New Rap Releases | Drake, Lucki, BNYX, ShittyBoyz, Kevin Gates, Lord Sko, Nick Grant

This is Friday to Friday, your weekly rap wrap-up, going through our favorite releases in rap and hip hop from Friday, May 15th to Friday, May 22nd. My name is Jacob. I'm a mixing and mastering engineer from Cali and your host for today. And I have with me producer and artist manager hailing from Montreal, Canada, Matt Kerier. Yo, what's good?

As well as producer hailing from Detroit, Michigan, Gav aka Lunar G.

What's up? What's up?

And last but not least, artist and producer hailing from the Twin Cities, Minnesota, Terry V.

Yo yo.

All right, I just want to first off kick it off by saying we're going to talk about the Drake release. Of course, we're going to talk about that first. And we're also going to talk about some other dope music that came out from other artists this week. So stay tuned after the Drake discussion. If, uh, if you're here for that, or if you don't give a [expletive] about Drake, we got you still covered with some other dope [expletive] that came out this week as well.

Yes, sir.

Uh, so before we get into talking about our favorites from this week, here is the full list of projects released. We got JPEG Mafia with Experimental Rap. This actually came out on the 21st, the day we record. So we're actually going to cover this next week. That's kind of a rare occurrence for us, but this is just a busy week. So, we want a little bit more time to breathe on the JPEG Mafia.

Also, we got 414 Jungle Baby with Jungle This, Jungle That, Benny X with Genesis FM, Chip Fu with Invisible Footsteps, Chill Rob G with Survival of the Better, Genesis AU with Red Star Woo and The Worldwide Scorge, Kevin Gates with Lost Files: The Collection, Lilo with Mastiff Pink Tiles, Lil Shine with Get Rich or Die Sipping, Lil Chic with Stuck in the Streets 3, Lord Scow with Elevator Music, Lucky with Drugs Are Bad, Maluma with Loco X Vulver, Mike Teezy with Chameleon, Mazy and Wheez Gotti with Blood Spilled, Nick Grant with Smile, Nutso Thugan with Voice of the Clan, Party of Two with America's Next Top Party extended cut, Papa Rod with Picture Day, Wondo Rondo with Until I Return, Ron Satch with Reaper Sun, Shaggy with Lottery, Shitty Boys with Back to the Basics, Sunreal with Honest Work, Spotty with The Last O, Tay Young with Wild, T Dark and DB with Set Your Sights Higher, Vince Spencer with Inspire Your Idols, Zay Dante with Taste, and then of course lastly, Drake with Iceman and Habibi and Made of Honor.

As we learned last week, Drake dropped three albums in one day.

Yes.

Let's kick right off into it. The three album thing. There's a lot of pushback about how bloated it is. And I find a lot of people have thought it's just become too easy to like make the decision to just skip one or just not come back to one. But, you know, word is that he was able to count all three towards his deal. That's the rumor. So, if that is true, that would be a dope move. But, it's a lot of music.

Yeah, he's out of there. Some might say too much. It was hard to juggle between three new albums that you feel kind of like you have to listen to because of the culture and everything that's going on and then like all the other stuff that dropped that day that we only got to kind of the week after, right? But the problem is it's three Drake albums, but then on top of it, you have Lucky, which like we knew was going to be great. Then there's Benny X and it's like it keeps going on where it's like it was a really competitive day.

Like I'm the same way. Like it's a little too much. But also like now I have to really really sit down and decide what I, what I'm rocking with.

What you going to listen to?

Yeah.

And I figured, you know, of course Iceman on top of that list because of the two-year, or not two-year, itis, cuz Drake has been making music, which is a narrative people were trying to throw around, that Drake wasn't releasing, like Drake was releasing [expletive]. But with this one, I mean, this is obviously the one of the bigger albums of the year. So I, I don't know. Let's, let's, let's get into it cuz I'm, I'm curious to hear what you guys, we, we talked a bit about it.

Yeah.

Let's start off with Iceman specifically.

All right. Bet. So, Iceman, it's cool. Like, it's, it's, it's cool. That's, that's, that's, I was thinking of how I was going to break it down. I had all of these thoughts and I've been listening. I've been talking about it, but it just boils down to it's cool. I'm, I'm not going to get too deep in, it's, it's, I don't know if we thought what Drake was going to do. Like it's, it's, it's like, for it's, for all the dogs. Um, CLB. It's, it's, it's, it's Drake. Like it's Drake.

I think every song though that he has "make" in the title are the best songs on this project.

What?

Make Them Cry, Make Them Pay, Make Them Remember, Make Them Know. Like those are probably the best songs, um, on this project to me.

I liked all those too. And the way I'd interpreted that is that it feels like the use of the word "them," "make them," reminds me of the "they" from Not Like Us. Like "they not like us." Kind of feels synonymous to me.

I was outside a lot this week and when Iceman dropped, like I was outside with a bunch of people and we were all talking about Iceman but nobody was playing, nobody was barely playing Iceman out throughout the whole weekend. There's this Art World event in Minneapolis, in North Minneapolis, this big art event. This DJ was out there spinning, doing an amazing job, didn't play in that one Drake record. It's Drake. It's Drake.

If, I feel like, if you hated Drake, this project is not the project that's going to make you turn around and be like, "Oh, I'm back on Drake team now." No.

No. If you love Drake, then you probably love this project. He didn't give us too much of anything new. Um, a lot of subs just running at people, running back at Kendrick. I will say the hardest line is at Ross. "I've been Aiden Ross' streams before Aiden Ross was streaming." That one was stuck in my head.

Yeah.

