Author: Thirtyseven

Rapsody makes dope hip hop albums. That process takes time: it’s been five years now since she dropped Eve. That was a monolith from left field, a concept album about black femininity. What could have easily been an art school trainwreck instead turned out to be a dynamic, powerful album. An album type album, too.…

A lot of people can’t see past the mask. “The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.” Mach-Hommy isn’t rapping to celebrate himself, he’s showing us that there’s a way out. We are living through a time of immense upheaval & glorious chaos. Reality is being re-negotiated. This modern…

As far as my one & only life is concerned, the summer of 2002 was one long lost weekend, all of it soundtracked by that debut Demigodz EP. Those were tumultuous days in the cracker rap ecosystem. For those of us who thought that Eminem was corny, Esoteric was dogshit and Aesop Rock wasn’t on…

I first heard G Perico come up in a conversation about Action Bronson. Years later, I still say they’re both innocent: Bam Bam didn’t bite Ghostface any more than G Perico is doing an Eazy-E impression. Both comparisons are inevitable, I get it, but I’m not signing any petitions to kick them out of the…

Whenever Copywrite pops back up, it’s always interesting. Pete Nelson has been having one wild-ass ride through adulthood over the past…well, it’s been a long time. As we lurch into the flames & bloodshed of Summer 2024, he’s out running a promo camapign for The Last Supper, his new album on Man Bites Dog Records.…

Los Angeles is a weird fucking country. When Roman Polanski was making Chinatown, he spent his weekends filming orgies at his house, entertaining a steady stream of seekers, dreamers, dealers, fixers, hustlers & pimps. Worst of all, of course, were the actors, directors & producers he called friends. Decades later, things have only gotten worse:…

Pretty Toney is a wizard of pure chaos. He’s given the game some of the finest LPs we will ever study, but even them classics were full of curveballs. It’s hard to make a case that his catalog is all classics at this point, and that’s coming from a big fan of Ghostdini‘s weirdo excesses.…

When Lou Mackey sent me this video, I assumed that was a recommendation. As it turns out, he was actually asking me to stop for a moment so that he could use my boots & pantslegs to scrape some dogshit off his shoes.  Prior to pressing play, I thought that NF might have evolved into…

I’m old enough to remember when Nickelus F lost that battle to Shellz. He was a teenage wunderkind Unsigned Hype, way back when my people (Rural-Cracker Americans) were still taking The Source seriously enough to steal copies off the magazine racks. Hell, I even had friends who would tear out pages and hang them on…

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…