Weekly Fix #2 ('21)

Welcome to the Weekly Fix, where I go over everything that I’ve listened to that has come out within the past week. I’ll give a little blurb about the project/single with my feelings on it thrown in there, throw some descriptors and other artists names to give you an idea what the project/single is like, and link to all applicable streaming services where you can find the music. The bottom section will be devoted to projects that have Bandcamp or online webstore links, to give a greater highlight to those artists who you can support directly. Click here to see a list of previous Fixes.

——————————

Alright so it’s Saturday morning, 1/16, and I’m just now starting the Weekly Fix for last week. I haven’t listened to anything from last night, and I won’t get to till I get done with this shit here. I’m hella behind y’all: any spare moment I had to work this week was spent on the Album of the Year posts, so I’m sorry this is coming out so late. Family emergencies and all that…

Anyway, this week was another week of a steady stream of releases, not too many, but a great crop of releases nonetheless. Griselda has another album for us, this time in the context of a soundtrack for their new movie, Smoke DZA has an awesome compilation tape with a lot of upcoming rappers, and the Mutant Academy went crazy this week with two separate projects from Fly Anakin and Big Kahuna OG (with Monday Night on the assist on the latter’s project).

The Singles post got back up to more than a solitary track, being a pretty full week all things considered: go and check out some new Aesop Rock & Homeboy Sandman, Desiigner, and Big Ghost LTD. with Conway the Machine, among a whole host of others.

The release calendar has slimmed up considerably in the new year: I have a dozen or so projects I have my eye on, but I think a lot of artists (especially the bigger ones) are waiting for a little bit more… stability? I get it, it seems like a strange time to be releasing anything, but if you’re an artist waiting for times to be clearer before you drop, just know you might be waiting a while. For next week I have a few albums on the radar: Kota the Friend is gonna drop a Vol. 2 to his Lyrics to Go Series, al.divino and Grubby Paws got a project cooking, Hus Kingpin is dropping his long-teased Portishus LP, and Lil Skies is gonna try and get some attention with Unbothered. Mark these on your own calendars, and see what else I see, over on my Upcoming Heat page.

Thank you all for understanding with all this craziness going around right now. Some of y’all are probably thinking back to this time last year like “this dude was dropping on a timed schedule and everything what the fuck happened??” To be honest I don’t know how I did it last year… but I’m making my way the best I can this year. Y’all are the best, I hope you have enjoyed my Album of the Year picks I’ve been dropping over the past week, get ready for the Top 5 throughout next week, and I’ll see all of you again on the next Weekly Fix. Peace.

Here’s a link to the Week #2 (’21) Playlists

&

Here’s a link to the Week #2 (‘21) Singles

&

Here’s a link to the Week #2 (’21) Art Appreciation post

-----STREAMING PROJECTS-----

Various Artists (Smoke DZA, Jayy Grams, OT The Real, etc) – R.F.C. (Money Is the Motive) Pt. 1

Cover Artist: [Unknown]

