We’re about halfway through the decade as I’m writing this, and it felt like a good time for me to reflect on what music I feel has scored the last five years of my life. By and large, these are going to be albums that I listened to a lot, enjoyed a lot, and had the most impact on me. Generally, when I have written about albums in the past, they’ve been really deep dives, going track by track and analyzing those albums amidst the context of the artist’s full discography.
In this list, I’ll definitely give some in-depth thoughts, but I will note that for a lot of these albums, I do eventually plan to write proper explorations about them at length in the future. These are well-thought out but still relatively off the cuff, with less focus on writing eloquently and more just on telling yall the shit I’ve been on lately.
Without further ado, let me get into the list. I’ve picked 15 projects, some are EPs, mixtapes, instrumental, etc — I’m not discriminating here.
15. Cat Food, by Abhi The Nomad (2023)
Most of y’all might not even have heard this unless you were following Abhi The Nomad, since this was a Soundcloud exclusive project. Despite the lowkey release of it, it’s easily my favorite Abhi project, for reasons that are obvious to anyone who knows me and knows this project.
This is a straight-forward, bars and beats kind of tape, a throwback to that DatPiff era of mixtapes IMO in how it uses beats from well-known producers and isn’t released for profit. I think Abhi is absolutely flowing over these beats, and getting deep in his lyrical bag. His mainline albums are often more syncretic, being these blends of indie rock, funk, pop, and rap. There’s plenty of songs I love on those albums, but I’ve always wanted an album of just Abhi barring out on beats since I first heard RUN.
And this album fully delivered on that. I don’t have a bunch more to say about it. It’s just such a treat. The one thing I definitely need to speak on though is “There’s A Hell For You” — I’m a communist, anti-imperialist, trade unionist, what-have-you — so I am ALWAYS seeking songs that aren’t afraid to speak up along those lines. While these themes don’t usually bleed through on Abhi’s mainline albums, I knew some of this shit was there underneath based off this one freestyle I remember Abhi posting on Soundcloud or something a few years back, rapping about colonialism and imperialism. This is a fading memory for me at this point, but it was an early inkling of something I was so happy to hear in full-force on this album. The feature verse from Emilio Rojas put me onto him for the first time as well, and his verse was one of the best verses I heard that year.
If you’re into Indian diaspora rap, Alchemist beats, or just high-quality hip hop in general, don’t sleep on this one!! I know Abhi just released his last album this year with Destroyer, but he did say it was his last “as Abhi The Nomad”, so I’m really excited to see whatever it is he goes onto do from here. This tape cemented him in my hip hop chronology. Along with some other albums later in this list, it’s absolutely a staple of brown hip hop history, one deserving of much more visibility.
14. Alfredo, by Freddie Gibbs & The Alchemist
I always think, if rappers were stocks that you could invest in, what’s the rapper you’d have made the most money on getting in early and watching them skyrocket? For me, that’s gotta be Freddie Gibbs or Denzel Curry. Both are rappers who I found wayyyy before they got popular, both around 2012.
So, by the time this album came out, Freddie had become a household name in hip hop, and finally got a tape with The Alchemist. This album is dope, damn near every song is a hit for me, and with how concise it is, you can just put it on for a short drive and be done by the time you get home. And if you’re not home yet, you spin the whole thing back.
The production is at once murky, ethereal, and memorable. I don’t have as much to say about this one. Alchemist is doing what he does, Freddie is doing what he does, and probably everyone reading this has heard this album. I’ll save my words for the more niche, unique, and underrated albums on here. You’ve heard enough about Alfredo.
13. Pray For Paris, by Westside Gunn
Griselda absolutely dominated the 2020s for me. Spoiler, this isn’t the only album from them on this list. Pray For Paris is my favorite WSG album easily, and IMO it’s his magnum opus, in every sense. The production is varied yet cohesive, carrying that characteristic grime interspersed with wrestling samples and crate-digging loops.
It took me a little bit to get used to WSG’s voice, but once it clicked, I got hooked, and dug through all his albums over the course of a year. He brings such a flamboyant, loose-cannon energy to the crew that reminds me of ODB or ScHoolBoy Q in their respective cliques. I think Benny and Conway will bar you to death, but their style is very traditional, and their flows while assertive and catchy are not too bouncy or attention-grabbing. WSG brings all that, and gives Griselda the swagger and character that pushes them into being more unique.
