Oh my god.  If you missed the 2011 Miltown Beat Down Finals, I feel sorry for you.  This was without a doubt, the best MTBD battle in the 6 year history of the event.  The beats we all great, the energy was high, people were having a great time, and it was one of the best looking events I have ever produced.  All around AWESOME!

The competition was tough on Friday night.  Each producer brought their A game for this final bout.  We kicked things off with the sounds of DJ KiKi.  He is a 17 year old MKE DJ who came up through the True Skool DJ program.  Kiki graduated high school on Thursday, and then rocked Turner Hall on Friday.  WOW!  Then we turned the party over to Kid Cut Up. (If you want your party  kicked in to high gear, hire Kid Cut Up!)    During Cut Up’s set, the 2011 finalists joined me backstage for dinner and conversation about beats.  We spoke with Young Guru about Milwaukee, basketball, Hip Hop and music.

By 8:00pm, we had a nice number of folks in the house, so we kicked things off with the 2011 Wild Card Battle.  This competition was our way to bring some of those who did not make it to the top 8, back into the event.  We had Andy Peter battle Bubba in the first round, then Luxi battled her boyfriend, ClassiCal.  (That was an interesting battle for sure.)  Bubba and ‘Cal made it to the end with ClassiCal winning the 2011 WILD CARD BATTLE.

Then…

We began the battle!  This year’s finalists were 40 MIL, GoodWill, AudioPilot, Reason, TradeMark, Sam Winters, Champ and White Russian.  These fellas brought their best foot forward for the night’s rounds.  Each battle was high energy and very tough to call.  Most of the rounds were won by a small margin, 20 points here, 30 points there, a real tough night of judging.  When all was said and done, there were two men standing… REASON and AUDIOPILOT.

Before we got down with the final battle, we had a brief intermission with our special guest judge YOUNG GURU.

Young Guru played a high energy set of his personal favorites, songs he’s produced, and wrapped up his live set with an amazing scratch set, breakin’ down the Run DMC classic “Peter Piper”.  ( so fresh! )

So then we got into the last battle for 2011.. REASON vs. AUDIO PILOT.

This battle was personally very exciting for me, as we had 2 MTBD veteran producers, who have worked together in the past, and even recorded together, now BATTLING for the crown.  They each brought high energy beats, but in the end REASON was victorious.

Reason went home with a Native Instruments MASCHINE, Komplete Audio Interface, Massive sound design plug-in package,  Aerial 7 headphones and a $100 MODA 3 gift card.  CONGRATS REASON!

If you’d like to hear more of REASON’s music you can download his new album here…

and if you are a fan of his beats… Check out this INSTRUMENTAL version…

For more you can visit REASON’s website at www.4ar.biz

CONGRATS again to Reason and to our runner up AUDIO PILOT.  You can follow up on both these producers on www.unifirecords.com

Special thanks to all the sponsors for this year’s event. We could not have produced such a high quality event with out your support. To Kid Cut Up, you are the best DJ in the mid-west, and maybe the world! Thanks to all the producers who put their heart and soul into making good beats so Milwaukee’s Hip Hop scene can be so great!

Thank You MILWAUKEE!

We will see you all next year!
PEACE!
- Jordan “Madhatter” Lee

We have got a lot of great beats in store for you, and a few surprises.  Many are wondering what the schedule for the night will be, so HERE IT IS!

6:00pm Doors open at Turner Hall.  We will have a special DJ set from the students of TRUE SKOOL, featuring DJ Kiki and hosted by DJ Bizzon of WMSE’s Mad Kids Hip Hop show.

7:00pm  Milwaukee’s best, KID CUT UP and DJ Bizzon rock the party along with VJ SLYM.  There’s no better way to get the party started then with *NO REQUEST SOUND SYSTEM.

8:00pm 2011 WILD CARD Battle.

We’ve had so many great producers come through the Miltown Beat Down this year.  It was a shame to see many of these producers NOT move on to the finals, so we’ve re-introduced the WILD CARD battle.  This year’s battle will NOT provide a spot in the top 8, but rather it will be a separate battle for a separate prize package, courtesy of NOVA MUSIK and Native Instruments.

Round 1:  ANDY PET.R vs. BUBBA
Round 2: LUXI vs. ClassiCal
Round 3: Winner vs. Winner

9:00pm  2011 FINALS

GoodWill vs. Audio Pilot
Sam Winters vs. Champ
TradeMark vs. 40 MIL
Reason vs. White Russian

Winner A vs. Winner B
Winner C vs. Winner D

We will then take an intermission to enjoy the sounds of our guest judge… Jay-Z’s tour DJ and sound engineer, YOUNG GURU.  Guru will bless us with some of his favorite selection and personal greatest hits!  A set NOT to be missed.

