Chopped and Screwed music compilation

Matt Biddulph turned me on to this excellent 14 Tracks MP3 compilation titled "Screw The Pitch," a very trippy batch of hip hop, dub, and electronica music that's been cut up, pitch-shifted, and tempo-tweaked to create a weirdly hypnotic opiated sound. As Matt pointed out, this drunky, slurry, sizzurpy mix is something of a toast to the "chopped and screwed" (or "slowed and throwed") remixing style that emerged from Houston's Purple Drank-drenched underground hip hop scene of the 1990s. (For those not aware of the alluring potion, Purple Drank is cough syrup that contains codeine and Promethazine mixed with Sprite or Mountain Dew and sometimes Jolly Rancher hard candies.) From 14 Tracks:

Rollin' from DJ Screw's doped tones to Markus Schmickler's queered pitches, this 14tracks selection explores the relationship between displaced pitch and space in screwed HipHop, dub and experimental electronics. From the very first experiments with variable tape speeds, through the widespread use of turntable pitch controls, right up to the application of autotune and time-stretching, the evolution of electronic and mechanised music is continually displacing our perception of the "norm", and in turn creating heightened (or equally drowsy) psychedelic effects. Our selection focuses on a bunch of cuts which toy with our perceptions of time and space...

"14 tracks: Screw the pitch"

• [hohum]

  Neat site, and this is a good collection of tracks. But am I correct in guessing that these are just that — collections of tracks — and not continuous mixes?

• [Anonymous]

  Prune Juice.

• [Evil Paul]

  Holy crap, that mix has a new Burial track, I think I’m going to buy it based in that alone.

• [Rob Thornton]

  14 Tracks is a great way to dig a wide range of adventurous tracks across all sorts of avant-weird genres. Each 14 track collection costs around 8.99 GBP but I have always been happy with my purchases. My favorite so far is Echospace Exclusives, a marvelous set of dub techno.

• [jbldb]

  I consider myself a fanboy of some more grating forms of electronica, but I think I need to be high on cough syrup to truly appreciate this kind of music. The beats are just … too… slow…

• [Anonymous]

  I think the reference to Robitussin is also to the dextromethorphan (DXM) ingredient.

  See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recreational_use_of_dextromethorphan

  • [Anonymous]

    As the first poster says, the drinking of cough syrup in this manner is almost entirely for the DXM content. It’s a powerful dissociative hallucinogen.

• [humanresource]

  I loved it. Definitely getting this album. Is the cough syrup sold separately?

• [bjacques]

  DJ Screw was Houston’s best kept musical secret for years. But the timing is OK. It’s been too long since they were last put on the musical map, by the Geto Boys.