AOTY #9: Jay NiCE & Farma Beats - POMPEii! [2019]

Welcome to my Album of the Year highlights! I’ll give you a little run down with a brief history to start, show you the tracklist (with the tracks in bold being my favorites) with all of the featured guests (if any), give you some descriptors that might make you more inclined to check it out (if my recommendation isn’t ain’t for you), and I’ll provide links to stream/buy the project down at the bottom. Enjoy!

I honestly had no idea Delaware made rappers like this, and now that I know I’ll be sure never to forget. Jay NiCE, Left Lane Didon, and Chris Skillz among others are leading this wave with a lot of support from artists like Tha God Fahim and Mach-Hommy, and POMPEii! is a perfect place to get starting in figuring out what this scene is all about. A forceful but gentle emcee in Jay NiCE, a who’s who of features on here from DE and beyond, and an incredible instrumental selection provided by Farma Beats that all fall into a compelling motif surrounding the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius. At only 8 tracks, POMPEii! is s short but necessary listen for all for you Hip-Hop lovers out there.

Tracklist

1. Vesuvius A.D ‘79

2. Earl Simmons (Feat. Left Lane Didon & Rome Streetz)

3. Apollo, Vulcan, & Mars (Feat. Tha God Fahim & Vinnie Paz)

4. Vantablackmagma (Feat. Recognize Ali)

5. Doomsday Clock (Feat. Stack Skrilla)

6. Perfect Herculean (Feat. Ru$h)

7. 2,000 Years Buried (Feat. Chris Skillz & All Hail Y.T.)

8. Blk Juice (Feat. Kuji Young)

Tha God Fahim (Left) and Jay NiCE (right) on the cover for their Strictly 4 My D.U.M.P.E.R.Z tape (I couldn’t find a good solo pic of Jay, or any pic of Farma Beats, so here we are). Jay is one of the formost faces of the Delaware scene right now by way of Dover, and with frequent collaborator Left Lane Didon he hopes to dominate this rap shit.

Recommended if you like:

Low-fi hip hop, 90’s boom bap, Tha God Fahim, conceptual albums, good storytelling, Guilty Simpson, political themes, instrumental variety, Griselda, lots of features, short projects, aggressive deliveries

Here’s my original write-up of POMPEii!:

Jay NiCE & Farma Beats - POMPEii! [2019]

↓ Listen to POMPEii! ↓

Spotify/YouTube/Bandcamp