The biggest boss in Hip-Hop has started 2012 ablaze with the release of a new mixtape – Rich Forever. Almost 20 tracks of new material featuring production from J.U.S.T.I.C.E. League to Lex Lugar and vocals from Diddy through to Nas. The first track to receive video treatment is ‘Stay Schemin’ which includes raps from Drake and French Montana. The melodic, slow moving track produced by The Beat Bully features a colourless hook sung by French Montana. The record seems accustomed to Drake with similar sounds and a format that wouldn’t feel out of place on his previous album ‘Take Care’. The Canadian excels on his verses while Rozay adds classic adlibs and the signature husky voice to the chorus. Years of mixtapes and spending time working on the underground scene, French Montana is starting to become a popular feature artist at the moment. Having released a mixtape in late 2011 with Waka Flocka, Montana is on his way to reaching the same commercial success as his peers.
Ross, who suffered two seizures in quick succession in October 2011, is working on his next album ‘God Forgives, I Don’t’. The album was set for a release in December last year but has been pushed back until early 2012. The ‘Rich Forever’ mixtape, serving as a warm up for fans, is following the similar strategy that Lil Wayne executed last year before his release of ‘Carter IV’ by reaching over half a million downloads already on Datpiff.com. The generosity of a free mixtape seems to work in favour of a forthcoming album in terms of publicity, in terms of quality however, we will have to see. Rich Forever is available to download for free here.
Since June this year Drake has been dominating blogs with his sophomore teasers including ‘Dreams Money Can Buy’ – sampled from Jai Paul, ‘Marvin’s Room’ and the duet with Rick Ross ‘Free Spirit’. Since releasing his second album ‘Take Care’, the title track has gone on to make the strongest impact with the commercial crowd. It features one of the biggest selling female artists of all time Rihanna and takes it sample from Jamie xx’s rendition of Gill Scot-Heron’s ‘I’ll Take Care Of You’.
The song features repetitive drums, a deep bassline and harmonic piano chords matched with polite side-chained strings. Drake’s lyrics touch upon past romances and the emotions involved with break-ups. The track reached #9 in the UK official charts and has topped our Shazam Tag Charts in the UK and USA. The album has been received with mixed reviews, although reaching #1 in the Billboard charts. Compared to Drake’s debut album, the overall feel of this is slower and introduces Drake more of a compassionate singer. With most songs produced by his sidekick 40, this was inevitable. Just Blaze’s production of ‘Lord Knows’ is the most dynamic and hard hitting track which also features Maybach Music, other featured artists on the album include The Weeknd, Birdman, Lil’ Wayne and Stevie Wonder.
Odd Future member Frank Ocean released his free 12 track mixtape, ‘Nostalgia, Ultra’, back in February of this year. Even now , Ocean’s tracks are getting regular plays in both the States and UK. Also he’s featured on many ‘To Watch’ lists for 2012, including topping ours. The most favourable track for Shazamers this year has been the slow tempo ‘Swim Good’, which has gained plenty of spins on college radio and the influential UK urban digital station BBC 1Xtra. Quite the achievement considering the track is taken from a free mixtape that’s had no help from a PR company. ‘Nostalgia, Ultra’ simply spun a web of downloads through word of mouth and the help of Odd Future leader, Tyler The Creator. The mixtape has since been plugged on numerous blogs gathering attention from musicians including Pharrell Williams and Beyoncé who have both been working with Frank in the studio on new music.
Lyrically adept and with a sensual tone, Frank’s voice simmers over the southern style beat. The track consists of a recurring organ riff that creates the backdrop for repetitive tambourines and distant claps phased to each ear. Frank’s lyrics are heartfelt and gripping with the singer talking about his journey to the ocean where he will deposit his broken hearts filled up in his Lincoln Town Car trunk. Dressed for a funeral, Ocean continues with his story until the listener is left with the reflective sound of seagulls and the tides of an ocean.
Previously available to download for free, his album has now been removed from Odd Future’s download page. Rest assured, there will be plenty more to come from Frank Ocean in 2012.
