Media

Aesop Rock, Eyedea, Slug: "Thorns" (Unreleased)

12:38 p.m. · November 2, 2011 · by Andrew Martin

Underground hip-hop lost one of its most creative artists in October 2010 when Micheal "Eyedea" Larsen died from an accidental overdose. The gifted lyricist and rapper left a huge mark on his family, friends, and fans, and since his passing an online memorial has been created to honor his life and his work.

The site published a particularly intriguing post today that features a previously unreleased track by Eyedea and longtime friends/collaborators Slug, of Atmosphere, and Aesop Rock. The song, "Thorns," apparently stems from recording sessions that took place in 1999 and 2000, when Aesop Rock was crafting his acclaimed Definitive Jux debut, Labor Days.

It turns out that the song they recorded didn't end up finding placement on a project, so it sat in the vaults unused for all these years. You might recognize the Blockhead production, though, because Aesop Rock used it on Labor Days cut "Bent Life." The full story behind "Thorns" is as follows: 

“This was one of the songs we had recorded on what I believe was Slug and Eyedea’s first trip to NYC. If memory serves, we ended up not keeping it because it didn’t really have any direction or structure – it was more just us 4 bugging out and getting to know each other. The same trip yielded “Missed by a Mile” with the same line-up, as well as another one or two that never saw the light of day. As my deadline for Labor Days was approaching I knew I wanted to use the beat for my record, so this version was dismantled.”

Hmm, makes you wonder if there are more gems like this just sitting on a hard-drive somewhere. You can stream "Thorns" below and download it at 900 Bats.