After Young Guru’s set, we will have the 2011 FINAL battle.  The top 2 producers will battle for the grand prize package, which includes products from Aerial 7 headphones, Moda 3, Puma, and a Native Instruments MASCHINE.

There will be no shortage of great beats this Friday night, so don’t be late.  Doors open and 6pm and tickets are available HERE.

We hope you can join us this FRIDAY NIGHT.

There are few words that I can use to describe our final round of preliminary battles other that WOW!  There were surprises, upsets, and some of the best beats we’ve heard all year.  One of the most shocking developments of last night’s battle, was the defeat of both our 4th and 5th MILTOWN BEAT DOWN champions.  This past night was one of the toughest for the crowd to come to a vote on.  I saw many people change their vote from one battle to the next, showing little loyalty for anything other than their favorite beats.

Here is how the night broke down…

SAM WINTERS [417] vs. SAUL GARZA BEATZ [209]

MARK VALDEZ [319] vs. JIHAD BARACUS [406]

JAMES JAXIN [427] vs. BAKTRAX  [326]

LEX LUTHOR [329] vs. CHAMP [357]

The first round of battles were often determined by one amazing beat.  For example, the Lex vs. Champ battle was tipped toward Champ at the beginning, and then Lex pulled out one of the best beats he’s ever played in the battle.  A “beat off” was called and the final beat from each producer brought the scores to a close call.

There were many audience members who were torn on who to vote for.  You could see it in the faces of the crowd when we’d ask them to vote.  Our 5 judges not only listened to what the crowd said, and tallied up the points for creativity and  sound quality *. (Sound Quality is a relative factor at Jackalope Lounj based on the limits of this small room’s sound system.  But for the record, many of the producers in this battle sounded GREAT in the Jack, so while the system may be less than perfect, the playing field was level.)

We moved into the finals of last night late into the 11 o’clock hour.  Here is how that went down..

SAM WINTERS [428] vs. JIHAD BARACUS [321]

This was a particularly tough one.  Jihad brought the expected high energy, sonic power house boom bap that we’ve come to love from him.  Sam “flipped the script” on ‘em and brought some reggae and dance tempo beats.  In my talks with the judges,, many of them felt strongly that this versatility worked in Sams favor.

JAMES JAXIN [244] vs. CHAMP [301]

This was a very interesting round.  These guys were both playing by the same set of rules.  High sonic quality, impactful club beats.  If anything, the judges felt that James lost more that Champ won.  But the numbers don’t lie and CHAMP was victorious.

Well there ya have it!  Our 2011 run at Jackalope Lounj is done.  I need to take this moment to give some shout outs to the fine folks at the Wicked Hop and Jackalope Lounj for hosting this year’s battles.  To RUFIO, the best bartender in Milwaukee, I thank you brother.  We could not have done this without you.  THANKS!

A very special thanks to our judges; JC Poppe, DJ Slym, Tarik aka the Architect, Why-B and Cecilio of King’s Go Forth.

And to the best DJ in the Midwest KID CUT UP, you are the man.  Thanks to you, the part NEVER stops.  Love ya brother.

Well all that we have left to focus on now is the 2011 MILTOWN BEAT DOWN FINALS.  If you have not yet purchased your tickets, be sure to CLICK HERE.  We will have some more details up this weekend on the finals and our special WILD CARD BATTLE.

Thanks for all the love Milwaukee.

-Jordan

We again had some very close calls last night.  One battle even came down to just 2 points.  The vets came correct last night, but the new faces had some of the most exciting sounds we heard.  The diversity of sound last night was one of my favorite parts of the battle.  Heads were feeling some of the unexpected new styles that hit the stage last night. Here are the scores…

Reason [408] vs. MC Cullah [361]

Mixed Up [362] v.s Luxi[428].

Goodwill [423] vs. Mighty DR [168]

Hurrikayne [275] vs. Jooney Dubz [361]

There was a lot of energy in these first four bouts.  It was nice to see some hardware in the house, as Mixed Up played his beats out on his ROLAND MV8000.  (that big ass one the RZA uses.)  Goodwill also surprised the crowd and the judges, while I kept my smart ass comments to myself when Hurrikayne and Jooney Dubz battled.  (These fellas made me look like a 12-year-old up there.  Big ass dudes with big beats.)

The evening finals were close… VERY CLOSE.

