You know who else knows something about a hiatus? Frank Ocean! On August 30th, we’re organizing Finding Frank, an interactive listening party for the 10th anniversary of Frank Ocean’s Blond! I’m really excited about this, and to be back with all of you. Just like with Stick Talk and Flying High, we’ll be going through the album track by track, and talking about our memories associated with the music. We’ll also be giving away a copy of Blond on vinyl!

I’m having a lot of fun with this rollout. I’ve set up a hotline that anyone can call to leave a message about Blond or Frank, and have been putting missing flyers up around New York City. If you see them in the wild anywhere, take a pic!

Here’s the hotline: 917-781-2595. Here’s a link to RSVP. I hope to see you there!

Between the I.C.E raids across the US, the wars on Palestine & Iran, and the ongoing conflicts created by Western interference in countries like Congo, Sudan, and Venezuela to name a few, it’s felt like the powers that be have been dedicating unfathomable amounts of time and resources to separate & destroy us. It feels right to shift our focus to unity instead, and so this month’s theme was “Heat Melts ICE,” celebrating musicians from around the world.

People shared contemporary folk from Iran, soul music from the Phillippines, R&B from Egypt, Peruvian jazz and so much more. We also were treated to some Vietnamese dessert baked by one of our members, Kathy Phuong of Mật & Butter. To top it off, we raised over $300 for the Immigrant Defense Project, an organization engaged in the fight against I.C.E, and dedicated to protecting immigrant rights.

It was a really special night, and I’m extremely grateful for this burgeoning community! Read on for a few selects from the night, and links to the playlist.

“Age Ye Rooz” by Faramarz Aslani | Recommended by Parnia

According to our member Parnia, Faramarz Aslani’s “Age Ye Rooz” is considered an Iranian classic. The title translates to “If one day,” and Aslani spends the song thinking about what he’ll do should his lover decide to leave him, but despite this the tone of the song is far from morose. The guitar playing is light and agile, and Aslani is pensive but upbeat. At a time when Iran’s future has been suddenly plunged into uncertainty, it felt good to revisit its past. Aslani passed from a battle with cancer back in 2024, but his music lives on. We stand with the people of Iran. Thanks, Parnia!

Representing: Iran

Genre: Persian contemporary folk

Best for those who like: “beautiful acoustic music”

“Till My Heartaches End” by Ella May Saison | Recommended by: JP

In the lead up to this song, JP gave an impassioned speech about his home country of the Philippines, and its long struggle with the after effects of colonization by Spain, the United States and Japan.

“This song represents the tears of my people.” He said, choking back tears of his own. “Music is all we have.”

Ella May Saison is lovingly referred to as the “Philippine Queen of Soul,” and as we, at JP’s request, closed our eyes and let the song wash over us, it was easy to see why. Thanks JP!

Representing: The Philippines

Genre: Soul Music

Best for those who like: “soul music and power vocals - Mariah Carey / Whitney Houston / Celine Dion”

“Lave Le A (Remix)” by Tonymix | Recommended by Joshua

“Lave Lé A,” is a song about washing yourself of the things you don’t have space for in your life; people, situation, police etc. It’s also a fkn banger, and according to Joshua, who is himself Haitian: “When this comes on in the function we [Haitians] go crazy.” This is actually a remix, and how Tonymix managed to cram four other artists on this while only adding two more seconds to the runtime is beyond me, but apparently that’s pretty typical of a Carribean remix track. I had never heard of the genre “Raboday,” before this, but I want more of it! Thank you, Joshua!

Representing: Haiti

Genre: Raboday

Best for those who like: “high energy Caribbean songs”

“Fire On The Mountain” by Asa | Recommended by: Fola

Aṣa is a French-Nigerian singer & songwriter. On “Fire On The Mountain” she expresses astonishment at the general population’s apathy toward the atrocities of the world. Lines about people buying up blood diamonds and ignoring crimes committed against children are powerful, especially when you check the upload date and realize the song is almost twenty years old. It’s a good reminder that many of the problems & conflicts we’re aware of today aren’t new, they’ve just been magnified. The fire was then and is now a raging blaze, but you no longer have to be in range to see the smoke, so don’t look away. Thank you Fola!

Representing: Nigeria

Genre: Afro-pop / R&B

Best for those who like: “soul food to the ears”

“Alone” by Ephraim | Recommended by Christopher

This one was a crowd pleaser, largely because of the music video, which was definitely made with Windows Movie Maker. But it wasn’t just the 4:3 aspect ratio and bad dance moves in front of a mirror that made Ephraim’s video feel like it could’ve been on TRL. Ephraim pays homage to the early 2000’s era of R&B sonically as well, showcasing clear influence from Craig David and Brandy. Sounds like the kind of R&B I would’ve heard on the radio as a kid. Wrote about that a while ago. Christopher, the member who recommended this, actually discovered Ephraim a few days before the meeting. Thanks Christopher!

Representing: Democratic Republic of the Congo

Genre: Early 2000’s RnB

If you like: Brandy, Imogen Heap, Craig David

“Gallo Pinto” by Daniela Andrade | Reccommended by Allan

“This one’s for my mami, this one’s for my dad / Gave up everything to give me what they couldn’t have.”

The video for “Gallo Pinto” opens with two immigrant parents, who have left behind all they hold dear to build a better life for themselves and their child. Tragically, this also means their child is away from them, outside of their grasp back in their home country. It’s an immigrant tale as old as time. The parents sow seeds in fields and sew pockets on pants, work derided by many as “unskilled labor,” but ultimately the labor that keeps our world moving.

Allan introduced his song by deconstructing the model minority myth, speaking on about how important it was that all immigrants, irregardless of their material, quantifiable contributions to the countries they move to, deserve dignity, safety, and a high quality life. “Gallo Pinto” was actually the last song of the night, and what a closer. Thank you, Allan!

Representing: Honduras, Canada-based

Genre: Pop

If you like: Joni Mitchell

I want to again thank everyone who came through, and give a special thanks once again to Estiee and the team at Vowels for believing in the vision, and allowing us to use their beautiful space. All photos by the wonderful Joshua Sim.

We can do so much more together than we can do independently, and that extends not only to finding great new music, but fighting for what’s right. New York just survived one of the worst winters in its modern history, and we did it together, clearing sidewalks and helping the vulnerable. But even as the ice melts and the temperatures soar away from being life-threatening, there are still many people for whom it is still not safe to venture outside. Donate to the Immigrant Defense Project here, and let’s continue to do our part to make New York safe for all its inhabitants.

If you weren’t able to make it, stay tuned for our next meeting! In the meantime, here are some links to the playlist. Thank you, and I’ll see you soon.

Apple Music | YouTube | Spotify

I’m Ebrima, and this has been Edited for Brevity.

While all genres of music are welcome at Hear Me Out, I’ve always wanted to make sure there was some unifying through-line, so our first meeting of the year has a theme, and a timely one at that. In the wake of I.C.E’s heightened activity across the US, it only felt right to spend our first meeting of the year celebrating immigrants, so this month’s theme is “Heat Melts ICE”. We’re asking attendees to bring songs from artists with roots outside of the US, and leaning further into collective action, we’re making this meeting a fundraiser too. The event is free to attend as always, but we’ll be collecting donations via a pay-what-you-wish model, with all proceeds going to the Immigrant Defense Project, an organization focused on keeping families together and ICE off of our streets. There will be light refreshments and drinks provided too.

Pull up to Vowels on March 4th, at 6PM. RSVP here! I hope to see you there!

I’m Ebrima, and this has been Edited for Brevity.

I was determined to make this a step-up from our first interactive listening party, Stick Talk, and I’m glad to say we succeeded. Here are a few improvements and special touches.

• It’s all about the story: We went even deeper on the process behind the album. In the lead up to the event, I had the pleasure of interviewing a source quite close to the album’s recording process, and was able to share some never-before-heard stories about the creation of the album. We also played a few track demos and some music videos.
  

• Details: Since this was a Travis Scott event, it was only right to have our microphone auto-tuned. Every person who came up to speak about a song. had the chance to introduce themselves and do their favorite Travis adlib in autotune. Stay tuned for some clips of this.
  

• Cover Story: We were joined by a special guest: creative director Chiki Uno came and spoke on his experience as the set designer for the album cover shoot, showing never before seen photos and sharing his story. We’ll be publishing a separate article soon covering that chat.

Before we get into stories from listeners, here’s some lead-in context.

Our source, a recording engineer on this project, received a call out of the blue one night. A past client had been searching for them, and had another job. An address was provided over the phone, and further detail was promised upon arrival. Imagine our source’s surprise when the address revealed itself to be a mansion nestled in the hills. It turned out that Travis Scott, who’d asked for the engineer personally, had been working on his debut album, Rodeo, and was assembling a superteam to bring it to life.

The mansion—which used to belong to the singer Seal and has actually now burned down—was one of two bases of operation, the other being a different mansion nestled in a canyon. Producers Metro Boomin, Southside, FKi 1st, Sonny Digital and Allen Ritter were mainstays, and other collaborators flitted in and out, recording verses and lending ears. On this particular night, Chief Keef happened to stop by, and the song “Nightcrawler” was recorded. This was the first of many near daily recording sessions for months on end, with our source often clocking twelve hour shifts.

Okay, with that out of the way, let’s get into it. The entries below are thoughts shared by our attendees, but this time, I’ll be chiming in with context and stories from my research. Enjoy.

Track 9: “Antidote”
Name: Nigil, 28 | Favorite Travis Adlib: “Straight Up!”

“I was a sophomore in college. I remember this album dropping and going to [marching] band practice. Someone took the aux cord, and they were blasting [Antidote] and it just stuck in my head. We ended up marching it and playing it in one of our field shows. I was a bass player, and I actually arranged it.

When we marched to it, [during] the breakdown before he started rapping fast, that was our point where we could cut loose and just have fun. Then he starts rapping and I’m dialed back in. *Minus the [part about] kicking the cameraman off the stage. But it’s a really really, really fun record for me. He’s a misfit, and as someone that felt like a misfit throughout their entire life, I just really resonated with that in this album.”