Where some Griselda albums can be a little samey (which is not a bad thing, their sound is timeless and does not get old), this album is always switching it up. Whether it’s the melancholy melodies of “327”, the more modern trappy flow on “Euro Step”, or whatever the fuck “French Toast” is, no two songs sound too similar in production or in rapping.
“George Bondo” is up there with the best of the Griselda posse cuts — every time Westside’s name is mentioned, the first two lines from this song are what play in my head.
“$500 Ounces” is like the underground rap gods all assembling like the Avengers. I really wish Benny and Freddie didn’t end up beefing because a full album of Griselda and Freddie would’ve easily been a hip hop classic. But for now we at least got this gem out of it before shit hit the fan.
My favorite song is “329”, and it highkey might be one of my most played songs among all the albums on this list.
12. BRAT, by Charli XCX
This is an album I’ve actually written about at length, so if you want my full thoughts on it, read my full review. For the purposes of this list, I’ll try to summarize a bit about what puts it so high on my list.
Charli XCX is an artist I’ve been a fan of for a long time, since her first album back in 2013 and her mixtape era. True Romance and Super Ultra were key projects in me becoming a full-fledged pophead all those years ago, but I ended up not following her music much for the few albums before BRAT.
I think BRAT is a magnum opus of Charli XCX’s sound in how it captures everything that makes her stand out, from her energy, lyricism and personality, to, most importantly, her sound. She had flirted several times with PC Music and hyperpop back when I was still following, but hadn’t yet released a full, focused album fleshing out that concept.
BRAT accomplishes all that and more. Not only did it deliver on everything she’s already been good at, but it also showed new sides of her that round out her cooler-than-you musical persona with a newfound vulnerability and reverence for the artists she admires. My favorite moments were the whole “Girl, So Confusing” saga with Lorde, the reflections on SOPHIE’s impact on Charli and her music, and the absolutely production chaos of “Von Dutch” and “B2b”. Read my full review if you want to hear more, since this is just really scratching the surface of how definitive and important I feel this album is and will be viewed in hindsight.
11. The Price Of Tea In China, by Boldy James & The Alchemist
Of all the artists that have been affiliated with Griselda over the years, I think I can now say that Boldy James is my favorite. His flow and delivery feel so perfect and effortless over the grimy production we usually hear on Griselda albums, and I think he plays with his flows the most out of them all. Conway’s super close for me in those regards, but I think what puts Boldy slightly above is his beat selection and his more modern rapping style. These days, amidst the deluge of Griselda and underground rap albums that pour out every year, Boldy’s the one I always make time to check for.
And that all started with this album for me. The Price Of Tea In China keeps a cohesive, oppressive soundscape full of dusty drums and ominous synthwork, but it’s incredibly dynamic, always changing up the pace with each song. “Surf and Turf” is an obvious standout, and I feel Vince Staples has the best feature verse on the project. I think he sounds really at home over this kind of product — it reminds me of how he’d flow back on Summertime ’06.
Alchemist, with this album, adds another jewel in his crown built over these last 10 years of scoring the sound of the underground rap scene. If there’s a single MVP of the last decade in rap, I think it’s Alchemist. He’s able to have such a distinct, identifying sound while also bending and molding that sound to fit whichever rapper he’s partnering with on the project. He feels like the purest representation of hip hop to me right now — no frills, sample-based, sometimes experimental, sometimes by-the-books, always grimy, always right on the mark. And for all the Alchemist projects I’ve heard, numbering in the double-digits, I’m still not even close to having heard everything he’s produced.
“Run-Ins” is a super underrated song to me. It find it fascinating how many different ways he’s able to flip the word “run”, all while hitting this fast intricate flow and making it all sound so easy.
I think when all his said and done, Boldy’s discography is going to be viewed as being as consistent as any other. He’s had an album find its way into my top 10 every year since 2020, and none of them sound the same. I feel he’s firmly staked his claim as an underground all-star, and I’d not be surprised at all if he starts touching some more mainstream stages soon in the way Gibbs did.
10. LAFANDAR, by Heems & Lapgan
Ight I’m gonna take a moment to brag here and say that I knew about this album well-before it was even announced because Heems DM’d basically saying “psst hey don’t tell anyone but I am doing an album with Lapgan” which had me gassed up as hell!! But I didn’t share that info with anyone until the album was actually announced.
Oh man, this is a special album.
Heems is one of my favorite rappers, and Lapgan has become one of my favorite producers of all time over the last two years. The idea of them doing an album together had been a dream of mine to hear. It seemed it would be so perfect, a tapestry of Indian culture stitched from samples and drums, with the most authentic Indian-American rapper making his return over them.