British electronic band Does It Offend You, Yeah? released their second album earlier this year, entitled ‘Don’t Say We Didn’t Warn You’. Their first album planted the artists firmly into the electronic rock scene in the UK in which they achieved respected critical acclaim and completed countless festival appearances and worldwide tours. A three year gap between albums has kept their fans anticipating their new music and has also meant gathering new fans from their lively gigs and TV syncs.
‘The Wrester’ comes from their new album and features a foul-mouthed sample in the beginning and throughout. The beat is hard hitting, repetitive, sharp and vigorous. It’s a mix of electronic synths coated with effects and live drums that has strong crescendo into a furious drop. Californian based creative video group the ‘Hi5Collective’ have made a fan-made video, which has been posted on lots of hipster and well known music blogs in the states and crossing over to here in the UK. This is the same group that have made fan-made videos for The Weeknd and Tyler, The Creator escalating more than 100k views. The unofficial video matches the song beat for beat and creates a stunning visual description. It has been received with great enthusiasm and has quickly made the Hi5Collective very in-demand directors. Take a look at the video here; the second album from ‘Does It Offend You, Yeah?’ is available to buy now.
Lesbians kissing, throwing eggs at bystanders and cruising on a mobility scooter aren’t the normal elements of a rap video, but Pusha T and Tyler, The Creator synchronize all of these with the backing to Pusha’s latest track. Trouble On My Mind is the track from Pusha featuring Tyler from Odd Future. Tyler has admitted he is a huge fan of Pusha and Clipse, and the enthusiasm and admiration shows with their light hearted energy throughout the video.
The song is produced by The Neptunes, long time friends and producers of Pusha and one of Tyler’s most proclaimed influences. The track has classic 808 kicks and a crispy snare overlapped by a sinister synth that swoops up and down throughout. A rich sounding organ riff appears at the beginning and end of the song and a muted horn makes an appearance taking inspiration from Pusha’s previous mixtape. The general sound fits into Tyler’s ‘Goblin’ material and Pusha’s last release ‘Fear Of God’, the song is a direction of the two together. A mean collaboration of two of Hip-Hop’s most wanted characters at the moment, which doesn’t disappoint.
Pusha T’s next project ‘Fear Of God Part 2: Let Us Pray’ is expected soon and features this song. Still touring and in high demand for interviews, Tyler’s debut studio album Goblin is out now. Watch the video for ‘Trouble On My Mind’ here.
After releasing mixtape’s to the hip-hop world in America since 2007, Big Sean’s debut album has finally been released and the rapper has respectfully claimed his title for fame and honour. Sean, real name Sean Michael Anderson, met Kanye West in 2005 and impressed him with a spontaneous freestyle, Kanye made note to remember his name. A few years later with mixtapes achieving hundreds of thousands of downloads on Datpiff, Sean was signed to Kanye’s G.O.O.D Music record label.
The album boasts production from Kanye West, iconic producer No I.D., Boi-1da and others including Pharrell. The stand-out tracks are undoubtedly those created by No I.D. including ‘I Do It’, ‘Don’t Tell Me You Love Me’ and ‘So Much More’. Sean worked with Chris Brown on the single ‘My Last’ which reached #4 in the Shazam Tag Charts back in March this year. The collaboration with Kanye on ‘Marvin & Chardonnay’ sees Sean work with Roscoe Dash, who delivers a classic Roscoe sing-a-long hook. With tracks like these the album received glowing reviews from Hip-Hop’s top platforms including an “XL” from XXL magazine.
Sean’s lyrical content has been better in past mixtapes, but his humour continues to amuse and there are occasional sparks of top word play that ignite with the solid beats creating up-tempo, strong, soulful tracks. The album’s other featured artists include Wiz Khalifa, The Dream, Lupe Fiasco, Chiddy-Bang and John Legend and is available to buy now.
The latest release by Lil’ Wayne, prior to his next album ‘Carter IV’, is a slow love song mixed between acoustic guitars and soft 808 drums. The rapper ditches his usual grungy rap voice and takes to the whole song with sincere vocals, topped off with an underline of auto-tune to correct his sharp notes. It’s when the song hits halfway that the track really exposes its lurking possibility. A key-change by Wayne, a mature drum pattern emerges and harmonic strings add a deep, relaxing complexion in the song as a whole.