*Editor’s Note: There’s been speculation for a decade as to what the “Antidote” actually is, and in my research I was able to get the real answer. I polled the crowd during the event, and everyone agreed Travis had to be talking about letting weed smoke out of a hot-boxed car. But the truth is actually a lot funnier.

As I mentioned earlier, the album was recorded between two mansions; Seal’s old mansion in the hills, and another mansion nestled in a canyon. According to the engineer we spoke to, the latter mansion’s studio had a window that faced directly into the canyon, and occasionally, someone would forget to close it. This meant that when Travis made or previewed his songs—often at deafening levels—the music was sent reverberating through the canyon, disturbing the neighbors.

Within this context let’s look at the last line of the first verse:

“Who that at the front door? Is that the feds, oh no no, no.” This is still referencing the police at the door, but not in response to weed smoke. They were responding to noise complaints filed by disgruntled neighbors. Then we plunge into the chorus, which is also the first line of the song and it all makes sense:

“So don’t you open up that window, don’t you let out that antidote.” This song is just a reminder to his buddies to close the damn studio window. This song could’ve been a post-it note on the studio door, but he decided to put it in a song LOL.

The antidote was the music all along. Who knew? Now you do.

Track 2: “Oh My / Dis Side (feat. Quavo)”
Name: Q, 28 | Favorite Travis Adlib: “Straight Up!”

“I’m from Atlanta, and [at the time] YRN (the third mixtape from the Migos) had just been like the biggest album in all the high schools. Quavo was the adlib guy, melodies, and Takeoff and Offset were more lyrical. *Being from Atlanta, [it was special] to hear the famous Quavo adlibs on a more commercial project.

“[When I listen to this song,] I can see two sides of my being. You throw in Travis, [who] has an embodiment of a suburban kid, and [while] I can’t resonate with Quavo like that, I am from Atlanta. They just went back to back, shot for shot, and the hype continues to build. It’s just multilayered.”

*Editor’s Note: Firstly, can you believe there was an earlier version of this song without Quavo? Crazy. Secondly: I wanted to give a little shine to River Tiber, a singer-songwriter and producer from Toronto, whose background vocals are on the “Dis Side” portion of the track. He was all over hip-hop in the mid-2010’s, but just in the background. His song “West,” featuring Daniel Caesar is the backbone of “Broken Clocks” by SZA, his song “No Talk” is sampled on “No Tellin’” by Drake, and more recently, his song “Hypnotized” was sampled on “Savior” by Kendrick Lamar. He’s an incredible artists in his own right, so please check him out!

Track 10: “Impossible”
Name: John, 28 | Favorite Travis Adlib: “Let’s Go!”

“Impossible to me was the standout immediately, for one big reason. Man, I was what, 15? 16? At the time, me and the old lady was going through some things.”

At this point our DJ, Mac, chimes in:

“I don’t know if I heard you right. You said an old lady? Or your old lady?

John: “Nahhh, like, you know, my lil shorty.”

*Crowd laughs*

John: “It was rough times. I think this song also stands out because it’s one of the more emotional songs. Apart from “Drugs You Should Try It,” I don’t think Travis really tapped into that bag like that.

“On the song Travis is alluding to a relationship that seems toxic, and the reality of it is that everyone in this room can relate to being in a situation [like that] and thinking: ‘Man, what if we could just rewind it all?’

“I think the sound—trance-like, theatrical—meshes well with the theme of the song, and just the idea that Travis at this point in his life is trying to have it all.”

*Editor’s Note: This song was finished at the end of a long night of recording, and Travis was just tired and wanted to go to sleep. Travis’ drawling delivery on the track is what makes this one a standout, but it wasn’t really an artistic choice; bro was just drowsy.

Track 11: “Maria I’m Drunk (feat. Young Thug and Justin Bieber)”
Name: Nkosi, 28 | Favorite Travis Adlib: “OoOoOoOoh”

“What starts out as a hazy, Kid Cudi inspired modern ballad about the common feelings one might get when finally touching the tarmac and L.A. quickly turns into a bop with the vibe creator at that time, producer Travis Scott, featuring peak Young Thug and the Black Man we call Justin Bieber. Focused on basically the mentality that goes into the drunk homie that’s like: ‘What’s the next spot we hitting?’ Even though it’s 3AM.”

[That’s] a summary I wrote for the song in my mind. This song just embodies fun. At the time, I’m 18. I can’t get into clubs. We had this older friend named Carol who would tell us about these parties they would do at 1Oak, and I was like, “Damn, whoopty-doo! I wish that I was able to go.” So I just went to concerts, and that came to life for me. It was this amazing vibe. I feel like at [that] point I was that person like: “Alright, what’s the next spot we’re hitting, because I don’t want to go home. I want to have fun.”

*Editor’s Note: This song was recorded at Seal’s mansion, and originally only featured Thug and Travis. But after the song leaked, Justin Bieber called Travis, and asked to get on it. Upon release, this song was an iTunes exclusive, as an attempt to get Beliebers to buy the album to hear his verse.

Track 7: “Nightcrawler”
Name: Juan, 28 | Favorite Travis Adlib: “La Flame!”

“I was part of “Travis Scott Twitter.” That was like the Days Before Rodeo era, and they used to make fun of us like: “People who listen to Travis Scott wear Vans and be in one corner at the party headass.” But by the time Rodeo came out, people were definitely more into bro. I was probably with my friends somewhere getting high when it dropped. I can’t remember; the weed was great in 2015.

“I’m a big, big Chief Keef fan. I was there when nobody wanted to listen to him, at the moment he was blackballed and damn near underground. I thought it was a really good look for Travis to bring him kind of back into the light, because you had a be a real fan of drill [to be listening to him] at that point. He was drill, and Travis was damn near a pioneer for the sound of mosh-pit music at the time. *Listening to it ten years later, it really did last the test of time.”

*Editor’s Note: This is my favorite song on the album! This was also the first song that the engineer recorded with the team. Apparently, there was an intern there that day that didn’t know what they were doing, leading our source to have to take the reins and get things going. I believe Swae Lee’s parts were recorded separately.

Track 6: “Pray For Love”
Name: Janiel, 28 | Favorite Travis Adlib: Vocals on “Oh My / Dis Side”

“At this time (2015) I was a big Weeknd hater. I thought that nigga was cornyyyyy! Like an over-sexualized Mickey Mouse. And at the time, my best friend was this Canadian girl, and I would just laugh at her slang. She’d be like ‘two twoos, bro!’ So I kinda fake-adopted the personality out of hate. Sheer sinister malice. And now I love the nigga.

“Part of the reason [I like this song] is because when I listened to it, I thought [The Weeknd] was saying “Selah” in the chorus. He was saying “say it loud,” but “Selah” could work because it’s a biblical term that’s often at the end of scriptures in Psalms, which is the book of songs. So when I listen to “Pray for Love” I’m thinking about that idea of spirituality and music, and how, by finishing it with Selah, this incidentally is a prayer, whether he knew it or not. I think all music is spiritual, but I also went to Bible camp, so there’s a correlation there, I think.”

*Editor’s Note: This song began its life as a Weeknd song. It ultimately ended up on this album, but some of the ideas from the Weeknd’s demo ended up making the cut on fan favorite “King of The Fall.” Subscribe to Janiel’s excellent (and equally hilarious) Substack here!

Thank you all for another successful event, and for making this such a great year. You’ll probably get a reflective new year’s thank-you email at some point, or maybe not. But either way, I hope you know how grateful I am to every single one of you!

I’m Ebrima, and this has been Edited for Brevity.

It’s hard to imagine a time that Travis Scott wasn’t a juggernaut in every sense of the word; a living, breathing IPO. We know him as a musician, our parents maybe know him as Kylie Jenner’s baby dad, and my nephew knows him as “Fortnite man.” People are requesting “FE!N” at Beabadoobee concerts. Don’t know who that is? Exactly.

While he’s today reached unfathomable heights of celebrity, fame and riches, Rodeo features Scott pre-apotheosis, as an alien from a planet “nine light years away, just outside of the Kepler Solar System” who’s crash-landed on Earth, armed with nothing but a burning desire to “rebel against the system” and bend this world to his will. Travis Scott has little left to conquer in 2025, and it shows in the recent music. But one only need revisit Rodeo to remember the hunger he once possessed, and the wizardry it brought out of him at the time.

So, we’re back! Excited to announce that on December 14th, we’ll be throwing Flying High, an interactive listening party celebrating Travis Scott’s debut album Rodeo. Like last time, we’ll be listening to the album in full, but I’ll be inviting audience members to come onstage to share their thoughts / stories / memories associated with the songs throughout the experience.

If you love Travis Scott and Rodeo, come through and chat about it with other people. Never heard it? Come find out why people love it—and La Flame—so much. The hope is by the end of the night, you will not only have revisited a classic album, but you'll walk away with a new perspective. This is our last event of the year, so don’t miss it!

​​Join us at telos.haus on Sunday, December 14th at 4PM. Unfortunately, we will not be playing FEIN—sorry wrong album—but it will be fun, I promise you. Tickets are $5 and come with food and drink, as well as an entry to win a copy of Rodeo on vinyl! RSVP here!

See you soon.

I’m Ebrima, and this has been Edited for Brevity.

The idea was born a few months ago, when I was gifted a record player for my birthday, and as such began to shop for records. While browsing in a record store one day, I overheard a song I really liked and did what anyone would do. I looked around to make sure no one was watching, retreated into the back of the store, and took my phone out to Shazam it. Nothing popped up. Confused, I walked to a different part of the store to stand directly below a speaker, and fired up Shazam again. Still nothing. That was new.

I made my way to the counter, and asked the person working what song it was. They turned around for a second, and when they swiveled back around they were clutching a record jacket. The album was called DBA: Success by one Kenneth Jenkins. I took a photo of it, thanked them, and left the store.