It was my most anticipated album in a long time, and the lead single “Accent” just threw gas on my fire of hype. Heems came through on that song, a heartstring-pulling verse about the way-too-common experience of growing up Indian in America and being made fun of for your accent. “How does my accent sound when I’m crying? How does my accent sound when I’m dying?” was arguably my most memorable lyric of 2024. It hits me in the soul every time I hear it.
Not to mention, after the verse, a beautifully poignant sample chop from Lapgan to carry the remainder of the song, to its eventual cathartic conclusion.
When the album finally came out, I feel it fully delivered. The album felt like it was made just for me; not only is it Heems and Lapgan, but some of my all-time favorite rappers in Blu, Open Mike Eagle, and Quelle Chris are featured here.
9. Ajai, by Serengeti & Kenny Segal
I was completely obsessed with this album when it came out for a solid month or two. I love concept albums, and I love them even more when they have a relatively mundane, everyday concept.
This album is about a brown dude named Ajai. He’s a hypebeast, constantly staying up to cop drops, waiting on line, spending way too much time and money on that shit. I can relate heavily, I’m all over the streetwear shit, all the way down to the more obscure shit, so I love that one song on here where he’s just rapping all the different drops he’s trying to cop, from Maharishi to Diesel and Off-White Ikea rug collabs. This is actually so ridiculous lmao I felt like this album was written about me haha.
But the album isn’t just goofy. Serengeti’s level of detail when painting these characters, stories, and scenes is unmatched. I honestly don’t know if there’s a better story-teller in hip hop in that sense. I know guys like Kendrick and Lupe can tell these elaborate sprawling tales with deep meanings, but I think Serengeti clears them when it comes to just the level of minute detail he packs in, you can literally see the scenes as you listen. The goofiness quickly fades as you see depth being added to Ajai’s character and situation. The key conflict of the album is his deteriorating relationship with his wife, all told in first-person from Ajai’s perspective. It’s so vivid, and it’s not just Ajai directly telling you what’s happening with his relationship. It’s hard to describe, but there are moments where you can sense his relationship falling apart in the background, foreground, side-scenes meanwhile he’s still busy rapping to you about the new jacket or sunglasses he copped. A song that’s stuck out to me since the first listen is “Don’t Wear That Suit Ajai”. The premise is that he copped some streetwear suit that his wife is just begging, PLEADING him not to wear to the important business conference she needs to attend in order to attain the next level of success at her job. The hook is literally her just repeatedly begging him “Don’t wear that suit Ajai please, don’t wear that suit Ajai please, don’t wear that suit Ajai please, don’t wear that suit Ajai please”. But with how addicted he is to streetwear and showing off his latest cops, I think you can already guess how that conference plays out. I literally feel disappointed in him like he’s a real person I know and am embarrassed about. I don’t think I can say that level of investment in any other concept album.
It’s actually so astounding how well this album is put together. You can see just how people can fall obsessively into a hobby while their life is fall apart, a denial of sorts letting them repress and be oblivious while the problem is screaming in their face. I won’t spoil any further, but there are scenes on this album that stick so memorably in my mind, I can literally picture the events in my mind. There are even backstory songs explaining formative moments in Ajai’s life and such. By the end of the album, you truly feel like you know this dude, how he thinks, and why he is the way he is. And Serengeti followed this album with an Epilogue EP and an Ajai II. It straight up feels like awaiting the next season of a TV show. Goddamn man this shit is so genius!! I didn’t want to include those two as separate entries so consider this entry as being all three projects together, or just the first album if you want me to pick one.
The second half of the album kinda deviates from the concept but in an interesting way. Apparently, Serengeti had previous concept albums focused around other characters, and in this second half, Ajai basically meets one of those other characters. It’s actually kind of cool, Serengeti is changing his voice, accent, and intonations to conjure entirely distinct sounding characters, rapping back and forth to each other, simulating a conversation between them. It reminds me of how Tamil movies had this weird phase where each actor was trying to one-up the other by going from double-acting, to triple-acting, to eventually Kamal Hassan doing a movie where he played 10 different characters, all interacting with each other in the same scenes LOL.
I think if the second half just kept going with Ajai and his relationship, it’d be much higher on my list, because the shift to this other character kind of throws me off. The music is still great and so is the rapping, and I love the “double-act” rap concept, so it’s still mad unique and I’d highly recommend this project.