Yeah. And so like, and I will say this about the project, it was good to see Drake rapping. Like when he dropped the 1 a.m. in the album, which turned out to be Make Them Remember, right? And I text you guys and I was like, "Yo, Drake's talking." Like, it was good to hear that type of Drake again, but the more I listened to the record, it just like, "Okay, okay." It kind of just faded and went and went, went down the more I replayed it back.

For me, the whole album, I was, I kept wondering why I wasn't going back too much. So, like I said before the podcast, to me, Ran to Atlanta is the most standout beat, which is a stupid thing to say because it's really the most simple beat, right? But I, I feel like I, I don't know. The whole album I can recognize that every bit of production is, is of the utmost quality. Everything is super well-crafted and everything. I just didn't feel that there's anything that's stuck to my head production-wise. It's more the Drake melodies, more like the songwriting and the certain things that he's said. Uh, like the, like "shebang." Shebang is going to stay stuck. Like I've been just walking around just like vocal stemming that. Um, the writing is good, but the beats, I just wish there was a bit more. I don't know. I, I don't even know. I don't even know if standout is the right word because every beat was good, but just, I don't know. Maybe I prefer more like stupid beats. I don't. That's why to me Iceman is actually like my third favorite out of all three.

Wa. Yeah.

Okay. So, toss them all out. Okay. Okay.

Oh, well, I'll just to tag on. I feel like the most standout beat was probably Make Them Pay. Um, I don't know if that's because of the melody of Drake doing the free, like that's probably one of my favorites on it. Pretty much every song that I started to like, by the end of it I did not want to listen to anymore. Um, quite honestly, a lot of the bars probably went right over my head cuz I was paying way more attention to the production. I wanted to like the production cuz I usually do. That's usually what actually like draws me into Drake. And if I like the production, I'll replay a song and then I'll actually get to know the words to it. Like, I didn't find myself doing that with this. And I tried to, but it was like everything that I've kind of run back, I'm like, yeah, I'm still just listening to the production. There were a couple. Um, I really liked National Treasures and Whisper My Name for the beats.

Rain Atlanta was good, too. Just like what Matt said, it's what you expected, you know, and it's just kind of, it's hard to miss with that. I think he's got a formula and it works. There's a reason Kendrick said what he said. Like, every time you need a check balance, you run in Atlanta because it [expletive] works. But, um, I don't know.

So, in my opinion, like Drake's just proving his point with this [expletive]. So, it's kind of interesting to me. It didn't feel much like a clapback. And I felt like kind of what you guys said, every song had some bars about it. I was just like, ah, you know, like I, I wish that wasn't the case. Like, show us that you're an artist that can thrive off your art, not just because of what someone did two years ago. And I think there's, there's no real growth.

And, and that's the thing. Like when you're that big of an artist as Drake, like you have to play to so many different metrics, so many different people, so many different, you know, things that you have to hit. And then you're doing a numbers thing too. Like Drake's whole thing is numbers, even when he's talking. Like most of his clap back at Kendrick was like, "you did this, but still I still have the most numbers, I'm still, I'm still big." And all of, like, and that's one of the differences with some of these other artists who dropped this week, is that artists that make you feel something, like to give you something, and I've never really went to Drake to feel anything. It's only really—

No, that's a bar. But, um, I had rapper brain. I had rapper brain. Write that down. Write that down.

But, uh, unless it was outside like talking to, like outside partying or like kicking it with somebody. That's, that's really one of the only reasons I went to Drake. Like early Drake.

Yeah. When you like Love Her, emotional, and I wish he would have stayed that lane. But I, I don't, I don't, there's no growth. It's, it's Drake. We know what we getting here. It's, it's the same thing. It's, it's the same thing. But I just wasn't thrilled. I didn't hate it, but I just wasn't thrilled, you know? Like, I'm not just trying to be like, "Oh, poo poo, it's Drake, Team Kendrick." Like, no. I just genuinely, when GNX came out, I was actually [expletive] like, "Oh my god, dude. I got to run this pack every day. I want to hear it on my headphones. I want to hear it in the car. I want to hear it on my studio monitors. Like, let me listen to this all the time." Um, I don't see myself doing that with any of these three. That's just the reality of it, is it's probably not going to be in heavy rotation for me.

So yeah, and I will say too, like the, the way that Iceman was originally presented, it was like when it, when it was first like brought up, it was going to be this album that had this like undeniable, unquestionable amount of hits in order to show that Drake can spend, you know, x amount of time on the charts. And when Iceman dropped, like if you check right now on his Spotify, every single song is in his top 10, which is, is great, but I don't feel like the album has hits like that, in the sense that again, songwriting is, is great. You know, he, he puts together some really clever kind of hooks and stuff that you don't really hear, him and his friends. Um, the production—

Yeah, him and his friends, you know, a couple of other people in the room. Uh, production too, you know, amazing.

But it just, it doesn't, like, and I'm someone who, like, I know I go for like mainstream a lot. Like I'm a, I'm someone who I feel like you guys probably thought I, I was going to be like Ice Man is the best album of the year. I thought I was going to be that too. I really thought, to me, like, hey, I'm a, I'm, I'm not a Drake stan, but I really like Drake, so I was like, here we go.

You know, you were pretty hype.

Yeah. Yeah.

The stans really made this, the experience of listening to this [expletive] unbearable. Like it's, it's like the discourse going back and forth and people trying to play each other against others and like all this other, it's like, it's simple enough. If you like it, you like it. If you don't, you don't. You don't have to, because you have, you have so much love for Kendrick, you don't have to [expletive] on it because just for this, just for the fact that it's Drake. No. And, and vice versa. Just because Drake, doesn't mean you have to, "Oh, this is the best project in the world. Like he's changed the game with this."