At home, I searched far and wide for the album in the typical places; Spotify, Apple Music and TIDAL all came up empty. I finally found it on YouTube, where someone—a channel called Tito’s Red Hot Rips—had recorded the album directly from the record player, and uploaded it. The song I had heard in the store was called “Brighter Day.” As I listened through, thoroughly enjoying each song more than the next, it occurred to me that I should buy this album. Taking another look at the picture I’d taken, and seeing that my birthday was printed on the “For Sale” tag, made it seem ever more meant to be.

But when I returned to the store, the person working—their name was Nai—had some bad news.

“Ahhh. That thing? I actually liked a lot too, and took it back home to listen to it. But when I bring it back, I’ll set it aside for you to buy.”

Seemed simple enough. Not.

For the next month or so, I returned to the store at least once a week, leaving empty-handed every time. Nai either wasn’t there, or had forgotten to bring it back. It just made me want the thing even more, and each rejection sent me down the road to learn more about this record, and about this sort of music.

By the time I finally bought the record a few weeks later, I’d fallen utterly in love with jazz-funk. I’d gone down a rabbit hole and found a bunch of other artists who made similar music, like James Mason, Charles Earland and Johnny Hammond. I had become particularly obsessed with the Mizell Brothers, a production duo that was responsible for many of the genres standouts, including a handful of Donald Byrd and Bobbi Humphrey records. One of my favorite pickups was Byrd’s Places and Spaces, which is now actually one of my favorite albums of all time.

I’d have never fallen in love with an entire sub-genre if I only depended on the algos, and hadn’t had to deal with the friction that only interacting with another human being could produce. This entire experience reminded me of the power of a good detour, and I wanted to create a music discovery experience that would facilitate them. Here are some of the roads that our members led us down. Scroll to the bottom for links to the full playlist, and watch out for the next meeting.

“Feel Love” by Róis

Recommended by: Van

Genre: Electronic

Best for those who like: “Jockstrap, Miss Grit, Saya Grey”

“The Party” by Portraits of Tracy

Recommended by: Zahra

Genre: Alt-Pop

Best for those who like: “Shay Lia, Cults”

“Chick Magnet” by MahZe

Recommended by: Skylar

Genre: Hip-Hop

Best for those who like: “JPEGMAFIA or anyone who raps
over rock music”

“Strange Attractor” by Ivy Lab

Recommended by: Ragel

Genre: house? garage? dnb? electronic

Best for those who like: “Daft Punk”

“Volver Amar” by JUZU

Recommended by: Juan (aka JUZU)

Genre: Latin Pop

Best for those who like: “Cuco, Los Retros”

I want to thank everyone who came through, and give a special thanks to Estiee and the team at Vowels for believing in the vision, and allowing us to use their beautiful space. A special thanks goes out to our hero Leona who, in the face of a potentially devastating technical difficulty, volunteered to manually queue up each track for the entire night. All photos by the wonderful Sophie Ming.

If you weren’t able to make it, stay tuned for our next meeting! In the meantime, here are some links to the playlist.

Apple Music | YouTube | Spotify

I’m Ebrima, and this has been Edited for Brevity.

Algorithms are fine when looking for things we’ll like, but we still venture out into the real world to discover things to love. We line up outside new restaurants and coffee shops to try new foods, and clear our evenings to go to movie premieres. We go to mixers, try speed dating and join run clubs to find romance. We travel to new places where few look like us and fewer can understand us, to find new parts of ourselves. We do these things while assuming the risk of failure, challenge and disappointment, because deep down we know that the things we love will not come find us; that true discovery, and growth comes when we’re active participants, and not passengers in our discovery. Why shouldn’t music discovery be the same?

We often laud our algorithms for guessing right about us and what we’ll like, but what we don’t realize is that the algorithms we’ve “built brick by brick” have walled us into a comfort zone. In the interest of keeping our scrolls endless, our algorithms will please, but never surprise or challenge us. We know that true discovery is a journey. How do we wrest the reins from the algorithms, reclaiming the joy that only a detour can bring?

This is a longwinded way to say that it’s time to take music discovery back from the bots. So I’m starting Hear Me Out, an irl music discovery club that facilitates being challenged, being surprised. I’m asking each participant to pull up with a single song to share. It can be any genre, but it has to be by someone you think more people need to know about, whether they’re on some kind of come up, or were overlooked by history. We’ll experience all this music together, and talk about it. No guarantees you’ll hear something you like, but you will definitely leave challenged, and maybe even surprised once or twice.

Come through to Vowels (76 Bowery) this Thursday, November 6th for the first meeting! As per usual, it’s completely free, just bring yourself, some music to share, and an open mind!

RSVP here! I hope to see you there!

I’m Ebrima, and this has been Edited for Brevity.

Anyway, I first got the idea to throw a listening party for DS2 back in June. My work laptop had decided to spontaneously combust, and so I was left with nothing but my notebook for a few hours. As as I sat in the operating room (the Apple Store) the idea hit me. I could have people come through and talk about the album. I could have food items named after the songs.

Once I wrote the words “Stick Talk” in my notebook, that was it, I knew that I had to make it happen, and two months later, on August 10th, we did it. I threw a glorified birthday party for one of my favorite albums. We got together, sang along, ate cake, and said nice things about it. It was so much fun.

My friend Zahra, and the founder of the micro-bakery Black Zaffron created a one of one, Dirty Sprite Cheesecake, that included real lemon-lime soda in the batter—we used 7-Up in place of Sprite because we don’t rock with Coca-Cola; free Palestine—and was marbled to evoke the appearance of the album art. As we played the album front to back, friends old and new came up and talked to me about the music, sharing not only their thoughts, but stories from their lives, and the the role this music had played in them.

I thought about starting with a long intro about the importance of the album to hip-hop at large, explaining the role that it played in Future’s career and all that good stuff, but that’s well tread ground. Instead, I wanna tell you some of what my friends told me. Enjoy.

Track 18: “Fuck Up Some Commas” | Janiel, 28

First off, I was raised by two Capricorns. This is important because these niggas ‘bout they money. Ever since I was a kid, I remember prepping for school and ironing my money so that it would go into my pocket folded properly. My dad was a Future ass nigga. He still is. My mom is like the sweetest person ever, she’s in the church all the time—it’s literally angels and demons, but they both bout they money.

When this dropped, I was 17, interning at a tech company that I ended up being at for ten years after that. So my whole mind was “get money,” and I was like, “I need an anthem.” I never really cared as much as my parents did, but I wanted autonomy. My mom’s super religious, I’m a masc lesbian, I wanted to be outside but not have to be tied to the scrutiny, the shame—she loves me, but you know what I mean. I wanted my money. So this became this anthem for me.

I have not lived the Future life, but because of my father I’ve seen enough people. I used to joke as a kid I would never do no bad shit because I can’t go to jail. I got eczema. They gon’ put fuckin ointment on my commissary? I can’t go to jail. I’m too conditioned to comfort, so I have to be in the mindset of some sort of money at all times. I saw it as empowerment, and yes, this guy (Future) is terrible at times, but I see why you’re allowed to be.

I have a [two year old] niece now. When she first came out like three months old, I played the whole album for her like, “Do you know the world you’ve entered?” I had to set the tone, shit is crazy out here. So I have now generational ties to this fucking album.

Editor’s Note: Subscribe to Janiel’s excellent (and equally hilarious) Substack here!

Track 2: “I Serve The Base” | Shak, 31

So we're gonna go back to February 12th, 2016, and I had moved to New York in December of 2015. I was living in a house in Bushwick with like eight roommates, as one does. One of my roommates was a photographer, and we decided to do an art show together. We did the art show, and then later that night was a Ghetto Gothic Party.

The lineup was like Venus X, LSDXOXO, Total Freedom, and some other folks I don’t remember the names of, but we walk in and…I will never forget it in my life—and I’m a certified loud music enjoyer—they were playing “I Serve The Base” on the loudest speakers I have ever heard in my life up until that point. I genuinely can tell you, that was the loudest thing I had ever heard in my life. I’ll truly never forget it. That bass was shaking my soul free. It was outrageous.

“I Serve The Base” on a sound system like that was actually life changing. I’ve been chasing that high ever since in terms of hearing music that loud. And it was an amazing party, all kinds of crazy shit, Dev Hynes (Blood Orange) and Father were there walking around. And again, I’d just moved to New York, so that night I was like: “Yeah, this is the greatest city ever, anywhere. I’m never leaving. I’m going to be here my whole life.”

Track 10: “Blow A Bag” | Kaya, 31

I first came into contact with Future when I was in high school. 2011, 2012 era. On the weekends, me and my friends were partying and doing all kinds of stuff we had no business doing. Gucci Mane, Future, that’s what the boys were listening to. Future felt like a peer to Gucci, but lighter—the ladies could get into him. Gucci was a little harsh sometimes; you’re just like: “I can’t shake no ass [to this], we just gotta stand here while the men have their little moment.”

I went to [Spelman] college in Atlanta, so that was like being at school while some of this music was coming out. Funny enough, there was a girl in my class who at the time was dating Metro Boomin’, because he went to Morehouse for a bit. So we kind of had this connection to the people making the music. If you know anything about Spelman and Morehouse, that area is in the hood. We would go party on Parsons, and it was nothing but trap houses. It was interesting to see the dichotomy of it all: seeing the music in the “real” Atlanta, and then on campus and seeing the fraternities stroll to these songs.

This album really puts me back in college and being in Atlanta. It was very important for the culture at the time, and it gave people a very important outlet and entry point into Atlanta and [the strip club] Magic City—it looks so small in person. It’s across the street from a Greyhound stop. It’s really in the cut, but the wings are amazing so everyone should go!

Track 4: “Groupies” | Samir, 27

So, I heard this song not when it came out, but in 2017. I’m in college, I’m like 20, I’m out with my friends. I was kind of going through it with a partner at the time, [so I was] that one friend in the corner not having a good time. They started playing this song to make me feel better. Imagine, it keeps repeating: “Now I’m back fucking my groupies!” Everybody’s like jumping on me, and eventually I got into it. I was telling ‘em like: “I don’t got no groupies right now. I thought I was seeing somebody.”