8. The Plugs I Met, by Benny The Butcher
For an album as good as this one is, it’s interesting I don’t have that much to say about it. I’d say, if you like great rapping over great production, you really can’t go wrong with this one. It’s not innovative, but it’s perfection in execution. Every verse hits, every verse feels authentic, every verse feel intentional and crafted, and not a single instrumental is wasted. 38 Spesh became one of my brother’s favorite rappers solely off the strength of his verse here. I got a lamb, and a stick, like I’m fresh out the Bible.
This is in my opinion the best Griselda album to date. Which is saying something, considering how these dudes put out like 3 albums each, per year, and how many of them I’ve listened to.
7. PEP, by Lights
Heads up lol, my favorite artists pretty much dominate the remaining spots on this list. And if you know me, you know Lights is probably my favorite artist of them all. I’ve been a fan most of my life, her albums dominate my top 10 favorite albums of all time list, I have all her records on vinyl, and even met her and got my favorite records signed. And, this whole website only exists because I wanted a way to write down my thoughts on her albums, share them with her fans, and share them with her personally. And I’ve been able to do all of that.
Pep: this is an album I didn’t love at first. Both Pep and the preceding Skin & Earth came out when I wasn’t listening to as much music, and especially not following Lights’ music as much. Over time though, I think it’s grown on me a lot, in large part because of the chillstep companion album she later released, which underscored a lot of the lyricism on this album for me and let me slowly fall more in love with it.
One thing I always highlight about Lights’ albums is how no two of them sound anything alike. Her first album The Listening was very somber, nocturnal, and whimsical, the dreamy outpouring of a new adult reflecting on the increasing complexity of life and yearning for the simplicity of childhood once again. Her second album is my favorite album of all time, and has a very frosty winter synthpop sound, with abrasion and experimentation in sound and song structure. The third album felt like a collection of summery bangers, opting for more 80s sounds while still interpolating a lot of the contemplative, heady lyricism we’ve come to expect from her work. Skin & Earth went off the deep end, being an entire concept album tied in with a universe she created for her comic book series, with the various songs on the album directly depicting the scenes from the comic book series. And then came Pep, after having signed with Fueled By Ramen, and we hear a much more rock-oriented sound here. It reminds me a lot of Cage The Elephant and The War on Drugs. Where her previous work felt more introverted and ruminative, this album is very confident, very extroverted, and pulls more strongly at live rock and stardom.
My favorites here are “Beside Myself”, a post-rock inspired track that reflects on death and losing loved ones, and “Grip”, a very experimental and heavy electronic banger that is absolutely one of her most energetic performances live. I don’t think I’ve heard a pop song that comes as close to evoking that heaviness and weight that a metal performance often does.
I’m keeping this one short though because I will be writing a full retrospective on this album. I’m currently halfway through writing in-depth about every album in Lights’ discography, and I aim to tackle this one soon enough. As a summary though, I think Pep was Lights’ most tightly-executed project to date when it dropped. While the other albums hit highs and moods that I don’t think this one captures for me, I think her technique, talents, and skills are executed more succinctly here than anywhere else, not a single moment is wasted on this project.
6. The Outrunners, by Curren$y & Harry Fraud
Curren$y to me is vibes incarnate. He is the rapper for every day life. Whether you’re just driving, smoking up, or playing video games, I feel like he is the soundtrack. There’s plenty of music for parties, for action movies, and for gritty street stories about crime, but no one makes the regular chill day their muse like Spitta does. I think the best description of his music I’ve heard actually comes from an interview he did, saying something along the lines of “I don’t make music for when you’re heading to the party. I prolly make music for the dude who’s at the party only because his girl brought him there, just waiting to head home. And then when you get home and sit on the couch, ready to chill out, I’mma be waiting for ya with a joint and some flows.”
And that’s the beauty of his music. It is slice-of-life rap like no one else does. I knew from the moment he rapped about waking up late on a Sunday, hopping on the couch, downloading an updated 2K roster and starting an 82-game season, that he’d be one of my favorite rappers.
And yet, this particular album sticks out for me because of how, among this discography of chill stoner songs, this one has the most depth and meaning. I remember this dropped during the pandemic, and I used to follow him on Insta and Twitter and one weekend he made this really cute post about how his girl would be dropping his baby son off for the weekend and he can finally spend some time with him. You don’t often see posts like that from rappers with such genuine happiness. And wouldn’t you know, he dropped the video for “Gold & Chrome” pretty soon after, carrying his son around the house and rapping about how he all the vintage cars he usually raps about, he’d love to pass on to his son.