Like I'm like, he, he did it. He really, he gave us CLB, For All the Dogs, and Scary Hours 3. This is, this is, this is what Iceman was, at least to me in my opinion. Cuz unfort—, um, one of the things with, um, For All the Dogs was that, well, Drake's not rapping enough. He had the joint with Cole but he's not rapping. So then they ran it back with Scary Hours 3 and then, you know, he gave us a bit more rap and tried to keep up with Cole. But like, I don't, I, it's, it's Drake. He's too big to really fail. Like I don't think, um, even with the Kendrick thing, I know a lot of people were kind of hoping for his demise, but even with that, I don't, I don't, I didn't foresee like Drake falling off like Ja Rule, like 50 did Ja Rule. Drake is just too big for that to happen. He's just too big for that.

For sure. For sure. And something with Drake albums that happens all the time is that I'll listen to the album and I'll go like, ah, you know, like I only like a couple songs, whatever, and then 2, 3 months later the songs start playing a lot on the radio and whatever. And then like Drake songs have a way of coming back and sticking at some point. So I'm sure that maybe in a couple months some Iceman songs will kind of like gain some traction or whatever, but for me right now really, like, there's not much that I'm excited to go back to and there's not much that's like stuck in my head from Iceman.

No, usually there's like a standout. This is the song they dumped everything into. Like they tried to make sure this song popped, like Jimmy Cooks.

I thought that that was shebang to me.

Shebang was like, it's got, I'm not even gonna lie. I skipped through it because I like the beat, but I was like I can't [expletive] with like the bars. I don't even remember what it was, but it was just bothering me. And so I kind of skipped through it. I was like, this shit's boring.

That's not a personal favorite for me, but I just, when I heard it, I was like, "Oh, this is a club radio song for sure."

Yeah. No, I do. Okay, I'll give it that cuz like it's like strip club music.

Janice Shut the [expletive] Up kind of banged that one. Like the beat was pretty decent, on the fire hook on that one.

The hook was fire. I just like the sample where it's like "Janice, shut the [expletive] up." Like the perfect man.

Janice is one that, like, I saw Timberland said that that it was a very special song and that it was going to be a timeless record. I don't know what that really means from, from AI Timberland, but you know.

Yeah. Exactly. Timbo.

No. No, man.

Yeah. Well, I do love the hook on, on Janice. There's like this vocal modulation that's kind of like pleasing on the ear that you got going on over the autotune. "Teach me, baby."

Yeah, it's like low. It's pretty low for Drake. The first time I heard it, I thought it was a little silly. I'm not going to lie. But, but then after I realized— So, you're an engineer. You can tell me. Is it like, did he, did he like, machine pitch down his voice or something? It sounds like it's modulated artificially.

Yeah.

Okay. But yeah, cuz it sound, it started growing on me after the second, third time. I was like, "Okay, okay."

Yeah. That's one of my favorites on the, on the album, actually.

Yeah. But there was so many beat switches, not on just that one, but on the whole thing, that it's like almost beat switch fatigue. It's like too many. Make Them Pay is the one that I listened to it and I really really really liked the way it started. I did not like that [expletive] beat switch. It actually made me not playlist the song, but the beginning of it's fire as [expletive].

You just reminded me, when did I miss, dropped the single? I remember specifically I much prefer the second half of the beat than the first one cuz like it, the, the first half isn't bad, is just I would want the second half as its own song so I can save it and only listen to it.

Yeah. You know, back in the day I would have went as far as to like, you know, editing it myself, like downloading the song off LimeWire, cutting it in half and like— But you can't do that on Spotify, right?

So, no, What Did I Miss was the worst song on the album.

It was, it was a miss. I don't know how that was a single, like—

What Did I Miss was a miss. There was so long between What Did I Miss and Iceman actually coming out, but I thought the rest of the album was so much better than What Did I Miss. That extra time during the rollout to get inspired and just put the album together in a way that was going to make sense and maybe figure out the label aspect of it, too. But that should have been pulled off the album. That should have just been a single and then just stayed a single.

When What Did I Miss first came out, I was like, "Ah, whatever." I kind of like it a little bit more that it's on the album, um, this second time around. I found it, it fit well on the album.

Oh, interesting. Okay.

But again, the next time I hear some of these songs will probably be if I'm outside and somebody's playing it. Maybe Janice Shut the [expletive] Up just for the hook. But, um, outside of that, and like, and that's my point, like, again, like I don't think this album was bad. I don't think it was terrible. It just was, it either, it's cool. Like I said, it's, it's, it's cool. I actually thought it was better than I thought it was going to be for sure cuz, like, I kind of was like this Kendrick fan over here being like, whatever, like I'm kind of ready to not like it. But I did like it. I thought the production, although like my only real complaint with the production was the beat switch fatigue. I actually thought, to me, the production was exceptional overall. I really liked it. So, in it for the beats but I stayed for some, some good hooks.

And then there's just the cultural story aspect of all the [expletive] talking he had to do. He didn't just throw shots at Kendrick. He threw shots at like all his ops. And yeah, out of all the, the ops right now and all the beef and everything that's going on, the only person that's currently disappointing me is Rick Ross, because I don't like the way that he's moving. Where Kendrick and a lot of the people that were involved in this beef, they seem to have moved on and do their own thing. Rick Ross is still doing interviews and still talking about how like Drake was never one of them and like he only worked with them because he was helping out Young Money.