Future was with Ciara previously, and when this album came out they were separated. So that’s the value of that hook, like: “I was there then, I’m somewhere else right now,” and you can hear it ooze through his lyrics. All the ego, and vanity, and all of his flexing. “You deserve Rollies and AP’s and all that!” And I didn’t..I don’t—I’m not giving people AP’s but I’ve still got something for you, you know? There’s a lot of problems with that song, of course, but we’ve all been there.

That was the era of time where I needed that: for my ego, for my self esteem. It’s hard to say this, but I feel like Future can be a face of male empowerment in some way, at least in bigging up your own ego, like yeah, “you’re that nigga,” even if you’re not doing what he’s doing, you can relate to it.

Track 14: “Trap Niggas” | Sanoyha, 21

I got into Future through my older brother [during the] transition period from eighth grade into freshman year of high school. He used to drive me around in the car just bumping Future. It’s one of my favorite songs, I think he should have won a Pulitzer Prize for this. Just saying, like “God bless all the trap niggas,” am I wrong? Actually, God needs to bless me because I lost my trap phone. It’s kind of sad.

Editor’s note: If you find an iPhone 11 in a Hello Kitty phone case, please alert the publication!

Track 16: “Real Sisters” | Nigil, 28

I grew up in Atlanta, so I’ve seen Future’s evolution through the years. When this came out, I was going into my sophomore year of college [at Hampton University] and I was in the marching band. Students would submit music that we would like to play for the upcoming year, and one of the songs that dropped that summer that was huge was “Real Sisters.” One of the students arranged it, and we played it throughout [the year.] I remember because I played the tuba, so I remember the bass.

Future actually came to Hampton to perform. He did a majority of the songs from What A Time To Be Alive, but I remember when he did [“Real Sisters”], the reaction that I saw. I look around—it’s just hella beautiful women around. All the AKA’s was strolling to it, all the greeks—it was just a different type of mode. And at the time, I was also talking to this girl, and ironically, her older sister had a crush on me. So I was like “Oh, okay so everything comes full circle.”

It was just everywhere. It was everywhere in the club, I went to Magic City, I heard this shit. I couldn’t escape it.

Track 12: “Rich Sex” | Joe, 29

I do have to preface that I am a recovering Future hater. It wasn’t my cup of tea back in the day, but it’s hard to hate the man when he made this. I’m a huge R&B person, so when I did listen to rap around that time, I was listening to Chief Keef; real YN shit. Future was cool, it was trap, but it wasn’t enough guns, you know what I’m saying? I don’t know, Finally Rich was just like—“Love Sosa?” I love Sosa.

My favorite Future songs weren’t everyone’s favorite Future songs, you know? I loved “Loveee Song” with Rihanna—it was more like any time he did something more melodic was what I really loved. I didn’t care for the rapping as much. But then, I heard Dirty Sprite 2, and specifically, “Rich Sex.”

My homies were Future lovers, like “you gotta listen to this” and I’m like: “Dude, I really don’t want to.” They would turn on Future, I would leave the room. But then listening through the whole album—“Wow, this is amazing.” “Rich Sex” specifically, probably the best beat I’ve heard in all my years. I feel like what Future does great—it’s not really about the subject matter completely, it’s about the way he kind of is on top of the beat; not exactly what he’s saying, but how he’s saying it. His voice is almost an instrument in the way he uses it.

Track 5: “Lil One” | Destiny, 23

“In the beginning [of the album] he’s talking about fucking bitches and getting money, right? But here, now he’s like: “and don’t make me send my niggas after you, either.” I feel like Future just has a way; you kind of just start to embody whatever that song says to the highest degree, right? So you be [listening to this while] getting ready for work, and you’re like “Damn, and don’t let me send my niggas after you either!” And you’re like sitting in HR but you’re like: “Yeah!”

He gets in a different pocket in the second verse that kind of just re-amps you up to the second level. I’ve never held a gun, I’ve never sold drugs but…“the AR and Tec, that’s a real ménage?” Like, bitch?! There’s just a certain thing that just activates something evil inside you, and that’s really why I love him. Throughout all of the albums he’s released, he has never lost that feeling of like “I’m that nigga,” you know? And that’s why I love him.

I want to thank everyone who came through, and if you weren’t able to make it, stay tuned, I’ve got a lot of new, exciting things that’ll be making it out of the notebook very soon.

I’m Ebrima, and this has been Edited for Brevity.

I’m hyped to announce our next live event—Stick Talk: an interactive listening party and celebration for the tenth anniversary of DS2. We’ll be listening to the album in full, but I’ll be inviting friends, music journalists and audience members to come onstage to share their thoughts / stories / memories associated with the songs throughout the experience. If you wanna be one of those people, lmk in the form, or just email / dm us!

If you love Future and DS2, come through and chat about it with other people. Never heard it? Come find out why people love it—and our toxic king—so much. The hope is by the end of the night, you will not only have revisited a classic album, but you'll walk away with a new perspective. Me personally, I’m just excited to listen to “I Serve The Bass” at deafening levels.

​​Join us at telos.haus on Sunday, August 10th at 4PM. Unfortunately, we will not be serving lean, but there will be fun bites and drinks. The event is free to attend! RSVP here!

I really hope to see you there, it’s gonna be sensational. Bring a plus one and don’t forget your double cups.

I’m Ebrima, and this has been Edited for Brevity.

Back then, the closest I got to any kind of really regular worship was when I was eight, but instead of logging hours at the mosque, I was worshipping at the altar of a TV programming block. Service was on Saturday nights, and my brother and I would take our places in front of the TV at 7:50. When 8:00pm struck, we’d rejoice at the sight of Tom, the robot host and pastor of Church Toonami. After some short introductory remarks from him, we’d sing along to our favorite hymn—the theme song—and then the guy I’d been waiting to see all night would show up.

A man of few words, his sermons were often short, but I was enraptured by his delivery. When he spoke, his jet black bangs often swayed gently in the breeze, as if the wind itself rushed to hear his words; words I didn’t always understand, but I knew sounded cool. He had the most amazing outfits, and sometimes he even performed miracles, like breathing fire and walking on water.

His name was Sasuke Uchiha, a character from the anime Naruto, and he was the first aura farmer I ever encountered.

If somehow you’re still confused at what the hell “aura farming” is, it was called “being cool” like a year ago. “Aura” is a currency—doing something considered lame leads to an “aura loss”, while doing something cool leads to “aura gain.” Within this context, “aura farming” is going out of your way to look or be perceived as cool, while simultaneously coming off as nonchalant. Let’s take the first aura farmer in recorded history as an example—Jesus Christ.

Everyone from the believers to the baddies could be counted as fans of Jesus in his prime, and he achieved this status purely off the strength of kindness and unparalleled feats of wonder. Think about it. If you met a guy who could heal your blindness, bring your dead homies back, and turn water into wine, I think you’d be a follower too. Jesus literally was killed because he had too much aura. Then, in a final act of aura farming from beyond the grave, he clambered out of it, but not before waiting three days for suspense. If it sounds familiar, it’s because the anime Yu Yu Hakusho starts the same way.

There is a long history of aura farming in anime. A recent example is the character Sung Jin Woo from Solo Leveling, but if we look back, we’ve got Piccolo from Dragon Ball Z, or Killua from Hunter X Hunter. These are all characters known for being stoic and cool, yet often unnecessarily flashy. But there’s nothing like your first, and for me, that was Sasuke.

Yeah, the show was called Naruto, but it was immediately apparent that Sasuke was that guy. He showcased mastery of all the ninja arts, and always had the highest test scores. Plus, his fits were always immaculate. Before I even knew what “that shit” was, I knew that Sasuke had it on. He was giving his opps the work in a romper decades before they were a Coachella trend; blowing fireballs and summoning lightning with arm warmers on. He disappears at the end of Naruto in search of power, and returns in the sequel Naruto Shippuden with easily the best re-design. The funny part is that in a show largely comprised of fights, Sasuke’s reputation comes not from his victories, but from how cool he looked and sounded, even when he lost. And he lost a lot.

As a fellow anti-hero, fashionista and deadbeat dad, Playboi Carti has a lot in common with Sasuke. They’re both beloved characters that entire generations have cast themselves onto, paragons of nonchalance. Just for fun, I actually briefly considered making this aura farming piece about Playboi Carti and Jesus, but landed on Sasuke since JC washes Carti a little too easily. All they have in common is being tall dreadheads.

Aside from his music, Carti has become quite popular for the way he presents, but it isn’t limited to the way he dresses, or even his physical appearance. His fans seem really obsessed with the way he kind of just…exists? The make Reddit posts about the way he stands. The way he laughs. Even when he does something that would normally be embarrassing like falling on stage, there’s someone in the comments saying “the way he fell was “tuff.” It’s one of the funniest, most beguiling phenomena I’ve encountered in a long time, but it makes for an interesting case study on what today’s consumers do when you stop giving them the usual tools—like music—to understand you.

It used to be pretty normal that you wouldn’t hear much from an artist in between albums, but in today’s day and age where the biggest media fixtures stream their lives 24/7, it feels like a conscious choice to limit the access people have to you. You aren’t taking a beat, you’re being “mYstEriOus,” and your fans will find their own ways to remain tethered to you.

It wasn’t always this way with Carti. He had never been the most outspoken person, but something seemed to change after the release of Whole Lotta Red back in 2020. He stopped posting to social media and started declining interviews. He stopped putting out music; stopped speaking much at all. His performances, already pretty lyrically sparse, devolved into full on screaming. Not screaming lyrics. Just screaming. And Carti’s fans gorged on the crumbs he dropped, whether that meant a fit pic, a shadowy appearance on a live stream, or a loose verse here and there. By the time he released his album MUSIC this past March, he had amassed a legion of diehard fans who had never really heard him speak. It’s wild.

