Finsta Bundy - Mixtape

1. Finsta Bundy & DJ Krush - Supanova 0:00
2. Finsta Bundy - One Life To Live 4:01
3. Finsta Bundy - Feel The High Pt. 2 7:28
4. Finsta Bundy - Boogie Spirit 11:28
5. Finsta Bundy - Where Ya At? (feat. Brain Dead & D Ruckus) 15:34
6. Finsta Bundy - Feel The High 20:40
7. Finsta Bundy - Finsta Baby 25:45
8. Finsta Bundy - Game's So Crazy 30:36
9. Finsta Bundy - Bizm 34:56
10. Finsta Bundy - Bushwick To Shin-Juku 38:09
11. Finsta Bundy - So Much On My Mind 42:18
12. Finsta Bundy - Don't Stress Tomorrow (feat. D Ruckus) 46:13
13. Finsta Bundy - Bizm Revisited 49:47

Walter Giddens AKA Finsta was born in St. Albans, Queens, but was raised and grew up in Bushwick, Brooklyn. Before being exposed to hip-hop, Finsta played music in band classes in both junior high and high school, beginning on recorder, before moving onto playing saxophone. And, it was around the time he played saxophpone that, after his mother sent him to church, Finsta began “to get into the thought of writing and performing”, saying in 2006 that before getting to hip-hop he was “playing the sax, singing in my church choir, and trying to make gospel songs”.

After being kicked out of Bishop Loughlin Memorial High School, Finsta started attending Bushwick High School where he met Evil Dee (brother of Mr. Walt and one half of Da Beatminerz) in a band class. Evil Dee made an impression on Finsta, and in interviews he often recalls a vivid memory of seeing Dee playing the drums “like he was gonna kill them, like Animal from the Muppets”. Finsta and Evil Dee soon became friends and after spending time at Dee’s place. After watching Dee DJ and produce, Finsta started making beats on a Yamaha VSS-200 keyboard (with two seconds of sample time) given to him by Dee. While Finsta was making beats, Dee, before devoting all of his attention to DJing and producing, was also rhyming – in a 2018 interview with Brian Kayser, Finsta remembers Dee referring to himself in a rhyme as the “master of gibbersih”. Eventually Finsta started rhyming out of necessity, saying in the Kayser interview: “I wasn’t rhyming at first but I was making beats and I needed somebody to rhyme to the beat so whatever, I just started writing to the beat as well”.

With Finsta and Evil Dee both making hip-hop they decided to start a group, naming themselves High Tech after a clothing store on Wilson Avenue, Bushwick. Sometime before that, the name Unique Image was used – a name that is so incongruous with the sound and style of what would become Black Moon that Evil Dee laughs about it in an interview with Brian Coleman, claiming that they’re going to be “so over” when people find it out. At some point, Dee’s friends Buckshot and 5FT (both dancers at the time) join High Tech as MCs and the name is changed to Black Moon after a production company run by Mr. Walt. The rest is history with Black Moon, but important to this story is Finsta’s departure from Black Moon before the recording and release of their highly-regarded 1993 debut “Enta Da Stage”.

Finsta’s departure from Black Moon was briefly explained by Mr. Walt in Brian Coleman’s book ‘Check the Technique’ – Walt saying that “eventually it just made sense to cut E and Finsta on the mic and just leave rhyming to 5 and Buckshot”. Giving a little more context, in the Kayser interview Finsta talks about deciding to leave the group after his daughter was born – his focus shifting to getting a steady job to be able to support his family. Although he left the group, Finsta maintained a close relationship with Evil Dee and Mr. Walt, continuing to collaborate with Dee throughout the 1990s and 2000s.

Following his departure from Black Moon, and through Evil Dee’s connection with CRACD record label owner Gucci Man, Finsta released his first record in 1991 – the solo 12″ “Finsta Baby/Payday Is Bliss” produced by Da Beatminerz and himself. The recording was done at Calliope Studios in Manhattan and marked Finsta’s first time in a professional studio. In a 2013 interview with The Find, Finsta remembers that “Finsta Baby” and its B-side “Payday Is Bliss” were “basically tracked, recorded and mixed” on the same night. Both tracks are important as perhaps the closest example of what the recorded and unreleased (and maybe never-to-be released) High Tech album Finsta recorded with Evil Dee sounds like.

After leaving Black Moon and recording the “Finsta Baby/Payday Is Bliss” 12″, Finsta needed a DJ for live shows, and around 1992 was connected with a local DJ Bundy through their mutual friend Evil Dee. Although Bundy credits Evil Dee as linking both of them together musically, both Finsta and him recall going to the same junior High School together for a year, only living one block away from each other in Bushwick and often seeing each other in passing.

(Full Article: https://www.rapreviews.com/2021/07/finsta-...

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