And how like it feels like a bit of a lie in the sense of like, I'm sure you had some good times with Drake, man. I'm sure he spent some time in the studio, like, like, yeah, maybe Aston Martin Music from 2013, maybe that's when you had to help, like, Young Money, but I don't think, like, Money in the Grave and stuff like that is like, oh, I was forced to make music with Drake, you know? Like, everyone just get along. The beef is over. Be friends, make music together. If Future was able to do it, 21 was able to do it, I'm sure Rick Ross can do it.

I'd say he tried to do it, and I like 21, so that sucked. "Bees on the table. Bees on the table." Most boring hook. That's actually all I heard of the song and then I turned it off.

Actually, like Matt's take better. I would have used that over 21's take.

That's Iceman.

Yeah.

So that, that's Iceman. Last thing, not on Iceman, but just on the three album thing in general, I thought that Drake really sort of put himself in a box with the way that they were organized. It's not new that, you know, he's kind of in a box, but it's just so literal with these albums. I can do this, and then I can also do this, but then I can also do this. It's literally like a rap album, an R&B album, and an EDM album. The rap beats on Iceman, they are basically either a slow soul sample beat or an Atlanta trap beat with a beat switch that is unnecessary and sometimes make the song not good.

Yeah.

Like, so I just thought like he really put himself into a box so literally with just being like, here's the things I can do, and it's just so much at once.

Oh, I actually did have one more note. I need, I got to talk my [expletive] on Too Hard for the Radio.

Go.

I got to go, guys. So, everybody, everybody clear out. Well, first of all, just like Drake, Drake just didn't do a good job over this Bay Area style beat, like this. Oh, now I understand the issue. I— Okay, so this beat is like supposed to be like getting at Kendrick. It's like the exact same tempo and like cadence as, uh, you know, Like Us.

Yeah. Yeah. It's like exactly, you know, that same tempo.

It's just a big old miss for me. It was like disrespectful and I didn't enjoy it sonically either. So—

I enjoyed Too Hard for the Radio and I'm not going to lie, you had texted in the group chat like that it was, he was like laughing at, at Squabble Up or whatever, and I think I just didn't like realize it. I was listening to it and I was like, "Oh, you know, I like it." Now, I'm realizing that yes, it's, it's a song that is definitely mocking, right? Um, I think I liked it because I, I generally like to hear artists on things that they don't usually go on. I love that stuff. So maybe that's why for me, Too Hard for the Radio was like, "Oh, it's Drake on something that I don't usually hear him on." Mhm. But now understanding that it's, it's definitely, uh, you know, culture jacking a little bit, but which he been doing just like the BBL Drizzy, like he's just playing into all the other stuff trying to be like, haha. But yeah.

Or Jake, real quick, what's your shirt? What's your shirt? I'm just trying to look at your shirt. Does that say Boogeyman? Is that the Kendrick?

Oh, damn. That's, that's crazy disrespectful.

That's— Damn, that's messed up. On behalf of all the mix, bro.

No, I'm not offended.

That's a cool ass shirt. That's a really cool shirt.

All right, so that was Iceman. Let's get on to Habibi. So, first off, Rust Intro, I think I broke a record for how fast you can skip a song.

Yeah, I didn't listen to this album at all. Yeah, I didn't care for anything on this project. I started it and stopped it. Sorry. I— That's all I have to say. That's just all that happened for me. I started it and I went, uh, and I turned it off and I went to Made of Honor cuz Matt said that's kind of like— Honestly, Never Mind, which I think is the last Drake project I genuinely liked. So that's just me.

Yeah, this is the exact type of Drake I don't care for. So for me that's really all I have to say. I wasn't a fan.

So to me, I put it above Iceman, um, because I feel— you got to go.

Let's hear it. Let's hear it.

Iceman felt really long and, and tedious for the most part. And I found that Habibi, even though I'm not, I don't go for R&B all that much, I just found it was kind of a nice little playthrough of just like, I guess, yeah, the type of, of Drake that some people dislike. Um, but it was just, it was just vibes. Just 10 songs cuz, yeah, the first song is a skip. Um, quick skip. Sorry, but but it is 10 songs of just, just good quality R&B vibes. I didn't mind it. I didn't mind. I, I found myself getting a lot more annoyed with Iceman.

Interesting.

I think Classic is the only good song on, on Habibi. I like that one. But outside of that, it was like— No, I do enjoy Classic cuz it's like that retro 90s R&B type vibe, which is pretty smooth. But outside of that, I couldn't, I couldn't, I couldn't, I couldn't get through. I was, I was skipping. I think after Gen Five, I was like, I'm all right. I'm going over to Made of Honor. And I usually like Drake with the melodies.

That's fair.

I like Drake when he acts tough.

Yeah. I, I, I liked Low Shimmy. Low Shimmy did a verse on here and that one was okay. That was probably the highlight of the album for me just cuz I haven't heard him in a while and I kind of like his voice. I— over production though. How did you guys feel about the production?

I didn't listen to it.

Really? I, I— there's so much ethereal sense and like so much like it's just like, like boudoir music, like sex music, you know? It's just, that's Drake Habibi, that's the sort of R&B project, 10 songs long. Uh, we had some fans and some not fans in the group. Very divisive.

Let's get on to Made of Honor. This was sort of the EDM album. Uh, that was sort of honestly Never Mind— okay, Matt's favorite one. Tell me why did you love it so.

