Deen gives no fucks and owns no bucket hats.
I know that conventional wisdom says rappers are worthless if they employ Twitter as a means of music distribution. But that doesn’t apply to established cats or niggas who don’t resort to spamming their shit all over the damn place.
I’m trying to say that most of the music you run into on Twitter tends to be straight basura. And once you’ve been burned a few times, you don’t want to make the trip to the clinic anymore for penicillin shots beca… oops, my bad. Basically, one shitty Twitter musician ruins it for everyone else. So you learn to keep it moving any time you see some unfamiliar music from MC Yung Whoever on your time line.
But every so often, I’d suggest that you break that rule and do some crazy shit – because you never know what you might run into. I mean, I was just about to write some complimentary shit about Vince Staples (a new jack that has rapidly become one of my favorite rappers working today), but I figured I’d get around to that at some point in the future. Right now, I wanna write about this ATL-via-upstate New York nigga Liym Courteous’ ‘The Float Pamphlet‘. And not to sound like Jay-Z (yes hyphen) on some “my presence is a present” fuck shit, but the fact that I feel obliged to write about this shit is a compliment in and of itself.
The kid is nice. He be rapping. There’s the typical rap braggadocio on display, but Liym Courteous sprinkles his verses with so many details that lend an almost cinematic quality to his music. Not to mention the clever wordplay he employs within a flow that sounds pretty effortless for who I assume is a rookie to this rap shit. I could be mistaken though.
And even though Courteous throws a nod to the god Nasir in the form of an acknowledgement that he’s memorized what is for my money, the most lyrically adept mainstream rap album ever, he really sounds more indebted to another Queensbridge MC, Cormega. As a matter of fact, he flat out sounds like a nimbler version of Nas’ old nemesis – the same nasal delivery minus the unrelenting violence in the bars. In place of all that gully shit are rhymes about ambition and living the good life all over some of the warmest production I’ve heard in a minute. Must be something in the water out there. Or maybe it’s just youth.
And speaking of the production, the bonus track on the project is over a Harry Fraud beat, but it might not even be one of the best 5 beats on the project. Top honors go to the highlight of the project, “Gold,” produced by BLKVIITH, which samples Gwen McCrae’s 1974 ode to dickwhipped hoes, “90% of Me is You” to great effect. You might remember that sample from Jaylib’s ‘The Red’ or Mobb Deep’s ‘What Can I Do’ if you’re into that kinda thing. Liym and BLKVIITH match those prior efforts stride for stride.
Courteous also gets extra brownie points for keeping the project short and sweet. I can’t point to a single weak track on The Float Pamphlet (clever touch on that title too), so that kinda leaves me with nothing to make fun of. Besides his somewhat unwieldy moniker. Too bad I don’t have any jokes on deck for that shit. But with any luck, he’ll garner enough publicity for this shit in the near future and I’ll just learn how to say the name from an interview or something. Oh and it might help not to frown in the photos – pause – the music is some relaxed and happy dopeness. For now, you know what to do…
Download:
ZIP: Liym Courteous – The Float Pamphlet