So I have a little bit of a better perspective on this tape now given that I’m writing this a week after it came out. I was super confused last week because this album had dropped on all DSPs, and yet none of the artists involved had said anything about it on their social medias, with no promotion at all for this amazing project. But, now that I’m seeing that DZA is posting about it this weekend, it leads me to believe the shit dropped a week early on accident, so I’ll go ahead and write about it on this Fix since I’ve been bumping it all week long. It’s billed as a compilation album from my least favorite artist of all time: “Various Artists”. I hate this term, I always change it in my iTunes into something more tangible, and in this case, for all intents and purposes, this is a Smoke DZA project, as he appears on almost every track as a sort of glue that brings it all together. Jayy Grams, OT The Real, and Nym Lo are also billed as co-authors here, and while OT and Nym have a couple of appearances to justify this, Jayy is only on here once, a disappointment for sure but god-damn does he rip that beat to shreds with his verses. What we’re getting here is, like a lot of the best DZA projects, a mixture of that underground darkness you would find from guys like V Don or 183rd, and slightly more processed NY-infused trap beats. So that means you can get guys like Conway and 24hrs on the same project and it doesn’t feel off, rather it feels curated by someone whose mind occupies different spaces of music but can still bring them together into greatness. DZA is his usual self on here, his trademark nasal “Kushed God” flow fitting well into each vibe, but I need to give major props to the people he puts on this project. I’m not talking about the features, and I’m really not even talking about Nym Lo because the guy has been around for as long as DZA at this point and is known, but I need to give special praise to OT The Real and Jayy Grams. OT has been on the come up over in Philly for a minute now, and I think his time is rapidly approaching for stardom with all of the cosigns he’s been getting lately; his performance on this project is just more proof of this, his hoarse voice and detailed rap style having everything people looking for 90’s nostalgia will be satisfied with. Jayy, on the other hand, is a young Baltimore firebrand whose work with his group LOWFi I’ve been following for a while, and his style is so much more explosive and ravenous than anything else on this project. Both of these guys are two to look out for, and their performances on the project make this the must-listen this week.

Spotify/YouTube/Apple Music

————————————————

Griselda & BSF – Conflicted (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)

Cover Artist: [Unknown]

I’m still not over the fact that Griselda has a whole-ass movie coming out here soon, a progression in hip-hop that has precedent but is something I never thought I’d see in my lifetime. Will the movie be winning any Oscars? I don’t know, I haven’t seen it, but probably not; but the fact that this group of streetwise rappers could come up with the know-how to get something like this out the door is extremely impressive, and will only increase their profile amongst the hip-hop community at large. To go along with it, the boys over at both the Griselda and Black Soprano Family camps have brought their minds together (along with a who’s-who of other underground rappers) to bring us a quality compilation tape, not so much as a soundtrack as much as it is an accompaniment that assumes some similar vibes as the film I’m sure. Anyone who’s heard albums from any Griselda members will find something to love here, as well as fans of Flee Lord, Eto, and even some more mainstream sounds from guys like Dave East and YN Billy. Basically, anyone who gets down with modern East Coast sensibilities will be impressed with the quality of this record because, despite the usual letdown a soundtrack presents, it really seems like everyone brought respect to the Griselda brand with their performances. Add on top of that production from the likes of the late DJ Shay, Camoflauge Monk, and Daringer, and you get a project worthy of the GxFR brand. Go out there and listen to this project, and go out there and watch their new movie, Conflicted, which you can find a link for down below (I’ll get around to watching it sometime this weekend).

Spotify/YouTube/Apple Music/ CONFLICTED MOVIE

————————————————

NappyHIGH – Villains

Cover Artist: Thomas Holt

Going into this project completely unfamiliar with who NappyHIGH was a musician, I was pleasantly surprised to find an instrumentalist who takes cues from the great Beat Konducta and MF DOOM in his production style. He brings together weird and obscure samples on the pure instrumental cuts, weaving them inbetween tracks that he gives time to rappers: guys like Conway the Machine, Planet Asia, Blu, and Mick Jenkins can be found on this project, spitting over beats with a bit more bounce than the looser more discordant interludes and sample-collages. Whenever the rappers get on the cut, you can see Nappy’s production change to sunnier, more vintage California style, very much like Madlib but with a little bit more slap to it, maybe like something Anderson .Paak would feel comfortable over. While I usually tend to gravitate towards the more lyric-centric tracks, I think that Nappy’s production on here is so fantastic that I can’t skip the detours like I would on other albums like these, truly giving me that feeling of listening to a project like Madvillainy and being taken in by all of the wonderous samples and vocal clips being thrown at you. I wish I knew more about this guy to be able to speak on where this album came from, but suffice it to say for right now that I will be following this guy for the foreseeable future to see what other genius he can come up with, and anyone out there looking for some feel-good sample-based hip-hop should dig up this gem and get it into your playlists.