In the battle of LUXI vs. REASON, only 2 points came between Luxi and a trip to Turner Hall.  Final score for that battle…  Luxi [399] and REASON [401].  This puts the Reason and Luxi battle even closer than the ClassiCal and 40 MIL battle from last week.

Jooney Dubz and Goodwill also got down to the wire in their battle.  After 3 beats, it was too close to call, and the KID CUT UP called upon the crowd to chant for a “beat off’.  Each producer was given a 4th beat, and while Jooney Dubz played to cool, and selected his beat 2nd, Goodwill played the best beat we’d heard all night, and Jooney Dubz [366] lost to Goodwill [438], in over time.

Congratulations to  GoodWill and Reason.  These fellas will be at the June 10th finals with White Russian, Audio Pilot, 40 Mil and TradeMark.

We have seen some amazing battles this year.  So many close ones, that I’m contemplating having a losers WILD CARD battle at the finals.  Stay tuned for more info on that.

Be sure that you join us for the 2011 MILTOWN BEAT DOWN FINALS at Tuner Hall Ballroom Friday June 10th.  We are excited to welcome Jay-Z’s DJ, engineer and producer YOUNG GURU to Milwaukee for the 2011 finals.  Young Guru and a panel of Milwaukee’s best DJs and Producers will judge these final 8 on June 10th.

Don’t forget, that pre-sale tickets are available online HERE, and at Moda3.

Last night we had a deep and diverse array of sounds and styles.  No two producers sounded at all alike.  In fact, there were some battles that were almost too close to call.  The judges really had their work cut our for themselves last night.  It was very close in many of these bouts.  Here are the scores.

Andy Petr [400] vs. Bad Character [338]

Hitmayng [408]  vs. TradeMark [420]

40 MIL [382] vs. Sinister Reality [231]   I need to throw in some editorial on this one.  Sinister Reality was much closer to 40 MIL than these numbers reflect.  This battle called for an instant “beat off” ( our bonus round ).  40 Mil is a BEAST and Sinister held up very well to him.  

ClassiCal [392] vs. Big Steve [351]

The were so many surprises in these first 4 rounds.  Many of us were caught of guard with new comer ClassiCal’s victory over MTBD vet Big Steve.  But even Big Steve’s people were feeling the awesome sonic boom that Cal brought to the battle.  There was also a lot of debate in the judges booth during the Hitmayng and TradeMark bout.  Each producer had an even presentation.  It seemed that they were both holding back some of their better beats for later rounds, but they each had some bangers in there too.

The next round brought even more difficult scoring for the audience and the judging panel.

Andy Petr [386] vs. TradeMark [405]  Yet another close battle.  This one really boiled down to the creativity and audio quality categories.  Andy stomped most of the competition in sound mixing and mastering, but TradeMark’s battle beats were a crowd favorite.  After all, this is a BATTLE.

40 MIL [425] vs. ClassiCal [423]  This was the closest battle we’ve seen in years.  The crowd was on 40′s side, but the points fell heavy on ClassiCal for sound quality and creativity.  His last beat was a high tempo dance number, that had a 4 to the floor beat that cut into half time at the end.  40 brought out his M.O.P. style merk beats to ensure  he made a deep wound in ClassiCal.  

At the end of the night, 40 Mil and TradeMark moved on the June 10th Finals at Turner Hall.  As we stated earlier this week, 31 of the 32 producers in this event will go home with a loss, but we all win with great beats like we heard last night.

The energy in the room was amazing last night.  The crowd was having a great time, and we all can agree that is was a very close battle last night.  Thanks to our judges JC Poppe, Slym, Tarik aka the Architecht, DJ Bizzon, and Haz Solo.

Speaking of, here is a wrap up interview with the PLAY COUSINS Bizzon and Jank One…

See you next Thursday night Milwaukee.

Peas,

Jordan

Crying over losing makes you look like a bum.

Hey everybody, it’s Jordan here.

I wanted to take a moment to address the REAL purpose of the Miltown Beat Down.  Let me begin by saying, that while this is a competition, those who lose in this event are often the really winners.

I’d like to share a story of how two of our recent contestants dealt with their losses.  One of the contestants left the event without speaking to me at all about his performance.  I then heard rumors of this artist’s fans causing a fight at the event.  As if that wasn’t enough a rant of negative comments was placed here on our site, but since I don’t allow for hate on this site it was never posted.

The other contestant thanked me after the event for allowing him to be part of the battle.  He then RSVP’d to attend the other rounds of the competition and I even found out that he had a session with our DJ and co-host KID CUT UP to talk shop and trade beat making secrets.

