I gotta be honest with our readers. After M.I.A. dropped her last record I was ready to write her off. It was a terribly uninspired and mediocre release for the underground rapper turned international pop sensation. Shoot forward to today and we see the release of M.I.A.’s video for her new single “Bad Girls.” After the incredibly disappointing /\/\ /\ Y /\ I didn’t want to like it at all. I had already written the video and song off along with the rest of M.I.A.’s career. Well, after watching this vid I can say that I was completely wrong. I should have never written her off. This video is brilliantly swagged out in the best kind of way and Romain Gavras’ excellent direction helped to contextualize the song for me. Let’s just hope that the rest of Maya’s next album is just as on point as this single/video is.
Yesterday, Ghostly released Shigeto‘s mini-LP Lineage. This record demonstrates his unflinching respect for jazz, hip-hop, funk, and folk constructions. There’s something here for everyone to like. Ghostly says it best when describing Shigeto’s masterpiece, “Each song is a complex constellation of sounds and ideas, but his compositional focus and restraint grounds songs that are otherwise cosmically inclined.”
It’s also a familial occasion for the experienced producer. The front cover displays a picture of Shigeto’s great grandfather’s house from the early 20th century in Hiroshima. The back cover is a picture of his great grandfather during his time at an internment camp in Colorado. Truly personal indeed.
This record is beautiful to the point that it will take your breath away. It’s layered with delicate and intricate textures that combine to create something way more appealing than the sum of its parts. The record is streaming courtesy of The Fader. You can purchase it from Ghostly International.
Kirko Bangz is like the southern version of Drake, so the fact that he goes in over a number of Drizzy’s tracks on his newest mixtape The Progression 2 is totally justifiable. The Houston rapper built a strong buzz for himself early last year with “Drank In My Cup” one of our top ten favorite songs of 2011, and this new project sees the dude diving deeper into that same lean induced half rappling/half singing esthetic. Check out a few of our favorites from the tape below and be sure to grab the whole thing.
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If you couldn’t tell, WEDIDIT has a major crush on Drizzy. Like, to the point that they’ve remixed the dude around fiveorsotimes. Young bwoy D33J provides the latest WEDIDIT/Wheelchair Jimmy collab–with his suffocating take on “Over My Dead Body”.
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Internet sweetheart Azealia Banks is back with a new song. This one is an R&B tune set over Machinedrum’s “SXLND” about, “being a guy’s other girl. It’s about knowing that ur number #2, but still sticking around in hopes of becoming #1.” Download/stream the tune below and pre-order Machinedrum’s SXLND 12″ (due out tomorrow) here.
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A$AP Rocky takes a page out of Kanye’s repertoire for his latest joint “Celebration”, a track that apparently didn’t make its way onto the Harlem-ites debut LP LIVELOVEA$AP . Putting together flows about wealth, fame, and glory, the beat sounds particularly joyful and–dare we say it–almost mainstream, something we have yet to hear come out of the A$AP camp thus far. Have a listen below and let us know what you think.
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