| “At Least you Know What I’m About”: An Interview with Nick Hook | December 8, 2016 |
Nick Hook and Evan Gabriel talk about the Midwest, Madrid, and making piano music in Mexico City.
The new Fool's Good signee lands somewhere between late-80’s 808 slaps and the mobb music style that dominated of the '90’s Bay. Recommended if you miss Mac Dre.
| Danny Brown & DJ Sliink: Smokin’ & Drinkin’ Remix | July 10, 2014 |
Max Bell can sing a hook like Alicia Keys Summer music festivals have become synonymous with performances from the current crop of DJs du jour. If you’ve the funds or connections necessary to attend any one of the major festivals this year, you’re bound to see (or at least past by) one man alone on […]
| Summer Mixtape: Brad Beatson | July 4, 2014 |
Brad Beatson turns down only for freedom. In the summer, I’m looking to push play on a playlist and let it ride. It’s too beautiful out. And I know it’s inevitable that some drunken fingertips will hijack the music at some point to play what they want to. So this is my grand attempt at […]
| Dripping like Eazy E’s Activator: An Interview with 100s | June 23, 2014 |
Jimmy Ness lets his Soul Glo 100s (pronounced “hunnids”) was born in the wrong era. The 20 year old has been fascinated by the ‘70s since being exposed to American Pimp, Iceberg Slim’s autobiography and nuclear levels of hair spray. His parents moved him to the Ivory Coast due to failing grades and his last […]
| The Funkadelic Pimp Rap of 100s | March 11, 2014 |
Will Hagle is looking for his activator. Reducing Bay Area rapper 100s to a shadow of his pimp rap ancestors would be reductive. The truth is that 100s is comprised of shards of several other artists from various musical backgrounds. He talks a Short-esque pimp game, sure, but he also hails from the same city as the Based God. […]
| The Federals: Cam’ron & A-Trak Connect | February 3, 2014 |
Dan Adu Gyamfi ([email protected]) owns several mink coats dyed the color of carnations. The rap music industry always starts the year slow with labels figuring out which of their artists will drop an album and who will be the December tax write-offs. In the meantime, Cam’ron and A-Trak have announced a joint EP titled Federal […]
| The Inscrutable and Addictive Travis Scott | December 12, 2013 |
Brad Beatson wrote this from the inside of a sarcophagus. Above is the video for Travi$ Scott’s “Uptown” featuring A$AP Ferg, released on December 1st. It’s the second he’s put out this year in which the titular song doesn’t drop until 2+ minutes into the video. The other, “Upper Echelon,” is posted after the jump. […]
| Party Supplies and Tough Love | October 18, 2013 |
Brad Beatson brought the balloons. Whether it be producing “Grown Up” for Danny Brown or the critically-acclaimed Blue Chips with fellow Queens native Action Bronson, Party Supplies has been making some of the best recent hip hop production. You hear traces of “Grown Up” in “A Perfect Life,” but boom bap is nowhere to be […]
| The Grand Old Party: A Review of Danny Brown’s “Old” | October 11, 2013 |
Son Raw makes 2 Live Crew look like some Mormons. Danny Brown ended XXX with a pained howl that would have made a fitting epigraph had drugs, violence or jail snuffed out his promising rap career. Thing is, that didn’t happen. Against all odds, the skinny jeans-wearing backpack-rapper with a blown out haircut and encyclopedic […]