So, 80s is definitely making a comeback. It's like, I want to hear more of this kind of style. And then Made of Honor drops. And to me, it's like, it's exactly what I've been asking for. There's also, uh, Benny X that dropped that same day, which is also kind of giving me the same vibes, but really Made of Honor to me is just, it's, it's a fun project. I enjoyed the samples. It's samples that I recognize and that I, I could actually go, "Oh shit," like, like the, the Cha Cha Slide and stuff like that. Like it's all stuff that like I'm like, I've heard this before. Like it's nice to be able to see. And Cheetah Bring to Me was my favorite. I did not really care for BBW at first and then it kind of grew on me the more the beat went on. I was like, "Oh, okay. Okay." I was like, "I could get behind this." Yeah. It's just like all good club music in my opinion. It's— I like dance music. I like EDM. I like House, Dubstep. I like a lot of that kind of music. And so it was entertaining for me. And it's, uh, like I said, honestly, Never Mind was probably one of my favorite projects that he's done. And so like this was not that, but it was kind of reminiscent. So I was like, "Oh, okay."

Yeah. I thought it was cool. I like— which one? In Amazing Shape. Um, but yeah, I thought it was cool. Like Amazing Shape. Woo, man. Yeah. With, um, PopCon. Yeah. Like, and yeah, it's dance, like music you could dance to. Like this one I was, it's cool. Um, some of these I will spin. But outside of that, you know, it's, it's, I think I was just fatigued after listening to Drake when I heard Made of Honor. And so I haven't gone back yet since I spent the day just listening to it, uh, or listening to all of his albums. So again, I, I thought this was cool. I, I would say this one if not first or second because from your point, like it's a fun album, I give him that. But yeah, I got to say, outside Tweaking, that's probably the one that stood out to me that I'll like keep going back to, but Juice and the Juice is decent, too.

Interesting. So, Matt seems to have a very different order. So, let's just quickly do our Drake albums in order. Uh, for me, it's very easily Iceman on top, then Made of Honor, then Habibi. What about you, Gav?

I got Made of Honor, Iceman, Habibi. Okay, with a DNP kind of like in, in racing, like DNF, did not finish. It just did not apply. Yeah. So that one kind of like X, unfortunately, and I like R&B, so that's—

Yeah. What about you, Terry?

Um, yeah. Iceman— of a— okay. Matt, Made of Honor and Iceman.

Wow.

Iceman was the one he hyped up and I think people hyped these albums up, and the best way to experience these is just going on with low expectations. I had no expectation for Iceman. I just wanted to hear what he was going to do and it was cool. Um, if I was basing it off the expectations he was saying that he was stating it was going to be, I'd say that he missed. But then again, I'm not like a huge Drake fan. I'm not a Drake hater, but I'm not a huge Drake fan.

M, and I wonder, did he set the expectation or did like the, the culture and the fan base, like his—

Every day I was logging on and like, oh, the hits are about to drop, you know?

Yeah. No, AC, um, all of those guys.

Oh yeah, AC.

No, Academics, is that— that's another conversation. Okay. So that's Drake.

I did want to reiterate as well, like Matt said, if you listen to Made of Honor and you like the, the rap EDM blend, or maybe you didn't like it and you want something different, someone else's take on the same thing. Benny X, Genesis FM came out this week. That is a pretty interesting project. It had a lot to compete with this week.

I— so I heard Benny X today for the first time and I'm so mad I heard it today and I'm like, this should have been something that I should have been listening to since last Friday, because on my first listen I, I don't know if I can say that it's, it's better than Made of Honor. But off the first listen I'm like, this is a production that I, I want to hear. The weather is getting nice. It's getting hot. This is what I need. Funk hip-hop disco little whatever. Really interesting blend.

Yeah, definitely. This whole album had me just— Fuego with Yeat and Pez Puma. I thought that the song with Big Sean was cool. I feel like Big Sean, to someone that we've gotten a lot of like the same kind of sound from. So, it was kind of cool to hear him, um, on something a bit different. And then the song with Quavo, honestly, like I haven't saved or really loved a Quavo song in a long time, but that one I was really impressed with.

Yeah, that's my favorite one on the project. That one's really, really good. Telepathy Love was one of the singles that was— that I felt like that fit really really well in here. I liked that a lot. I liked Fallen with Don Toliver, Fanatic with Bo Knox, Overload, which is just production, which is kind of [expletive] really cool. But I liked a lot of this album. Pretty good start to finish.

Nice.

That's Benny X with Genesis FM. Moving along with the 80s theme, I want to get into Shitty Boys with Back to Basics. Dog militia. I'm so glad I pressed play on that one.

Yeah. And the very first song is called Back to Basics. They're really showing you what you're— what to expect throughout the whole project. To me, it sounds like an 80s action movie synths and melodies mixed with like Michigan rap. Danny G, bro. Danny G. If you guys not know Danny G by name, please please look him up. Listen to him. He brought Kodak to Detroit. He's impressive. Um, he's been behind a lot of Baby Tron.

Danny G uses a lot of this one like sample one-shot that I'm pretty sure is like the exact same sound effect as Tony Hawk Pro Skater when you collect a tape. It's like a super classic shot scratch noise.

I thought I heard that somewhere. Oh my god. I was like, I know it's a video game. I know it's somewhere. I just, I can't [expletive].

That's crazy. It kept coming up. It's, it's on pretty much every song, right?

Yeah. Or if not 10 times in every song.

Yeah, it's on like beat one of every song. God. And like, I'm glad you guys were enjoying this too. I thought I didn't like this sound and expected to be like annoyed as the week went on trying to give it a chance. They had to bring it back to the basics. But it was actually the opposite. It grew on me more and more throughout the week. And now I'm totally [expletive] with it. It's like this, this sound just kind of clicked with me this week. My standouts were Timeout, Geek Squad, and Lord Cyius. Those ones were my favorite.