Carti was far from the first artist in modern hip-hop to go on an extended hiatus, but few have been able to do so while aura farming as successfully. Between the fits, film and occasional guest verses and songs that he drops, we see too much of A$AP Rocky for him to effectively accumulate aura. Frank Ocean gets a little closer. His fans are more rabid, and with his last track having been in 2020, he’s been technically inactive for about the same time as Carti. His problem is that he has time and time again demonstrated his awareness of this dynamic by exploiting it. Not very nonchalant to bait your audience with a song snippet or a photo, only to follow up with a link to your latest vinyl drop or diamond encrusted cock ring.

What made Carti an especially effective aura farmer over the last four years was knowing how to give his fans just the right amount and variety of nothing. You have to give people never more than a glance of you, to blind them with a glint from your custom iced out lollipop as you stroll from the club into your hulking black SUV, so they have no option but to imagine what they’ve seen, and what they fill the gaps with will always be infinitely more interesting than reality. You have to allow people to draw their own conclusions, but if you wait too long, you’ll eventually be unable to compete with the version of you they create in their heads.

Going back to Naruto, we eventually learn that Sasuke is the way he is, stoic and standoffish, because of an extremely traumatic childhood incident. Everyone he loved was killed, so he avoids getting close to others, lest they become new people to lose. His path of revenge eventually leads him to near insanity, culminating in a death match with his best friend, which ends with Naruto knocking some sense into him. He never quite loses his cool veneer, but he eventually lets his walls down a little, becoming a parent himself, and ending the generational curse of hatred.

The end of Carti’s “mysterious” era was a lot less dramatic. Immediately following the release of MUSIC back in March, Carti performed at Rolling Loud California. His high octane, career spanning set was a momentous occasion for obvious reasons, but the most interesting thing happened in between the songs. He actually addressed the crowd. Smiled. Laughed. It was the most anyone had seen him speak, or emote in four years, and this increased visibility has continued. He’s back to doing interviews, and has a spam page on IG now. He seems happier, and so do his fans. Again, aura is a currency, and Carti cashed out on it big time.

Nowadays, with everything happening in the world, it honestly feels like God is playing hooky again, so we’re back to quasi-beefing. Many people I love and many I will never meet are at risk of / are currently suffering like never before. When I was younger, and it felt like God stopped listening to us, community always saved me without fail, and it is once again true in times like these. We all have to look out for each other. Go to marches, donate when you can, check on your loved ones, and stand up for your community.

But who knows? Islam does say Jesus is supposed to come back following the arrival of the anti-christ, and Netanyahu b e e n rockin’. Maybe all I need is to see a clip of JC at Rockaway Beach, hitting the griddy on the waves, and I might be back on board. I can see myself now, opening the comments, and typing.

“Bro is really Him!”

Send.

Six Disc

It’s been a while since I did one of these lmao. These usually aren’t particularly new songs—check out the homie Rhapsody’s New Music Friday roundup for the latest and greatest!—but what I just happen to be spinning a lot recently. Check out the songs below, & follow the Six Disc playlist on Apple Music & Spotify to get it all in one place!

Playboi Carti—FOMDJ

This week’s highlight! Not only is this one of my favorite Carti songs from this era, but it’s a fun look into his aura farming antics. What reason do you have to be rapping from a moving vehicle, bra?

Leon Thomas—Party Favors (feat. Big Sean)

I was regrettably late to the Leon Thomas train. I’ve known of him for years, but when MUTT released last year, I slept. Train came back around, and I got my tickets right in time to catch HEEL, the deluxe version of MUTT from last year. This is one of my favorites. Incredible beat, and a smoking guest verse from Big Sean.

Favorite moment: 1:50. I love when rappers have little sonic signatures. Not ad-libs, but sounds effects that they take with them even on features. Big Sean has this laser sound effect he sometimes adds at the end of his lines, and I just love the way it drives a line home.

Erykah Badu—The Cell

On Juneteenth, Erykah Badu held a concert in her hometown of Dallas, and I had the pleasure of attending & helping put it on. Running through her discography again, I was astonished at how well New Amerykah Pt 1 has aged, both from a content standpoint and sonically. I love how urgent this song sounds. Also, this song marks one of Thundercat’s earliest appearances. That’s him on bass!

Ray Vaughn—East Chatt (feat. Isaiah Rashad)

Ray Vaughn dropped off his TDE debut earlier this year with The Good, The Bad, The Dollar Menu and man, what an incredibly promising project. He really strikes the balance of deep and danceable so well, all while truly rapping his ass off. There are so many great tracks on it, but “East Chatt” is the one that I’ve been returning to constantly, and God—I miss Isaiah Rashad. I’m so glad he decided to give this song to Ray, because it may have never seen the light of day otherwise, and I really feel Ray rose to the occasion with his verse.

Favorite moment: 1:03 if you’re listening on Spotify or AM; 1:05 on YT. I love the way the strings briefly come in after the first half of the chorus. Keys are so dreamy too. Truly music for the vibers! Give Kal Banx his flowers!!!!!

KWN—Do What I Say

KWN is an R&B singer coming out of East London. She’s collaborated with Kehlani a lot recently, and actually just dropped her debut EP last month. Back in May, I had the pleasure of interviewing her for work and hearing the project a bit early, and man, incredible. Really refreshing alternative R&B, and I think “Do What I Say” encapsulates everything that I appreciate about KWN: amazing instrumentals, steamy songwriting, and incredible vocals. The music video is really steamy too.

Sam Gellaitry—Duo

As someone who’s known about Sam Gellaitry since about 2018—thank you, Darra—it’s kinda wild seeing him finally snag some mainstream recognition due to “Assumptions” taking off. Don’t get me wrong, “Assumptions” is great, but it isn’t even the best track on IV, Sam’s excellent edm-pop EP from 2021. That crown goes to “Duo”, a funky, bouncy track about a relationship meeting its end due to outside interference from other people in your ex’s life. #relatable, unfortunately.

“had me convinced that i knew you best / and now you’re sending paragraphs of words that came from someone else”

Favorite part: The chorus.

“they think you can do better all alone / a couple strangers acting clever, oh no / they come and go it’s temperamental i told you so / i only care about forever, but i wish you the best in all your future endeavours / let’s see where this goes and find out if we end up better.”

That Scottish boy bitter. I feel him.

Doodles

I’m working on the next live event. I can’t show you anything, but I could actually use some help from you—any Future fans in the house? Email me at editedbrevity@gmail.com or DM me on IG. I wanna pick ur brain!

I’m Ebrima, and this has been Edited for Brevity. SeEYuH!

You might be thinking—didn’t I just get this email? You’re not crazy, you did. But Substack is kind of annoying and has some hoops I need to get through to make the recording free. So this is a duplicate post with the rest of the info in the post.

For about half of you, this is now the the second email you’ve ever gotten from me, so I’ll take the the chance to set the stage again.

Edited For Brevity is a new music publication and platform focused on storytelling, whether that be in the dissection of our favorite songs, or in the stories told by the people behind the scenes. While we do now have an Instagram, Substack is where we started and everything will kind of feed out of here, at least for now.

For those of you who aren’t new here—it’s been a while, right? By now, you likely know why. About three weeks ago, we put on Stage Presence, a panel on the choreography, styling, and physical training of live music. It was also our inaugural live event, and I spent the last two or so months planning it.

I sat down with physical trainer Jason “RapsTrainer” Lewis, and choreographer & movement director Gigi Todisco for a live convo about their work creating dance routines and physical training plans for musicians, and it was really insightful. Here is a recording of the full live conversation, in case you missed the event, or just want to revisit the conversation.

The event was a resounding success; we had a great conversation & turnout, but more than anything, we started building an irl community of people driven by these kinds of stories, something which has always been a longterm goal. Not an audience—a community. I’m really excited to keep meeting people and for us to keep exploring these stories together.

On that note, I’m already plotting on some fun stuff for this summer, so stay tuned for that. In the meantime, check out the recording on the “podcast feed”, follow us on IG, and keep up with us here on Substack! See you soon, promise.

I’m Ebrima, and this has been Edited for Brevity.

Read more

Most of the time, no one is ever watching it. They’re talking, drinking or eating,
all options superior to watching a film play silently, only to leave by the time you’ve started to piece the plot together. I started thinking about this while visiting a bar a friend had recommended for their burger. It had been a long week at work, and I thought having a good burger might save me.

Spoiler alert—I was not saved. The burger took forever to come out and was lukewarm by the time it hit my table. The patty was really dry, there wasn’t any sauce in the burger—there wasn’t even cheese on it. I had to ask for it on the side, and then it just sat on the burger, never quite melting. I thought nothing could save this. That was, until my eyes found the screen nestled in the corner of the room.

On it, Angelina Jolie and this guy were standing atop a moving train, holding guns. In one deft motion, the guy threw his arm and fired. And…the bullet curved in a perfect arc, sailing through a window and striking a man squarely in the chest. My jaw—which was busy grinding this brittle burger to dust—dropped. I’d seen this movie before, like ten years ago.

Anyone remember Wanted? It’s an action flick from 2010, and one of the most outrageously cartoonish movies I’ve ever seen. The protagonist is this guy who gets plucked from his boring life as an accountant and recruited to an assassin org. Turns out his panic attacks make him OP at killing people, so naturally he becomes an assassin with the goal of killing the like, LeBron James of assassins, who it turns out is actually his father.

The assassins teach Bronny to curve bullets. With a flick of the wrist, they can send bullets sailing around obstacles and into skulls. During the eventual father-son gunfight, bullets are curving before colliding with each other. In one of my favorite moments, Bronny is pursuing a target who’s in a limo. When the glass proves bulletproof, him and his partner get the idea to flip Bronny’s car over the limo, so he can execute the target through the open sunroof. Just look at this shit, dude.

Anyway, the movie is a lot of fun. Yeah, some of the antics make the Fast and Furious movies look like Christopher Nolan films, but once you really suspend disbelief, it’s one hell of a ride. It’s a lot like with anime, and this movie is essentially an isekai. Read the plot again and tell me otherwise. I get the appeal of this kind of movie though. I can’t really judge people who like this stuff, because I’m a big fan of coke rap, another of my favorite flavors of escapism.