Spotify/YouTube/Apple Music

————————————————

Jamal Gasol – The Ghost of Fritz (Deluxe Version)

Cover Artist: Zach Sisk

I loved Jamal’s Ghost of Fritz album that he dropped last year: it was a thematically consistent and well-constructed album that went beyond putting fire collaborations and solid songs onto a project, it was a labor of love putting together a project that revolved around the life of the famous Harlem drug-king Rich Porter. However, in respect to the family of Porter, Gasol has redone the album a bit, taking out some of the more expository material and replacing it with some new material to make up for it. This new material takes the form of a new Freestyle, the fantastic Good Brother (a great hook on that motherfucker), and the standout collaboration with Big Twins called Golden Motto. That last track is a real special one to me; I love the sparse boom-bap beat with what sounds like clarinet or oboe notes spread throughout to give it this mysterious thread to it. Both Gasol and Twins are in top form on the track too. I already wrote about the original back whenever it came out, so I’ll leave it at this: if you fucked with The Ghost of Fritz back then, I think you should give the updated album a shot to hear what kind of changes he made, cause it’s still as fire as it was before, with the added benefit of some more tracks.

Spotify/YouTube/Apple Music

————————————————

-------SOUP’S HOT DEALS-------

Fly Anakin – Anakin & Friends: Episode 1

Investment: $8.04

Cover Artist: Fly Anakin

I appreciate the fuck out of artists who make albums that are mostly about themselves, inviting fewer people on average to keep them company on their solo projects in favor of promoting themselves and their own talents. However, I also appreciate artists who KNOW that people love a good crossover track, putting out low-stakes projects that focus more on tracks that may not comfortably place on their more serious efforts, but will still feed the people who are looking for the artist to put out material with other artists to keep the people fed. That’s exactly what this Anakin & Friends: Episode 1 project ends up being: I can hear why some of these tracks wouldn’t mesh with projects like At The End Of The Day or FlySiifu’s, but I still love hearing tracks where artists go out and have fun with their friends and close collaborators, fun music that humanizes the artist and allows us to connect with them on a different level, a more friendly level. On this one we’re getting killer cuts that feature the likes of Big Kahuna, Navy Blue, and ANKHLEJOHN, as well as some freestyles thrown in there to get the product out the door and into our ears. There isn’t much more to say than that: if you’ve liked Fly Anakin in the past (the explosive and densely-worded emcee from Richmond, a key figure in the Mutant Academy movement), then go out there and support a project like this one to tell him how much you appreciate him.

————————————————

Monday Night & Big Kahuna OG – Shark Report

Investment: $20.00

Cover Artist: ral_duke

The Mutant Academy went two for two this week. The first hit was Fly Anakin’s project that you can find above, and the second was this second installment in the Kahuna/Monday series of collaboration projects. However, this project is much different than both what we found on their album Thug Tear from last year, and really it’s different than a lot of material you would hear from this scene in general. The beats and flow patterns on here are distinctly more modern than their recent material, shifting from that boom-bap Wu and hazy modern underground aesthetic to a more mid-2000’s Atlanta vibe, along the lines of people like Gucci Mane and Jeezy to my ears. The flows are more tripleted, and beats are synthier and bump harder, and the two are rapping from more of the perspective of a drug-pushing street-lord rather than lyrical flexes and knowledge rapping. It’s not radically different that the normal lyrical topics that Kahuna and Monday Night delve into, but the shift in instrumental scenery shifts the perception in my mind to the two doing something unique to them. Kahuna had been known in the style for a little bit now, his hungry and dogged voice making him a perfect fit for these kinds of instrumentals, but I was surprised by how well Monday Night was able to adapt his style to these nimbler flows, his deep and walloping voice hitting those pockets wonderfully. If you’re looking to see artists you know from one scene take on an entirely new challenge in hip-hop, give this a shot.

Spotify/YouTube/Apple Music

————————————————