Really works A to Z. Yeah, I have no standouts because of that reason, because I've only done it from A to Z. There's nothing that I'm like, uh, I need to skip that one. So maybe next week I'll have standouts, but really for now, for me, it was A to Z. It's 13 songs. It's 30 minutes. What is 30 minutes in a day, right? Like, it's such an easy listen. I loved it. I loved it. And I— I didn't know who the hell, like I had seen the name before, but I think I always thought that it was like comedy rap or parody rap or something. I was like, "Shitty Boys." I was like, "That can't be a real name, right?" Um, and then I saw you talking about it and I was like, "Okay, well, you know, I should check it out." I'm like, "Okay, I know Baby Tron, of course." You know, man, I'm, I'm so glad I found this.

Well, I'm so glad that you helped me find this cuz, uh, this is my sound for real. For real.

Yeah. Yeah.

It's kind of, uh, like based on plays, it's pretty slept on. The biggest song has like 163,000 plays and that's Time Out. But dude, this whole album is so fire. I really really like Fetty Moola and Guala. That's an energy beat. Um, Killian Hayes, that one's fire. Just everything. The little like [expletive] Beas and Butthead noises at the beginning of Fetty Moola.

The whole thing, like you guys said, works start to finish cuz it's— it blends together like really well. There's a couple songs that like clearly kind of break and like change up a little bit and like you're like, "Oh, that's a new song." But there are a couple songs where I'm like, "Oh, [expletive], was that this one or that one?" Like it just plays really well. I didn't realize I finished the album the first time. Like I was like, "Oh, I heard this one before." Yeah.

And I was happy with the fact that this is 13 songs where the vibe is, is immaculate throughout all 13. That's a rare thing to find nowadays. And it really, this to me— and it's why I was maybe a little bit mean about Drake, but this really put in perspective to me what could be done with an album, in the sense, like, these are 13 songs. I didn't need to skip anything. I wouldn't change anything about it. But then you have something like Ice Man, which is supposed to be, you know, billion dollar budget and it's 18 songs. It's like I didn't have that, like, need to keep listening to it, you know? Yeah. So really, man, Shitty Boys, they, they've got me as a fan. 100% locked in.

Yeah. Awesome. That's Shitty Boys with Back to the Basics. And speaking of vibes, let's talk about Lucky with Drugs Are Bad. We got a couple of features— from the also features from China, Lil Baby, and Yachty on the bonus song I Don't Care. That was one of my favorites. Lil Boat. There's some funny vocal samples from like movies and TV shows in between the songs. Man, so many funny ones. I loved Twin Flow with V's. Another Detroit rapper.

Just want to say, shout out my boy Wills. Worked with him, engineered him and [expletive].

Nice. Oh, dope. Yeah, I'm a fan of these for sure. And I like to see Rio again. I feel like, like in 2025 that's, you know, a lot of people were asking for more. In 2026, we've been getting quite a few. I've had this, the Nupy intro stuck in my head like that first song. My other favorites were Super Tune, Madness, Round Tripsky, and, uh, Yesterday on My Face.

Certain songs just like hit this weird pocket where like I just get something out of it that I wouldn't— I've never got out of a song before. It's like just like tickles this weird little part of my brain where I'm like, I didn't know that I was interested in that until like I heard it. And it's like almost, I didn't know I was interested in it until I heard it, like the third time, and then I was like, "Oh, oh, I'm playlisting."

That's actually really good. And shout out to Lucky for having— he had Little Baby, which is a huge feature. And I found that Lucky did Little Baby better than Lil Baby did, in the sense, like the beat is very— it's a Little Baby beat and the flow that Lucky kind of uses is, is very kind of typical to that. And as, as a lot of people have been talking about, Lil Baby's kind of, I don't want to say falling off, but like for the most part, people are wanting a little bit more from him. So to see Lucky be able to do it and do it better is kind of like, well, you know, I guess I guess all we need is Lucky from now on, you know?

Dude, I just want to say looking at this album, I've pulled it up on Spotify right now. The first nine songs, they are all over a million plays. Lucky's the guy, man. Nice. Round Tripsky has 2.3 million. Love that one.

That's crazy. Lucky is an artist that people continuously underestimate and I really like it. Like I saw him in Chicago, where he's from, at a festival. It had four stages. They had him at the smallest of the four stages, which was a little like offshoot tent stage. And, uh, that entire stage fit, I don't know, a couple hundred people in the pit. There were like full mosh pits around the outside of the gate. You couldn't tell where the actual area was. Like that was the most turned stage out of— I guess that was during the the Gemini album, right? Yeah. Um, that was— that's— that was one of the craziest. That was like he was performing as I walked in too. And so like that's what I walked into and just immediately hopped in that pit. And Lucky, Lucky. Lucky. I mean, I keep saying it like without even thinking about it. Yeah. He— I— he, he influences a lot of [expletive] that like people don't even totally notice or think about until you hear it and you're like, "Oh shit." Like, that's— he's been doing that in 2015 or whatever. Like his very first album is crazy.

His first album, Alternative Trap 2013 with, uh, Count on Me and Cocaine Woman. Some of that [expletive] is just absolutely insane. It doesn't sound at all like anything he does now, but just to know that that's the first project he decided to put out and then ended up in this lane, you can hear that he's been very very like boundary pushing for a while.

Yeah. And the budget's been going up. Every album it sounds better and better. I'm happy to see that. On every album he always keeps like a, a Visor or Rio feature. And I like that he stuck to that because really on the newest album the only thing that is like money is like the Little Baby feature. Lucky, he did stick to what his sound and surrounding is. I liked that a lot.