It’s this deeper layer of him thinking about his family, about police brutality, and generally appreciating the simple warm moments of life, that make this album my favorite Curren$y album. I have so many warm memories of playing video games and chilling with my friends and brother while this album was rolling in the background.
5. dEd, by Lights
For those unfamiliar, it’s become a bit of a tradition that after releasing a new studio album, Lights releases an acoustic version of the same album. Usually, these acoustic projects alter the entire mood of the album and add some new compositional flourishes. Which is to say, they aren’t just re-releases, but entirely new re-imaginings. There have been many instances where a song I didn’t like on the original album ended up sounding absolutely magical on the acoustic.
So, after her 5th album Pep, I guess Lights wanted to switch it up, so instead of an acoustic version, she instead opted for a chillstep, downtempo approach to the companion album. I think I didn’t truly like Pep until I head dEd, and honestly, dEd probably ranks as a top 5 Lights project for me. The sound of this album is so unique, though admittedly, this is a genre I’ve never really listened to, so that’s not saying that much. But I just remember putting this on for a first listen during a late night and being floored. It feels so spacious, so atmospheric, and gives me a lot of the same vibes that Siberia gave me, but more distinctively nocturnal.
The versions of “Grip” and “Voices Carry” on here feel like floating in a sensory deprivation chamber. They just fall so softly on my ears, and as someone whose been listening to music quieter and quieter as I’ve gotten older, I feel the sonics of this project just so perfectly align with what my ears want to hear these days.
I also feel like we were getting an early taste of Lights’ self-production here. She started doing self-production and engineering in full force on her next album, but she was already experimenting with her own electronic music with How To Sleep When You’re On Fire and her Lün side project, so it was good to see that talent more on display here. I feel like when she has taken a more active role in production, her music has sounded all the more unique as a result of it.
I would really like to here more of this sound from Lights, but something tells me this sound will remain either unique to this project, or continue to be something relegated to her side projects.
4. History, by Lapgan
This album is just CULTURE man. I grew up listening to so much cratedigger music, so having already been a fan of Madlib, discovering his Beat Konducta in India series felt like striking gold. Culture is just so fascinating as this endless, ever-changing mine of gems imbued with centuries of meaning and importance. To then, almost a decade later, find an Indian producer whose sound feels like it was forged in the crucible of that intersection of Indian culture and hip hop cratedigging, it felt like coming home.
Every single second of this project just feels like it has so much love and culture carved into it. It feels like walking through a busy Indian market, each second bringing in a new sample that echos through the cacophony like the chatter, bustling feet, ringing bicycle bells, and car horns energizing the bazaar. It’s a veritable deluge of tastes and sounds as varied and as cohesive as an thali you could get at local Indian restaurant, and even with that distinctively Desi palette, it feels as hip hop as you can get.
The hip hop addict inside 11-year old Sri felt so spoken to when 24-year old Sri first listened to this project. I have no idea what my life would’ve been like if this album existed when I was younger, but being this Indian kid so thoroughly enraptured by J Dilla, Madlib, and hip hop in general, it felt very validating of the kind of person I was but often couldn’t find around me. All I can say is, I’m glad it exists now, and I’d encourage any Indian hip hop fans to check this out. A producer as talented and experienced as Lapgan can truly speak paragraphs and essays without uttering a single word, painting only using the samples they’ve dug up and polished over the years.
3. Samurai, by Lupe Fiasco
Sekiro as a rap album. Pure honing of skills. No frills, no fanciness. Just put on some beats and be the best rapper in the world for the next 30 minutes. I feel after the conceptual focus of his previous albums, it was nice to hear Lupe just go off without the overhead of trying to maintain a narrative or an overarching theme. I do recall there still being discussion of some central theming related to Amy Winehouse, but as a listener, I felt these were just fantastic, varied, fun songs, and didn’t really pick up on any greater message. There was a period of time where this album was the only thing I listened to, multiple times per day. The runtime was so perfect for working out, and my own journey into fitness and pushing my limits every day felt so thematically aligned with this album. It’s really the anthem for any samurai sharpening his blade.
This is just fun. Some of the best rapping you can find. Hearing Lupe make an album like this feels like getting to watch Kevin Durant just cook in a 1v1 tournament: while it’s cool seeing the level of thought, restraint, and discipline that goes into a conceptual album (team basketball in this analogy), sometimes the simple, flashy stuff is what puts talent on display most visibly.