Listen man, the closest I ever got to drug dealing was having to tell a Tinder date that I couldn’t share my adderall with her, so I don’t know a thing about the life of a drug dealer. But man, I love hearing about it. Coke rap has been a staple of the genre for a long time, and in the beginning most of the stories, while sensationalized, were born in some kind of truth. If you weren’t dealing the drugs yourself, you knew someone who was. Nowadays, most of it is fiction and it’s pretty tired subject matter, but there’s a guy that’s been breathing new life into the sub-genre for the last couple of years: Westside Gunn.

For the uninitiated, he’s a rapper from Buffalo, New York, and one of the founders of the rap collective Griselda, which he started with his family members Conway The Machine, Benny The Butcher and Machine Gun Black (RIP). What’s different about Griselda and Gunn in particular, is how they make drug dealing sound equal parts luxurious and outlandish. Gunn talks about sitting front row at Paris Fashion Week with coke residue under his fingernails, and giving his shooters orders to carry out a hit while he’s being chauffeured to the Whitney. It’s just really fun to listen to, his rapping is great and the beats are beautiful to boot.

While Gunn is best known for his signature adlibs that punctuate his lines—BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM!!—I love him most for the increasingly outlandish questions he posits to his audience, knowing full well that the answer to his “have you ever” ahh bars will be no.

“You ever rob ten bricks and sold ten bricks in a day?”

“You ever throw up from smelling too many kilos?”

“You ever cooked half a brick in an air fryer?”

No, señor Gunn, I cannot say I have. But there’s someone who strikes this balance of luxury and drug dealing even better, and I honestly think Gunn’s greatest contribution to the game was bringing this guy with him: Stove God Cooks. He’s a Griselda affiliate responsible for a handful of show-stopping features across Gunn’s projects, but I think he should be best known for Reasonable Drought, his debut album fully produced by Roc Marciano.

When I heard Reasonable Drought four years ago, I had to keep pausing to look this guy up, because the Spotify listeners and IG followers were not adding up. I couldn’t believe that he wasn’t bigger, and that this was his first project. It’s rare to hear someone arrive as a fully formed star on their first solo effort, and whatever that “it” factor is, Stove God Cooks has it in droves. Because the drug dealer rap persona is so played out, the only way to cut through the noise is to come up with increasingly inventive ways to say the same things, and Stove has this on lock.

For instance: A regular drug dealer / gangster rapper threat is to have their goons shoot up your car. It’s such a worn out concept that you’d think we’ve heard every way to deliver it. Nah. On “John $tarks,” a standout from Reasonable Drought, Stove says:

“Have my shooters write my name in cursive down the side of your Jetta / Have you climbing to the trunk / He should’ve worn his trunks the way that boy got wet up.”

The first time I heard this line I laughed out loud. It was just so simple yet effective, and with Stove, this creativity and humor is always on full display. He hits all the coke rapper marks, but does it with so much style.

Bars about renting a car for interstate drug trafficking? Check.

“The rental came packed with powder like Ramen noodles.”

Sports metaphors / references? Yep.

“They running plays out my book, ain’t that a bitch? / My highlight reel is full of wrist-twisting / My shit different, ‘89 I would’ve played for the Pistons.”

The classic “I’m just so fucking good at drug dealing” bars? You already know.

“If I become a author, my shit gon’ be called ‘To Whip a Bird’ / Have a book reading sitting 'round the stove.”

I haven’t even talked about the best part. His delivery. His voice is light, raspy and agile, and every word uttered is imbued with the utmost style and confidence. Many of his bars are bookended by his laugh, a crazed guffaw that makes it seem like even he’s in awe of the claims he’s making. It’s hard not to believe him. And amazingly, all the lines I’ve quoted are from “John $tarks” alone. Reasonable Drought is an entire album stuffed full of pure style and (white powdery) substance. Not a line wasted. It’s coke-rap escapism at it’s finest.

Like with anime, there are some elements and themes that are relatable to your life, but for the most part, the rules are completely different, and it’s fun to imagine what it’d be like to be a player in that world for a bit. Like my younger brother says, we don’t watch anime to see realistic things. So when life is feeling a little monotonous, I put on some anime or some Stove God and I laugh. Sometimes, when you’re getting through some bs, you just need something to wash it all down. Whether it’s a beer, a bad action flick, or an anime where a kid with stretchy limbs fights fascist maniacs, the choice is yours. I personally like coke rap.

The movie concludes with the main character turning against the org, and using his newfound skills to take out the leader. He then looks right into the camera and asks: “What the fuck have you done lately?” As the credits rolled, I looked down at my plate, and the burger was gone.

Six Disc

Here are the songs that I’ve been running back lately, in no particular order. Check out the songs below, or follow the Six Disc playlist on Apple Music & Spotify to get it all in one place!

Stove God Cooks, Roc Marciano—John $tarks

This week’s highlight!

Earl Swearshirt—MTOMB (feat. Liv.E, prod. by Alchemist)

I loved Earl when I was a teen, but I think he began to lose me as he found himself in a less accessible, hazier sound. Sick! and Voir Dire drew me back in last year, and I’ve since revisited his discog. I’ve been listening to Feet of Clay more recently, and this one stood out. I love how soft this beat is. Sometimes your tastes just have to mature.

Baby Rose—Caroline (feat. Mereba)

Baby Rose has the kind of voice that sounds a little out of place in this generation. It has this classic quality to it, idk you just have to hear it. As always, love me some Mereba. Shout out to my boy Clarence for putting me onto this entire project, a joint effort with my favorite jazz band, BadBadNotGood.

Sahbabii—Anaconda Livin

So Sahbabii is one of those guys I’ve known about for years, but never properly checked out. Shout out to my guy Shak for putting me on to this project. I know that “Viking” is the one everyone loves, but this beat is so ethereal. So much so, that I’ll forgive the rattlesnake sounds on a song called “Anaconda Livin.”

Twinz—Eastside LB

A few weeks ago, my friends and I did this challenge where we built a playlist together. This is one of my favorites, contributed by Juby! It just sounds like a good time, happy, light. I love that chorus so much!

Talaya & dsrt flwr—miss u sis

Conflict resolution skills are so essential to building and maintaining community, and it’s really easy for important relationships to disintegrate if we don’t talk to each other. “miss u sis” is conflict resolution distilled into a song, where two friends close some distance by just admitting they miss each they miss each other, demonstrating the power of calling someone in, instead of calling them out.

Doodles

In the spirit of keeping ideas small and executing on them, I want to dedicate a section to works in progress, or small ideas that have come to fruition.

I’m still on my banana bread grind, and this last week I made my best loaf yet. It was perfectly moist, and nice and chocolatey. I think the key was using bananas that I almost thought were too ripe. I also underbaked it a tad, 32 minutes a side. Spectacular. I prob should try some different desserts though lol.

I’m Ebrima, and this has been Edited for Brevity.

“Man, y’all don’t know none of these songs,” Lazer Dim said, the irritation in his voice mounting. It was the seventh song in a row he’d performed where barely anyone had reacted or sung along. He paced the stage, walking past the 17 friends he had loitering up there with him.

“I’m tryna play what y’all know, lil twan.” He addressed the crowd again. “What y’all wanna hear?”

Shouted song titles quickly filled the air. Lazer scanned the crowd of kids jockeying for his attention, before zeroing in on one particularly frantic kid, who’d typed the name of a song in their notes app and was waving their phone at him.

“Oh, you wanna hear “Winchester?” Do we have that?” He turned to face his DJ, who was already cueing the beat up.

Within seconds, a loud, distorted buzzing began emanating from the speakers: insanely blown out bass. Every few seconds, the incessant buzzing was broken by two sounds. One was the sound of a factory alarm or siren, and the other was, I kid you not, the Minecraft “Door Open” sound. The crowd was suddenly whipped into a frenzy, and Lazer Dim seemed energized by this, albeit a bit surprised. He seemed to be learning in real time what would get the audience to move.

Unfortunately, it seemed Lazer Dim had left for his first tour before his government issued Rapper-Live-Performance-Starter-Kitᵀᴹ had arrived in the mail, and as such he didn’t have any of the tried and true crowd control classics: I wasn’t asked once to put my hands up, or wave them side to side. There wasn’t a single four count to jump to. He didn’t even have the rap show standard “open that shit up!” and “when this beat drop I need y’all to go crazy!” He didn’t even have a setlist. The entire show had been fueled by audience requests.

I was watching this whole thing unfold from the back of the venue with my friend Shak, who had a spare ticket to the show and asked me to come along. I’d been a fan of Lazer Dim 700’s music for a while, and was really curious about how it was going to translate live, but I hadn’t expected this.

There’s already been plenty of discourse around post-pandemic // gen-z concert audiences just not knowing how to act. Something had shifted by the time we all were back outside. These new concert-goers were less engaged, and altogether more desperate for a viral moment, even if it meant they had to resort to cruelty to get it. Rico Nasty was regularly booed and pelted with objects during her opening set for Playboi Carti a few years back. Harry Styles got routinely catcalled was partially blinded for a whole show after being hit in the eye with a Skittle. And we’ve all seen the clips of Steve Lacy’s tour.

But what about the other side of this? What is this culture of instant gratification doing to artists, and their art? Specifically, how is this affecting artist development, and the music and the music industry at large? The biggest change, imo, are likes and streams being the new indicators of success. They’re shit indicators, and everyone except for the labels is getting screwed by them.

A few years ago, I actually worked for a label that strictly pursued viral artists. If you had a song go even semi-viral on TikTok, you’d best believe there’d be someone from this label trying to court you from your Soundcloud comments. This resulted in the label having a roster full of one hit wonders, many of whom were never able to recapture that lightning, but every once in a while they struck gold. I left about two months before they signed a then relatively unknown artist, whose name rhymes with Mice Slice, if that tells you anything.

