"Up to date / state of the art / take part, get taken apart as I make my mark"
Welcome to the South Easy
It’s all been about one verse this week, right?
Who cares about any other music getting released? Not this week. This week is one of those weeks. One of those weeks when nothing else matters. When one emcee jumps on some second rate corporate emcee’s single and energises the mediocre beat to classic status with a performance that defies belief with its passionate venom. Not heard it yet? Yeah, English Frank really goes in on Sway‘s new single ‘Supercharge Pt 2‘, it’s something else. Not sure I feel entirely comfortable listening to Frank any more after seeing that vid of him giving vent to some unfortunate racist tendencies, but that’s a whole other issue and I promised myself I’m not going to get sidetracked this week. Much. Been distracted for a few days. I’m playing catch up.
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Lunar C‘s been trailing his new single ‘Free Weed For Single Mothers‘ for a few days now, and I’m firmly of the opinion that it’s the best track title I’ve heard all year. You’ll forgive me, then, for being a little underwhelmed when I first heard the track. How blind was I? Further listens reveal it to be really very good. I’m just too shallow to accept songs that don’t go into the hook straight off. This is more of a lyrical tornado. There’s no doubting how touchingly earnest he sounds dissing peers who are lame enough to be conscious ‘I’m not fuckin‘ with them/They think they’re deep but they’re just moaning like a bunch of women, with all their ‘look what I’ve been through‘ raps, sounding like a shit Tupac tribute act‘. It’s true, apart from the bit about women moaning. Not all women moan, that’s just a vicious rumour (or fantasy…one of the two.) On a personal note, one of the saddest moments of the year so far was a few hours ago when I held off posting this vid on my personal Facebook page cos I reckon a few of my ‘friends’ (read: distant family) would be offended. It’s sad times we live in when these kind of policies aren’t taken seriously. I’d vote for Lunar C.
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The new Dizzee Rascal track is one of his surprisingly okay releases. It’s called ‘I Don’t Need A Reason‘ and he appears to be putting in effort on those verses, the delivery at least. Nice to see him paying tribute to his forbearers with a video so clearly inspired by MC Duke, too. Overall though, his old sparring partner Wiley‘s new single ‘Flying’ is much better, but less noteworthy cos Wiley’s so much more prolific it’s easy to get complacent. Y’know Heatwave Will? He’s mentally ill. I wrote a wee bit more about this track the other week, but it’s worth mentioning again now he’s shot a video for it. And yes, he’s in the video. He showed up for the shoot. Unlike that other time.
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According to ‘Where U Been‘ 2 Chainz bought a new crib just to fuck you in. He’s been getting money, so he says, ‘where the fuck you been?‘ I guess that’s why he bought a new crib for you. He can’t fuck you if he doesn’t even know where you are. That would impractical. Still, couldn’t he have found someone who already had a house to fuck? Maybe someone with a sub-prime mortgage having trouble making the payments. He could take them grocery shopping after he fucked them with all the money he saved from not buying a new house. I guess you must just be very special. A memorable fuck. The type who’ll worship his dick without asking for anything in return.
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First time I heard A$AP Ferg‘s ‘Hood Pope‘ I thought he said ‘If you’re feeling shit, motherfuckers, sing along‘ and I figured, okay. I don’t feel too sprightly this morning, maybe I should take him at his word. On rewinding I realised he’s actually saying ‘if you feel this shit‘ which is a whole other thing but still, thankfully, applicable. Not that I truly relate. It’s a long time since I’ve drunk any Jesus Juice and I don’t have demons chasing me for my dough cos I don’t have any dough.
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Until today I’d never figured there was much question that Riff Raff was a joke. The only issue outstanding as far as I was concerned was whether he was funny or not. Like, not wanting to be racist or anything, but was he going to turn into Fred Durst and embarrass the rest of us whiteys into hiding for the next decade? I know for sure he’s a Bon Jovi fan, and that’s suspect enough. Then I heard his track ‘Ballin Outta Control (The Neon Response)‘, supposedly yet another response to Kendrick Lamar‘s infamous (already!) verse on ‘Control’ and I’m actually, sincerely impressed. Surprising, right? Out of the three or four replies to ‘Control’ I’ve heard so far it’s by far the most creative with its wordplay, the most ingenious with the angle of response, and the most effective. Listening to it increases my respect for both of the emcees involved. Everyone else seems to have missed the point with their of dumb thug responses. Does anyone really need to hear a troll like Papoose speculating about whether Kendrick was an abused child? Riff Raff has nailed it by attempting to bring his lyrical best. He’s the only one I’ve heard so far who hasn’t missed the point, he’s risen to the challenge. Even the whole first half works, where he’s talking about himself in some impenetrable wackoid gibberish like cut-up poems rescued from a hippie’s dumpster, ‘Used to have a right wrist, moved like a swordfish’ he starts, then the bizarre boast ‘suckers want to hate me/Librarians want to date me‘. By this point he had my full attention, but the bit that absolutely slayed me was he got all sincere at the end. I like to think I’m above all this shit, but when he finishes his verse ‘I hope you have a beautiful family and your label is successful, financially’ I got a bit choked up. Riff Raff as capitalist zen pioneer. Whodathunk? I am speechless.
"Up to date / state of the art / take part, get taken apart as I make my mark" 