Each of these contestants lost on Thursday night.  BUT, WHO IS THE LOSER?

I’ve built this event to give my favorite part of Milwaukee’s rap scene a stage to shine on.  The producers are the heart of what we do here in Milwaukee hip-hop.  I only want to build bridges and create love. 

Through healthy competition we see the imperfections in our own work.  We are forced to step out of our comfort zone and do some tough self-evaluation.  No one wants to be told that their baby is ugly. However, if any MKE producers REALLY want to make it in the music industry, they had better have some tough skin and be ready for a ton of criticism. 

I only hope that we continue to see collaboration and partnership grow from this event.  So many of the “losers” of the Miltown Beat Down have gone on to create great work with other MKE artists; Reason, Jihad Baracus, Audio Pilot, B-Side, and even LORN, are all past MTBD losers.  But, they know that the art they create speaks more to their legacy than a win or loss here.

So, please
act cool, show some love, and be ready to build Milwaukee!

Photo Love From the good folks at MKESCENE.COM

We began shortly after 10pm, and began the evening with quite a lot of technical difficulty. (Best believe that I will be shopping www.NOVAMUSIK.com for new cables today.)
While there were some sound issues that created a less than perfect presentation, we had some real nice beats in the first rounds. Outside of the sound issue, everything else was perfect. Kid Cut Up was rocking the crowd before, during and after. Rufio was slang’n drinks, PBR Joe had the Pabst V.I.P. is full effect and the judges were feeling the competition. Speaking of judges, that was my final FAIL for this season’s opener. I FORGOT TO INTRODUCE THE JUDGE PANEL.
So with out further ado… Ladies and Gentlemen…YOUR JUDGES!

From THE MAD KIDS show on 91.7 WSMSE, and JSOnline’s TAP MILWAUKEE…DJ BIZZON

From 88NINE Radio Milwaukee, Rhythm Lab Radio host and UnLooped creator… TARIK aka The Architect

From RUNMKE.com Remix artist, Producer, Designer and VJ… DJ SLYM

From OnMilwakee.com’s Milwaukee UP , Hip Hop Blogger, Manager and Emcee… JC Poppe

Umbrella Music Group recording artist and Milwaukee rap star… Prophetic

Myself and Kid Cut Up also serve a judges number 6 and 7 in close calls. (and we had a few of them las night.) If you have not seen the score card or rules, you can find them here.  Each producer is able to earn up to 500 points per battle.

After an intense night of battles, here are the results…

TRE COLD [217] vs. BUBBA [366]

OVA [271] vs. WHITE RUSSIAN [400]

JUNGLE BOY [229] vs. AUDIO PILOT [299]

No that's not Cash Beatz... LOL

CASH BEATZ [177] vs. DJ HEAVYWAIT [324]

In the finals last night, things got serious.  Each producer really stepped up with bigger beats and the crowd got a lot louder.

BUBBA [366] vs. WHITE RUSSIAN [377]

DJ HEAVYWAIT [337] vs. AUDIO PILOT [351]

WOW! That was close at the end there, but WHITE RUSSIAN and AUDIO PILOT will move on to the 2011 MILTOWN BEAT DOWN FINALS at Turner Hall Ballroom.  Advance tickets are available now, and while these preliminary rounds are 21 and over, the finals are an ALL AGES show!  Be sure to join us next week for the 2nd Preliminary round at The Jackalope Lounj.

I have to admit, that it breaks my heart that great producers don’t always move forward, but that’s what battles are all about.  68 signed up, only 32 made the cut, and 31 of those will be losers.  The event is, and always has been, about giving these producers a platform to show the city their beats.

I know I had a great time last night, and I hope you did too.

Peas y’all.

DJ Madhatter.

The Miltown Beat Down’s creator and director Jordan Lee ( AKA DJ Madhatter ) got his start in radio with good friend and fellow DJ Kid Cut Up.  3 years ago, Cut Up and ‘Hatter began the MAD KIDS RADIO SHOW on 91.7fm WMSE in Milwaukee.  Jordan returned to WMSE last night for an interview with Kid Cut Up and DJ Bizzon.  This was a great way to talk about the history of the event, and what has developed so far this year.

To hear the interview, just click below…

Support the MAD KIDS and real Hip Hop in MIlwaukee, make a contribution to WMSE today.  Click HERE to make an online donation.  You can follow the Mad Kids on their blog and download ALL their past shows here.

Don’t forget to join us for the first round of battles THIS THURSDAY at the Jackalope Lounj.