Viral culture is so pervasive that it’s also begun to affect music structurally. And no, I’m not talking about songs generally being shorter. I don’t know how I didn’t realize this sooner, but as we walked home from the show, we came to the realization that Lazer Dim’s songs don’t have choruses, bridges or outros. The rapping that does occur is a rapid fire line after line onslaught, thanks largely to the “punch-in” recording style he and most new rappers employ. It’s as if he’d been conditioned to create songs that sound like snippets. The result is music that is particularly poorly suited to live performance because it’s really hard to learn. You can’t teach your audience a chorus if your song doesn’t have one.

Yada yada yada. Okay, we all know that TikTok and our current internet culture has created a system where careers can be born in minutes. And the labels have always been circling, have always been looking for a quick payday, The fact that you now can be singing in your bathroom in the morning and be signing a deal before your shower is warm might be good, and every once in a while we make the right person famous, someone who not only knows that preparation + opportunity = success, but has been preparing for a long time. But more often then not, we end up with artists who show a lot of promise, but just aren’t quite ready.

This structure is eliminating the time that most artists need to grow, and you end up with artists who are still finding their sound thrust into the mainstream before they’re ready. I talked a bit about Lazer Dim’s music being influenced by viral culture, but I think it’s actually more that he’s still discovering his sound. The issue is that he was catapulted to fame right in the middle of that process. Having this discovery phase in front of an audience must be terrifying, as you’re beholden to the thousands of people that brought you massive overnight success. The thing is, you were still finding your sound, and now further experimentation is at the risk of alienating your base. Being able to experiment without an audience that’s going to call you “mid” is crucial, lol.

It doesn’t help that these days, a viral single is also a fast-pass to the top of the festival lineup. Gelo, whose song “Tweaker” is going crazy right now, just booked a Rolling Loud set next month, and is listed above so many artists, some of whom have been grinding for over ten years. In case you’ve forgotten or are unaware, Gelo has a single (1) song out. Artemas and Hanumankind, two other artists with viral singles last year, are second line at Coachella. But what’s the use of that fast pass, when you aren’t tall enough to ride? This is how you end up on a stage in front of hundreds, if not thousands, with no idea of which songs are going to go off live, and why.

I don’t really have a solution here besides…idk, having artists get popular slower? What happened to having to perform for years in shitty venues where no one knows you? Trying to win over a crowd? Crafting song after song that never sees the light of day? We gotta bring back putting your reps in, but also learning from other artists. Going back and doing our homework. I think Lazer Dim, as much as I love him, would really benefit from going on tour with another artist. Maybe Denzel Curry, who he’s recently collaborated with, and who is a phenomenal live performer. Most importantly though, I hope that he gets the opportunity to figure out where he wants to go with his sound.

I remember listening to a great interview Jessie Reyes gave a few years back on the “It’s The Real” podcast, where she likened “blowing up” vs growing slowly, to being a palm tree vs an evergreen tree, respectively. A palm tree looks pretty, but has weak structural integrity. An evergreen is a little more boring, but it’s firm. If a storm blows through the town, that palm tree is likely to be uprooted, but that evergreen tree, which has spent years and years growing little by little, burrowing its roots into the ground, is still going to be there. We should all get a fair shake at being evergreens.

After the show came to an end, Shak and I walked to the train together, and befriended this college kid on the platform. He’d recently moved to the U.S from Romania, and this was only his third concert, the other two being Destroy Lonely and some other adjacent artist. Before we got off the train, he asked for our Instagrams, suggesting we could go to another concert together. Man, the day we take this kid to a show where the artist asks him to jump to a four count, he’s going to lose his marbles.

Six Disc

Here are the songs that I’ve been running back lately, in no particular order. Check out the songs below, or follow the Six Disc playlist on Apple Music & Spotify to get it all in once place!

Lazer Dim 700—Winchester

This week’s highlight!

Minako Yoshida—Koi Ha Ryusei

I stumbled upon this song while looking for another one, and for a while, I was unable to leave my couch. I haven’t teared up listening to a song in a long time.

Bktherula—PSSYONFT

Finally digging properly into Bk’s solo discog, starting with her LVL5 P1 EP. This is a standout for me. Beats on this project are crazy.

OoOh! WhaAaAt? OoOoh! WhAaAt?

J. Cole—Crocodile Tearz

Been on a Cole kick lately—can you tell?—and I decided to revisit Might Delete Later, hadn’t really listened to it since it first dropped. Really love this beat, and the build up to the drums finally dropping. Might Delete Later definitely features Cole’s best rapping in a long time, but substance wise, it’s a bit lacking. He’s got some new tricks, but the question still remains: what’s he going to do with them on The Fall Off?

Mac Miller—Rick’s Piano

We had a listening party for Balloonerism on the release day, and this was a standout upon that first listening. Upon a revisit, it’s immediately clear why.

Crissy P—Posture

Crissy P is one of the most consistent rappers out of Seattle, and I’ve been lucky enough to witness his growth in real time, project after project. I was late to it, but he dropped an EP last year, and this is one of my favorite songs from it.

“It’s a mismatch, why you wanna beef when it’s homies we can’t get back?”

Doodles

In the spirit of keeping ideas small and executing on them, I want to dedicate a section to works in progress, or small ideas that have come to fruition.

I made this banana bread a little while ago, and was really happy with it. The recipe called for four bananas, but I only had three. I normally would have just dumped the recipe into Chat GPT and had it reduce the recipe down for me—that’s what I chiefly used it for—but in the interest of eliminating my reliance on AI, I did the math by hand. Man, can y’all still remember how to do long division? Because I was struggling. Anyway, my math was good enough bc the bread came out so good. I loved it, and so did my friends. Threw some chocolate chips in there too. I might try making it again this week. Here’s the recipe if you’re curious. Lmk if you want the reduced version w 3 bananas, I already did the work lol. Prob gonna make it again this week.

I’m Ebrima, and this has been Edited for Brevity.

I checked my phone. I’d been sitting in the coffee shop for about two hours, waiting for someone who didn’t even know I existed. I had a vague sense of what they looked like, and an even fainter sense of who they were, but I knew that we needed to speak to each other. Was this considered stalking?

Finally, I saw the doors of my old apartment building open, and a man emerged. He was Black, a little stocky, and wearing all black. Definitely the guy. My heart leapt into my throat, and I watched him walk past the coffee shop, my body tense. Was I actually going to do this? As soon as he disappeared around the corner and I felt my window begin to slip away I finally jumped up, burst through the doors, and chased him down the block.

“Sorry to bother you, man.” I started breathlessly, “I know you don’t know me, but I live in the apartment you just toured, and you really shouldn’t live here.”

June, 2023

When I first moved to New York, I figured it’d be nice to not have to worry about furnishing a place right away, so I decided to look for a sublet. I stayed with my cousin Malik for about two weeks, and spent my days going from apartment to apartment, checking for mold, noise and vibes. I didn’t care about the specifics too much, and as long as my roommate wasn’t crazy, we’d probably be fine. It’d only be temporary.

I still remember the moment I found the listing on Facebook Marketplace, how I thought the decor looked pretty drab, but at least the unit was modern. I reached out, and a day later, Malik and I were seeing the unit in person. The apartment belonged to a guy I’ll call L, a Black dude in his thirties who worked in tech support. He seemed nice enough, but over the course of our conversation revealed little about himself. I scanned the sparsely decorated apartment, searching for some further insight into his life. The poster I spotted upon entry told me he liked Beyoncé. I spied another hanging above the couch. Correction: he loved her. The TV sat atop an IKEA KALLAX shelf stuffed full with records. Cool, he was really into music. I could get with that.

After a brief, not quite pleasant but not quite unpleasant chat, L took us on a tour of the building and its amenities, including a decently sized gym and a furnished rooftop with a great view of the city. We rode down in the elevator together, talking about next steps if I was interested, before thanking him and leaving the building. The minute we rounded the corner and were out of view, Malik turned to face me.

“Listen, this is the one.” He said. “You’re not going to find anything this nice, for this price. Tell him you’re interested.”

I was fairly excited about it, and if Malik, who’d worked as a realtor for a while, gave it his stamp of approval, it must’ve been a pretty good deal. I texted L, and a few hours later, he texted back that he thought I was a good fit, and sent over some documents that I’d eventually sign.

I moved in a few weeks later, and on my first night I had a pleasant conversation with L about our respective backgrounds and interests. He was a transplant as well, and had moved to New York about six years ago. We talked a lot about music. L loved RnB, and owned hundreds, if not thousands of records. He was a homebody, and rarely ventured out unless he was going to his partner’s house or to a show. We talked about a bunch of artists, but spent some time talking about the British singer-songwriter Lianne La Havas, and about how great her self-titled album was. After maybe an hour or so, we bid each other goodnight.

“This might actually be cool.” I thought to myself.

About a month into my stay, I decided to throw a housewarming party. I invited about fifteen friends, and told L he and his partner were welcome, but they couldn’t make it. Whatever. The party was fun, but later that night, I got a text from L asking if we could have a discussion. The next morning, he told me he felt uncomfortable with the whole thing. I was confused. I’d given him notice, and thrown the party on the rooftop.

“Well, I just don’t like the idea of random people coming in and out of here. I have all this stuff in here and I don’t know these people.”

O-okay? I’d had a few friends down here to use the bathroom, and see my room, but no one had been down there unsupervised. Was that an issue?

“Yeah, and also: the weekends are my time to relax, so I would appreciate it if you wouldn’t have your girlfriend over every weekend. Maybe every other weekend?”

Well she’d never stayed more than a day or two, didn’t always stay overnight, and we’d been in my room the whole time, but okay. Seemed reasonable enough, right? I’m always one for open communication.

The song “Bittersweet” by Lianne La Havas is about the moments preceding and immediately following a break-up, and about gathering the courage necessary to step away from a situation that may no longer be serving you. As I assured myself that all would be well, I ignored the little alarm bell ringing in the back of my head, a bell that sang the chorus to “Bittersweet.”

No more hanging around, oh
No more hanging around, oh
Now my sun's going down, oh
Telling me something isn't right, something isn't right, oh

January, 2024

As we stood on the street corner, I realized my hand was on the man’s shoulder, and quickly pulled it off. I must have looked crazy. But the man just smiled.

