Torii MacAdams shot out your third eye with a BB Gun.
Denzel Curry – “Captain Sea Phonk”
Curry emerged from the black-shrouded Raider Klan a prismatic, psychedelic drug lover. Curry’s afro-futurist bent was never going to be fostered by Raider Klan’s purposefully backward-leaning stylings. “Captain Sea Phonk” is closer to the light side of Curry’s debut, Nostalgic 64, than the perpetually grim bass dirges of his former groupmates. Curry’s new album 32 Zel/Planet Shrooms, is out June 9th.
Troy Ave ft. Jadakiss & Fabolous
New York has no choice but to be brought back when Troy Ave steps up to the microphone. New York never stopped producing cocaine-peddling mixtape rappers, but it still needed to be brought back from the “weirdos” who dared to wear jeans that fit — who dared to listen to rap music with depth, feeling, and thoughtful lyrics, who dared to question the divine providence of Troy Ave’s success. New York needed Troy Ave to put all eight-and-a-half million residents on his back and return them to a time when Fulton Street was overflowing with DJ Kay Slay CD’s. Troy Ave can withstand the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, your sideways glances, your pleas of “Please turn that fucking garbage off!” He’s bringing New York back, and you can’t stop him.
Waka Flocka ft. Good Charlotte – “Game On”
I couldn’t have imagined a song this bad.
OG Maco – “Movies”
“U Guessed It,” which OG Maco has disowned, created false expectations for the Atlanta rapper. A song like “U Guessed It,” sonically kooky and immensely quotable (and Vine-able), is usually the cultural apex for young rappers–I admittedly assumed that it’d be more of the same from Maco. I was wrong. Beneath Maco’s hooting and hollering, obscured by his misanthropy and bleached hair, is a rapidly developing rapper. Maco’s proven himself prolific, and more importantly, has shown progression. His snarls and growls are still present, they’re just more confined.
DJ Paul ft. Dorrough – “Live In The Mix”
Juicy J released a music video this week (“Still”), in which he’s smoking two blunts simultaneously while rolling around on a knee scooter, leg in a cast. Juicy’s former Hell’s Mafia groupmate DJ Paul wins this week, though, with “Live In The Mix.” There’s nothing particularly subtle about “Live In The Mix”–it’s much of the same brutal trap that DJ Paul’s taken to of late–but subtlety was never DJ Paul’s calling card, anyway.
Curren$y – “Push Round Lite Weight”
I don’t smoke weed, but I still wanna hang out with Curren$y. There’s a rumor that Curren$y showed up to the first day of high school at McMain in a brightly colored safety vest. My kind of dude.
Migos ft. Sauce Walka & Sosamann – “On Top”
https://soundcloud.com/hoodrichkeem1/migos-on-top-feat-sauce-walka-sosa-mann-prod-by-zaytoven
The moiré of Migos and Sauce Walka adlibs is something approaching avant-garde. The average Quavo adlib is usually one or two syllables, or onomatopoetic, short enough to sneak between words or lines. Sauce Walka’s “splicka splicka dash” is so long that it inevitably overlaps with the vocals it’s theoretically supposed to underscore.
Wiz Khalifa – “Lit”
In the “Lit-Not Lit” binary,” “Lit” is Not Lit. Contrary to the title, “Lit” lacks the requisite lit-ness to be considered amply Lit. Wiz spends much of “Lit” singing, and, in the video, doing his best to amble through a seemingly endless series of dimly lit (Not Lit) rooms without tripping over a bong or a groupie. Wiz has completed his transformation into a sentient chorus, a black hole of substance, a balladeer moonlighting as a rapper. He is Not Lit.
