Cookin Soul is a dependable brand born from a long, weird story. Originally a Blog Era duo devoted to cornball novelty mashup mixtapes, these days it’s a one man band delivering nothing but soulfood-ass beats. In a business where consistency matters, Big Size keeps his product staggeringly on-brand.
Raz Fresco has made himself a legend off nothing but talent, work ethic, and a fundamentalist devotion to The Culture. His particular schism is extremely 90’s, distinctly New York, and steeped in the street gematria of Five-Percent Nation mathematics. These are all good things. Inevitably, these labyrinths of referential wordplay can feel rote, almost paint-by-numbers, but the kid carries that raw, original flaming fire in his heart. He is always on point.
“Snakes & Ladders” is exactly that. Sure, Main Source shout-outs and acronym games may sound decades old, but fuck, what a great decade that was. More importantly, this beat is an absolutely perfect slice of melodic filth, all vibrating in tune with one of the best bass chops I’ve heard from anyone in 2024.
Fresco floats over this like a professional should, nimble with the flow patterns but never getting handcuffed to his own rhyme schemes. No question, he’s delivered better verses in the past year. (Tons of them, in fact, often alongside artists like Estee Nack who force everyone else in the room to put in 110%.) But this is still 99th percentile performance, especially by the remedial standards of contemporary “rappers.”
Press play and let this one run, bud. There isn’t a single second out of place here; the beat, the verses and the video are a single organism, breathing as one. This is a pure signal from the high holy frontiers of the true school underground. Four Dickies.
