Dizzee was on the estate, unafraid to express ugliness, questioning whether things would ever change.
Category: hip-hop
‘Licensed To Ill’ is cringeworthy, abrasive, and grotesquely enjoyable.
Jungle Brothers’ ‘Straight Out The Jungle’ is a benchmark of Afrocentrism that pioneered jazzy self-assurance, a fun embrace of club culture, and spiritually conscious rhymes.
I have a system of analysis for beat tapes: imagine playing them over a five second YouTube ad for gym supplements, or a loading screen for a hotel lobby TV. If you can describe the music as ‘appropriately neutral, wholly inoffensive, and almost insultingly innocuous’ above the visual aid, then it has failed. A fair […]
Hip-hop boyband BROCKHAMPTON put themselves out of their contractual misery with a two-project dump. ‘The Family’ is an uncomfortable tell-all from Kevin Abstract, with the rest of the group virtually nowhere to be seen. Intimate details about the demise of their friendships are spilled over chipmunk-soul beats of varying quality. Meanwhile, Kevin checks his watch, […]
Like a King of the Dot championship rap battle, IDGAFATRSIJDUIDFLIA has a flurry of words, loaded references, and a meaty flow. $ilkMoney sounds rattled, but stays on top of his ailments and points of anger. It is a unique quality of abrasive, creatively sharp performers that they can claw us to their side with magnetism […]
With varying commercial and artistic success, Nas has always sounded certain. He is as sharply defined in his own vision as any hip-hop artist, which makes his singular place in rap more of a throne than a lonely corner. King’s Disease III is the third instalment in a progressively robust series. Featuring 100% Nasty Nas, […]
Quadeca is a YouTube rapper who made his name through clickbaity disstracks at fellow streamers. That should tell you everything you need to know about the quality of this record, but “I Didn’t Mean to Haunt You” defies all expectations. The grandiose, genre-spanning concept-album is written from Quadeca’s own purgatory, where a lifetime’s worth of […]
If you were worried that Westside Gunn’s winning formula was at risk of treading water in the final instalment of the ‘Hitler Wears Hermes’ series, you’d be wrong. A puzzling album scattered with incredible performances, esoteric moments (the Montell Jordan sample springs to mind) and a superlative feature list, ‘10’ possesses all of Gunn’s best […]
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