That one was also kind of a pleasant surprise for me cuz not a vibe I was expecting to like as much, and it was great.

[expletive] with Lucky with Drugs Are Bad. Let's get on to Nick Grant with Smile. Let's talk about some boom bap. We've been talking about a lot of big hits, EDM [expletive]. Let's talk about a little boom bap. Nick Grant with Smile. This is some real rap. This dude clearly studied the greats, has a pretty classic style, but he's still doing it in a fresh way. That album was super nicely sequenced. It plays through like a breeze. The energy switches up at the right time. Super well put together. Standout tracks for me: Same Song featuring Punch. This is Punch from TDE. I missed that this came out as a single in April. And then, uh, I also loved Price Tag featuring Westside Gunn. That was my other favorite one.

Yeah, that was hard. That one's fire. Razor Ramone, too.

I was gonna say Razor Ramone. Razor Ramone. Yes. One of my— I like that one a lot. Sci High. I like Sci High. I like a lot of stuff that I hear from him. Sci's got the pen.

I know. He's, he's busy. He writes a lot, right, for, for other people. So, a lot of other— That's a busy busy guy. He's Bart.

Yeah. Nick Grant snapped on this project. This is my first time listening to Nick Grant. I think this was probably my favorite that dropped this week. Well, no, not probably. This is my favorite project that dropped this week. This Smile album I had on, I had on repeat, man. I was blasted in it. I just got some new speakers, too. So, I've been listening to a lot of dope [expletive] and I had to, I had to blast this on there like, on, um, Same Song, like that flow— introspective, get your heads high, like that [expletive], right?

Yeah.

Yeah, real rap rap rap rap rap rap rap rap rap rap rap rap rap rap rap rap rap rap rap rap rap rap. Really rapidity rap. Yeah.

Yeah, that's really cool. I also really like Backup featuring BJ the Chicago Kid as well. That one had a cool hook.

Yeah, to hear him. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I love that.

Uh, this was your favorite album of the week.

It was way up there for me. Mhm. I liked it a lot. Definitely going to keep my eye out on Nick Grant in the future.

This was also my first project from him. Okay. Yeah. Got my attention. I'm paying attention now. Nick Grant.

Yeah. Really? Really, really good pick. Really good pick.

Hell yeah.

So that's Nick Grant with Smile. And let's talk about Lord Scow with Elevator Music. Fully produced by Static Select. These beats are everything you'd expect them to be. The beats are smacking on this thing. Uh, my favorites were Northern Lights featuring Be Real and Smoke DZA, and then NWO featuring a lot of people— featuring Andre Lawrence, Life of Th, Rocky Ali, Kai Cash, and Marco Plus. Those are my two faves.

I— yeah, I'd add in Donnie Brasco and Wonder. I second that. I got to say also Wish Upon a Star.

Wish Upon a Star.

All right, so pretty, uh, diverse list. Pretty much the whole [expletive] album, like you were saying. Boom bap. Static Selector's beats are like— I love his melodic jazzy beats too, which you got a lot of this on there. Absole was on here. Um, this was Dave— sounded really good on this too. Like I actually really liked it.

No, I, I totally agree with what you're saying, man.

Yeah, I think sometimes you got to stick in your bag. Like Lord Scow did it on this project and this, like this is a perfect example of it. Even that Nick Grant project we just talked about too. Like it, he wasn't trying to— Yeah. And I don't know his style or anything like that, but just off that one album listen, you can tell he's all about his pen and he lets his pen carry the weight and, um, you know, just dope beat selection. It's not really trying to branch out and, ooh, I impress you guys. No, I'm dropping dope [expletive] and you guys are going to listen to it and [expletive] with it.

Amen. Yeah, listen to the Lord Scow joint. It does have this cool ass elevator music vibe to it. Like the name is perfect for it. I love it. I like the cover art, too. I, I don't usually like comment on cover arts, but it's just like, it's really catching my attention.

Yeah, nice. Really dope project.

Yeah. Shout out hip hop. They said it's dead, but it's alive and well.

It's alive and well. And it's being done by white boys in New York.

That's— Scow with Elevator Music.

God damn it. Someone's got to carry the torch.

Hold on. Let's see. So, I have a couple picks left. All right. Next, let's talk about Party of Two with America's Next Top Party extended cut. It's a deluxe of last year's America's Next Top Party. This is a duo previously known as Group Therapy. If you've heard of Group Therapy with TJ Online, but they have now rebranded as a duo with remaining members Jada Grace and Swim. Also slightly adding to the confusion, Swim used to go by Koi, but all three of them used to be childhood actors and I believe are still acting, which could have something to do with why TJ Online left the group. Uh, but I couldn't find any official reason why he left, but now they've rebranded as Party of Two, and this is their first full-length project. It's one of those new school style genre blending that we, we seeing more and more these days, and I love that. It's, it's like modern rap, but then you got EDM, 80s rap, R&B, trap, pop. There's some rock hooks. Just crazy versatile. You will not get bored with this album. Out of Body had this big rock chorus and then the verses break down into like a 2000s like Neptunes beat. It's just this crazy genre mashup to go between those two. And then Friendly Fire. Any hip-hop fan should check this out. The two of them are going back and forth dissing each other on their own song as a, as a duo in a friendly way. And it's really fun. It's super hip-hop and it's such a smart way to prove that they work as a duo because it shows that they have tons of chemistry. The production's crazy on it, too. It's just like this clean ass crispy drum break.