2. A6, by Lights
I really really love this album. Lights took a darker turn with this album, infusing new wave, emo, and goth into her existing synthpop repertoire, and even topping it with a cyberpunk flourish. I haven’t seen many artists switch genre as many times as her, and more importantly, I haven’t seen many artists stick that landing as many times as her. This album is seriously so good. I feel there have been so many little moments in songs throughout her career where I would say to myself “Wow, this small part sounds really good, I wish she would explore this idea further in depth,” and I feel so many of those wishes came true on this project, from the washed out reverby mixing style that I noted on “Oil & Water”, to the layering of her vocals reminiscent of “Heavy Rope”, or the darker subject matter of the unreleased “The Horror”. I’m not one who is usually swayed quickly by recency bias, but I think Lights has somehow released her greatest song, over fifteen years into her career. The entire last stretch of this album is fantastic, and I’m so excited to hear the Side B when it drops next year.
Not to mention, while I had seen her on tour 10 years ago during the Little Machines album cycle, it was during this album’s tour that I finally got to meet Lights. I know for sure that 16 year old Sri would have been totally fanboying at the very idea, but I got to talk to her, get my favorite albums signed, share with her what her music has meant to me, and then also share the writing I’ve done on this website with her. She teared up at the idea that someone would write so much about her music. I honestly feel like this album would have held such crazy significance for me just because of that, but the fact the album is so masterful on top of that just makes everything feel so right. One part of becoming an adult to me has been this idea that I am just part of the world, with every other person in the world being no lesser or no greater than I am. On one hand, this means that I hold close to me a lot of socialistic ideas which have ensured that no matter where I am in life, I look out for those who might not have had the same opportunities, success, or luck. But the flip-side has been that I’ve been very proactive and un-anxious about meeting and connecting with those who I hold in high regard. I’ve been able to meet Heems, and build a relationship to the extent that he DM’d me and told me about an upcoming album. I’ve been able have conversations and learn from artists I really look up to like Abhi The Nomad and Lapgan. And here, I was able to meet and talk to Lights, who has been my favorite artist since I was 15. I really hold all of these memories dear, and I view them as these moments that remind me of how closely knitted I am into the world that surrounds me. All of these people are reachable, they are also just people, and it is such a joy to be able to say I’ve been able to directly connect with them.
I’ve written about this album at length already, I’d suggest reading that if you’re interested.
1. Drill Music In Zion, by Lupe Fiasco
I don’t think there’s been a tighter rap performance in history. Only Illmatic comes close, but I feel like Lupe Fiasco’s lyricism transcends even that in how abstruse, sprawling, and comprehensive his subjects and execution are. I’ll say Drogas Wave is probably still my favorite album by Lupe, but I think where these albums differ is in “efficiency” to put it in basketball terms. Drogas Wave just has higher peaks and more sprawling concepts, feeling like a whole world of context and connections exist between each song, but in doing so, it makes it harder to constantly replay the album because of its runtime and the sheer number of songs just means I don’t like every single song. Meanwhile, DMIZ is the opposite. I think it has no bad songs, not even any just-okay songs. Every single song is great, and the album is short enough and cohesive enough that I can just let the whole thing play through during a workout.
Some of Lupe’s best songs in his whole career are on here, namely “On Faux Nem” and “Ms Mural”. I think the former is just a testament to how good of a writer Lupe is. He’s such a verbose and intricate lyricist that it hits 100x harder when he subverts that tendency.
“Rappers die too much, that’s it, that’s the verse”.
…
…
…
The day this album dropped, everyone was talking about that verse. Has there ever been a shorter verse that has captured so much attention? And from there, each additional verse just gets better and better.
Lupe has gone on a generational run in the last decade, starting from Tetsuo & Youth. I think he is truly the greatest rapper we’ve ever gotten to hear. I don’t think there is a single writer in hip hop that can parallel the versatility, depth of concept, consciousness, adventurousness, and tact that Lupe has displayed so often in this late portion of this career. In my mind, the single word that comes to mind to describe him is “Hone”. I truly feel like he is the epitome of having a skill, in any domain, and working tireless to hone it, to refine it, to sharpen it, for no reason other than the inherent value of being the best you can be at the things you care about the most. I know Islam is very important in his life, and to me, his work is emblematic of the idea of ihsan, the performing of beautiful works to strive towards perfection and a righteous existence in worship of the divine. Doing great things and being the best you can be, as a token of appreciation for the gift of creation and being.