverse of styles and experimentation. Reigncraft Volume 4: The Labor reminds us that it all comes back to hip-hop, and we are all part of the same family. Written by Novocaine132

Reigncraft, Volume 4: The Labor was created in and features appearances from:

Did we get it wrong? It happens. Send us an email and let's get it corrected right away!

A film about Northwest hip-hop from

If We Try...

Hmmm... There’s not a lot of information about this record in the museum encyclopedia.

This TOWN LOVE website was created in 2021 as a pandemic-era project. It was a volunteer-led effort to help document and celebrate the complete history of Northwest hip-hop between the years 1981 and 2020. This public archive we built is now available for free online for everyone to read and explore.

If you'd like to contribute, and you know something about this particular record--a story, a memory, or a favorite lyric--please email us a short write-up, and we’ll add your thoughts to the archive when we get the chance.

Thanks for your help in preserving the history of our scene!

If We Try... was created in and features appearances from:

Did we get it wrong? It happens. Send us an email and let's get it corrected right away!