The feedback has been generally positive but has been a shock to some of Weezy’s Hip-Hop fans, creating a demand to stick to the hard, cursing lyrics they are attuned to. Although, not many people were expecting a rock album which Wayne released a few years back. Lil’ Wayne constantly shows signs of an artist undeniably open to opportunities and new ventures, a trait that many artists sadly lack. Weezy has come out on top with this and the love endorsed lyrics and repetitive guitar has attracted him to a new crowd and now has the single steadily climbing the iTunes chart.
The second single released from DJ Khaled’s fifth album ‘I’m On One’ features close friends to Kahled; Drake, Rick Ross and Lil’ Wayne. The song showcases Khaled’s diverse production skills and is a far cry from his usual horn filled anthems. A filtered chorus sung softly over by Drake while his attacking lyrics focus on newcomers to the Hip-Hop game and their naivety of their careers. Not normally one to create sparks; it appears a few people have certainly made a negative impression on Drake. Ross speaks with recognisable lyrics at a slow tempo and with less attitude than normal and Young Money affiliate Weezy keeps it short and sweet with a husky, lazy vocal.
The track sounds like Khaled has been working with one of Drake’s producer’s ‘40’, as it could have easily fit on Drake’s first mixtape ‘So Far Gone’ heavily produced by 40 and filled with slow, harmonic and filtered sounds. The team featured on this track have all worked together in the past and their chemistry is a welcome one to fans. DJ Khaled’s latest album ‘We The Best Forever’ is expected, with much anticipation, this June with a huge array of featured artists.
Collectively known as Gang Starr, DJ Premier and Guru set up shop and started making music in the late 80’s after Guru split up with previous member DJ Mike Dee. Premier’s outstanding ear for samples attracted Guru and they were soon making outstanding mid-tempo, granular hip-hop. Gang Starr’s third and critically acclaimed album, ‘Daily Operation’, carried the iconic ‘Ex-Girl To The Next Girl’. The track revolves around a sample taken from Caesar Frazier’s 1978 track ‘Funk It Up’ and another from Slick Rick’s ‘La Di Da’. A simple drum beat accompanies the bass of the sample while Guru’s memorable vocals smoothly flow over the beat only to stop at the chorus which reignites the sample with a trademark scratch sequence from Premier.
The video to the classic song includes Guru and DJ Premier with an array of female models represented as Guru’s ex and current girlfriends. ‘Daily Operation’ reached #65 on the Billboard 200 and will remain a cherished piece of work in the Hip-Hop world. Unfortunately Guru passed away in 2010 suffering from a heart attack, a tremendous loss to Hip-Hop, but his legacy will continue on with his groundbreaking music.
The first official album to be released from Odd Future leader Tyler, The Creator hit stores earlier this month. The release caused an exceptional amount of anticipation and excitement from hip-hop blogs, but also seemed to capture the imagination of more rock/pop publications such as NME and Billboard who ran cover stories on the rapper. With the album finally available reviews sprouted up everywhere from social networks to online magazines, most displaying mixed feelings about the album.
If you’re a fan of ‘Bastard’ and the other 200+ free songs Tyler and his gang have released since 2007, then ‘Goblin’ will be music to your deathcore-grunge-punk-rap ears. However, if you were expecting an album with tracks as good as ‘Yonkers’ – the lead single from the album and the track that represents the tipping point for Odd Future – then you could be left disappointed.
The album carries a theme throughout with Tyler pitching his voice down and playing the part of his own conscience. Each track is as crunchy and crisp as the last with heavy use of reverb and strong distorted basslines. Simplistic and effective with course lyricism the album is forceful, robust and, simply, typical Tyler. For new fans ‘Goblin’ might be a bit of a shock. But for die-hards and those that get the attitude and mindset of Odd Future’s music, then it’s an entertaining experience throughout. The jury still remains out on whether Odd Future are overhyped, it seems we may have to wait for the next album for Tyler and his team to really fulfil their much talked about potential.
