Metal Lungies

We’ll find Freddie Gibbs on plenty of loopy, hissing beats when Piñata finally drops next month, and he’s never very far from apocalyptic trap fare, but Cookin’ Soul’s clean soul beat on “Thug Till It’s Over” suits Gibbs particularly well. Cache of bonus cuts after the break.

Read the rest of this entry »

The only regret that we have about this cover is that it took us 10 days to hear about it. As much as we love Queen Bey (and don’t we all worship at the altar of Bey?), we might love The Weeknd’s take on “Drunk in Love” even more. Can we say that? Too late. This cover sounds like Abel Tesfaye circa his first two mixtapes… which is a great thing. we were underwhelmed with the release of his first album, Kiss Land, but this sounds more reminiscent of his tried and true crooning that will more than likely get any girl within earshot to lose track of all rational thought. Listen below and prepare to keep this on repeat all day (week? month? year?).

A nice surprise in December was the 777 compilation from L.A.’s Hit+Run crew featuring a swath of the city’s most exciting beatmakers. Deep breath: Mono/Poly, Jeremiah Jae, Zeroh, Kutmah, Gonjasufi, J.Rocc, Dibia$e, Ras G, Gaslamp Killer, Computer Jay, and Knx. Come for the progressive beats, stay for the latent Jewishness — song titles include “The Synagogue” and “Beta Israel” and the latter is on some blunted klezmer shit. Yo, I think I just named Ras G’s next album.

My soundtrack to the frozen tundra of New York City this Winter was Philly rapper GrandeMarshall’s super sparse “Time” which will appear on his My Brother’s Keeper, My Son’s Teacher project dropping this Spring.