Y'all got me hyped on— like I got like three albums right now that I know the second we're done this podcast I'm, I'm putting on. Oh, I know these actors. Sorry, I was just checking the, the Party of Two actors. Okay. The, the one of the guys, the guy from, uh, Are We There Yet. Oh, he's got like acting credits in a lot of TV shows. Okay. Yeah, I think a couple of them were in like one of the, uh, like either Disney or some big, some like legit big shows. Well, I'm so glad to hear people from Disney doing [expletive] like this cuz Punk [expletive] is one of my favorite projects or songs that I've heard in a long time, I gotta say. Yeah, that is so fire. Poser, which I think a lot of people [expletive] with considering it's got [expletive] 30 million plays. That one's fire, too. But just like you said, Jacob, this whole project is really cool. They slip in and out of different kinds of genres, different, uh, like flows, different ideas. It was like a showcase. And I like when we're— we've been getting a couple of those kind of projects. So, I've been, I've been liking stuff like that. I don't know who's producing it, if it's them or someone else, but production is [expletive] really cool. I like it a lot.

Awesome. Yeah, that's Party of Two with America's Next Top Party extended cut. So, Matt, you want to talk about Kevin Gates with Lost Files, The Collection? I didn't get a chance to check this out, but tell us about it.

Yeah. So, I, I, um, whenever I see albums where it's like, you know, releases from the vault or the lost, you know, songs or whatever, I tend not to really click on them, or if I do, it's going to be like one day when I have time. Um, I saw that the first song had Zetti Will. I have loved Zetti Will this year. It's— I don't know if you would call it TikTok music, but he's, he's very good at putting together these catchy ass hooks that just do really well on, on TikTok. Uh, so I was like, I have to give this a listen. The thing with Kevin Gates is, Kevin Gates, he's always good. He's never bad. He doesn't have any garbage music. It's always consistently good. The guy can write hooks. The guy can, can write, you know, verses. The flow is always impeccable, but usually because of that, it's never really exciting for the most part, especially cuz he drops like an album or two a year, right? But this one, The Lost Files, really, I urge you guys to check it out. It was good. It's still Kevin Gates at the end of the day. It's, you know, but the production, I don't know why these songs were not released before. I don't know if maybe they're like deluxe version songs that didn't make it, but really each song sounds good. So, the standouts for me was a T-shirt with Zetti Will, which is the first song off the album. Everyday with Baby Bum, Guta 2 was another one. Other than that, honestly, it's, it's, it's 19 songs, so it's quite a bit, especially with everything else that came out. But I listened to it the entire thing and I, I didn't feel like it was too much Kevin Gates. This one I didn't get any Kevin fatigue. I'm gonna still go back and pick out more saves, but I'm sure over the next days I'm going to find a bunch more. That's the, the Kevin Gates magic.

Nice. He's got those hooks, man. They just they stay in your brain.

Yeah.

Excellent. That's Kevin Gates with Lost Files, The Collection. The last thing we're going to cover is Mazy and Wheez Gotti with Blood Spilled. Mazy is a Sacramento— rappers around me. Probably like the biggest dude to come out of Sacramento, like at least as far as numbers. It's a lot of just like West Coast bangers on here. Very gangster rap, very like murder lyrics. But the production quality was high on the whole project. And the standout tracks to me were Mud Thicker, had this super hype high synth that goes throughout the whole track. And Forever Up had some crazy production on it. So that one's worth checking out. Mazy and Wheez Gotti with Blood Spilled. And that's going to be all of our releases from this week. Let's get into plugs. For me, I mixed and mastered a song for a Snakeo, a talented young rapper out of Cincinnati that I work with often, as well as mixed and mastered a song for the artist that Matt manages, Lucius Thundercat. And y'all will get to hear that eventually at some point. And you can, uh, check us out everywhere at frequencyoverflow and you can, uh, hear our beats at frequencyoverflow.com. What do you got, Terry?

Drive Slow is a record that I just released. You can check out more music or check me out on my socials at Yo V on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, wherever there's social media.

All right. What you got, Gav?

Nice. I've just been working on cooking up some beats. Uh, trying to kind of go through all my stuff, get it all organized, figure out what's going where, but trying to stay busy with it. So, you can check me out everywhere though at prodbylunar.g.

Dope. Yeah. And you sent a pretty dope beat to the group chat that, uh, I was, I was saying, uh, you know, maybe Terry should get on that beat. So, we might have a little a lunar beat crossover going out here.

Yeah. You know, we'll see what happens.

But, uh, what do you got, Matt?

Uh, so you can follow me everywhere. Matt Kerier. Uh, follow my artist, Lucious P, Thundercat. Uh, what have I done this week? Um, basically most of the week that was not dedicated to catching up on music, I spent on, uh, listening to the mix that Jacob was making. Uh, I tend to spend hours and hours with songs on repeat to really like get everything.

Awesome. So releases coming up next week. We got Big Sad 1900 with Colored by Motion, Tay Young with Wild, Bladey with Sulfur Surfer, Black with Love is the New Gangster, Fake Mink with Terrified, and French Montana and Max B with Wavegods 2, Cosmo Brothers. Thank you listeners. Like and subscribe on YouTube. Rate us five stars on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. You can follow the podcast on Instagram, Friday to Friday Podcast. You can save the Friday to Friday Spotify playlist to follow along with what we're listening to throughout the week. It's what we use to listen to the weekly releases and you can too. You can find that link in the description. Our intro and outro music by Lunar G. Podcast edited by me, Jacob from Frequency Overflow. And please join us every week to stay in tune with hip-hop releases from Friday to Friday. Peace.

Peace.