“Oh, hey!” He said brightly, “You’re the guy that popped into the apartment while I was up there with L.”

“Yeah. Look, I don’t wanna take too much of your time, so I have this notes document I made with all of the information about my experience there. I just want you to be able to make an informed decision about living here.”

He looked down at my phone, then back at me.

“I mean, I’m not really doing anything right now. Do you just wanna talk about it?”

We popped into a coffee shop, where I bought him a donut, and began to explain.

I told him about how from the moment I moved in, it never felt like there was enough space for me. About how L gave me two tiny kitchen shelves to cram all of my plates, utensils and dry foods onto. I wasn’t to take up any more space than that, so I had pasta, forks and cans of soup sitting in my closet. He occupied the rest of the entire kitchen. He gave me two slots on his shoe rack, and occupied the other seven with shoes he never even wore. The kitchen counter was crowded with appliances, coffee makers and blenders, which he seldom used, so cooking was a pain, and he wasn’t open to moving things around. He himself rarely cooked, and the microwave always smelled like shit, a product of all the frozen meals he ate. I told him about how right before Thanksgiving Day, L had simply announced he was using the kitchen the whole day, making no efforts to coordinate with us.

I told him about how L seemed to despise any friends I had, but had a particular dislike for my girlfriend. How he had, after she forgot a sandwich in the air fryer for five minutes, banned her and any future guests from using any of his appliances. How he had blocked her phone and laptop from the wifi. How he had asked me to have her over less and less, until he’d gone on to institute a full on guest policy where I was allowed two guests a week, non-consecutive days, and all overnight guests needed to be gone before 9am on weekdays. There were also no guests allowed between “business hours” during the week.

I told him about the oppressive atmosphere in the apartment. How I never wanted to be home, and spent any time that I was home in my bedroom. How I was beginning to wonder why I’d ever bothered moving in the first place. I felt duped, and just wanted someone else to be able to make an informed decision.

The man listened intently, sipping his coffee and nodding empathetically. After I was done, he thanked me for my warnings but told me that he would probably still take it if he was offered the room. He was in a precarious living situation himself, and needed to be somewhere new. I was satisfied enough having warned him. We exchanged contact info just in case he had questions. A few days later, he texted me to let me know he’d be moving in.

I moved out of the apartment a few weeks later, and on my last day at L’s looked at my room with a kind of sadness. Despite the rough times, it’d given me a lot. I looked around the apartment one last time, and noticed that the walls were noticeably less bare. On the wall right in front of my room, L had framed Lianne La Havas’ self-titled album. I smiled wryly, left my key on the counter, walked out of the building, and rounded the corner for the last time.

When I got home, I texted the new tenant to wish him luck. Guess what? L had gotten cold feet, and pulled out on him. Worst of all, he’d refused to return his deposit.

July, 2024

My girlfriend and I broke up last summer, but it was amicable, and we broke no-contact like we were playing ping pong; the period between exchanges was never long. On an evening at the end of July, a text notification bounced onto my screen.

“BRO. I think I see L.”

At this point, I’d long since moved out of the apartment and was living with a friend, but L was a figure that loomed large in our early memories of New York, an almost cartoonish villain. She sent a photo, and even with all the grain and darkness, that bald milk dud head of his was unmistakeable. Then, dear reader, I made the mistake of doing some digging, and found out where it was taken.

Do you wanna guess whose concert it was? Lianne La fucking Havas.

It felt like the universe was having a laugh, and I laughed along with it. Not only was Lianne La Havas an artist that L and I had bonded over, but her music had soundtracked the early stages of my relationship with my now-ex. I had put her on to Lianne. So to find that she had a show, and both my ex and my ex roomate were there and not me, was deliciously ironic. She would tell me later that she’d gone to the concert in an attempt to reclaim the music. I sat down on the couch and put “Bittersweet” on, and as I looked at the picture of that sad little man, I couldn’t even muster up the anger I’d once felt. Life was so much better for me. I was reminded only of the magic of my first day living in New York.

It felt like the opening scene of a movie or video game. I got in a strange man’s car at the airport, and for an hour we rode in silence as raindrops streamed down the window, the two of us equally unsure of where we were headed. By the time the uber screeched to a halt in front of my new apartment building, we were in the middle of a full on tropical thunderstorm. My driver helped me with my bags, and for a while I stood in front of the building being pelted by the rain, fiddling with the call box thingy until it crackled to life.

“Door Open.” Why did it have an English accent?

A few minutes later, I was standing in L’s doorway, sopping wet. He welcomed me inside, and showed me to my room. It wasn’t that big, and the closet was small, but for the time being, it was mine. With my mattress on the floor and my suitcase in the corner, I felt myself getting excited. The rain had stopped, and the room was bathed in a golden glow from the setting sun.

Bittersweet summer rain
I'm born again
All my broken pieces
Bittersweet summer rain
I'm born again, oh

Six Disc

Here are the songs that have had a chokehold on me all week, in no particular order. Does anyone use Last.FM? Worth or nah?

Lianne La Havas—Bittersweet

This week’s highlight!

Rich Amiri—One Call

It’s like Future and Carti did the fusion dance.

Sabrina Claudio—Belong to You (feat. 6lack)

My new and very non-bitch-ass roommate put me onto this one. My sister loves Sabrina Claudio. I’m pretty sure she did something racist on Twitter or something, but this is good enough that I haven’t Googled to find out.

J’Von—Friends Again (feat. MoRuf)

J’Von is probably the best rapper out of Seattle, and has been for a few years. Also a super dope artist (he does all of his cover art and also makes apparel and toys!)

J. Cole—Judgement Day

I just finished listening to J. Cole’s Inevitable audio series, and man. What a treat. I love a good behind-the-scenes story. It’s really cool to hear these songs with the added context. This is one of my fave cuts from the deluxe version of 2014 Forest Hills Drive.

Doechii—Boom Bap

I just really love the sample in the beat. The song as a whole is great, but I keep going back bc of the beat.

Doodles

In the spirit of keeping ideas small and executing on them, I want to dedicate a section to works in progress, or small ideas that have come to fruition.

For this week, we’ve still got this Doechii X Kaytranada—DoechiiNada? DoeTranada?—mashup that I made last week. Listen to it, you bums.

I’m Ebrima, and this has been Edited for Brevity.

I skimmed Pinterest for a while before landing on a recipe for chocolate chip cookies, figuring they’d be practically impossible to mess up, and for a good while, they were. They always came out perfectly chewy, soft and gooey in all the right places, and the best part was that the dough didn’t need to be refrigerated. I could decide I wanted cookies, and be eating them within the hour. I found the process particularly soothing compared to my other hobbies, and Ioved watching the eyes of my loved ones widen in surprise when they tried them.

These cookies eventually became a small source of pride, and I eventually felt confident enough to start telling friends about them. Almost a year later, my friend Juby invited me to a Friendsgiving she was hosting, and I committed to bringing the cookies. A few hours later I was standing outside her apartment with the cookies, but when she opened the door she received an additional thing: an apology.

“I promise they’re normally better than this,” I said, holding a tray of flattened, crispy discs instead of soft gooey pucks. For the first time, the cookies had expanded like crazy in the oven. Everyone insisted they were still really good, but I couldn’t stop thinking about this failure. I’d done everything the same, so what was the deal? I figured it was a one off, and blamed it on the oven. When I moved apartments a few months later, I tried again. They were better, but still not up to my personal standards, and eventually I stopped trying. Clearly the lucky streak was over. It seemed that so many of my creative pursuits had followed that same path.

1. Try something new and find out you’re picking it up kind of quickly.

2. Share something you’ve made, get some praise and feel good about yourself.

3. Overthink it.

4. Become unsatisfied with what you’re producing / what you’re capable of.

5. Stop producing.

As you probably know by now, I embarked on a writing challenge a few weeks ago, with a goal to write roughly one music review a day for twelve days. The idea came while talking to my friend Melissa, as we were both feeling a little uninspired, and wanted to challenge ourselves to create consistently. I decided I’d take on writing, as it’d be easy to keep the bar low, and I wanted to do it more.

During most of the challenge, my little sister was visiting me from out of town, and so I had to squeeze my writing in where I could, chipping away at it bit by bit each day until I had a story. We’d get on the train and I’d be typing away before the doors had closed. As soon as we’d finished eating at a restaurant, I’d have my elbows propped on the table and my phone hovering before my face, my table manners whisked away along with our empty plates. I hogged a bench at the MET, hunched over my phone in front of four marble statues of Joseph, chiseling a block of text into a story. I spent more than one night up until 4am, writing away.

If this sounds stressful, it’s because it was, but more than that it was fun. So much fun. It’d been so long since I’d created unencumbered by the weight of metrics and self-imposed expectations. There wasn’t time to overthink because I barely had time to think at all. It’d take everything I had to finish the day’s review, and as soon as I’d published it, I’d have to start thinking about the next one. I never knew what I was getting until the reviews were finished. Sometimes the stories came easily, and at other times they needed to be coaxed out, but I always enjoyed the process.

The real surprise though? People were reading them. I was writing these so fast and didn’t always think much of them, but not only were people reading them, they were connecting to them. Even the ones that I thought no one would care about. My writing challenge reminded me of something important: once the cookies go into the oven, they must always come out, whether as pucks or discs. Innumerable ideas have been lost to rumination, once perfectly formed balls of dough reduced to ash because I always wanted to add more, because they were never good enough or ready for the world. It’s more important to get out of your own way and let the ideas into the world, because no matter what you think, someone else will appreciate them.

On that note, I really want to thank each and every one of you who’s taken the time to read anything that I’ve written over the last few weeks. This blog / newsletter / whatever the heck is the product of this experiment, a place where I’ll be sharing my ideas without thinking too hard about them. It’ll mostly be writing, but you might get some random stuff thrown in here. I’m going to be challenging myself to act on my ideas while they’re still small, to pull the cookies out of the oven before they’re inedible. Sometimes, they’ll be just right, and other times, they’ll be a little too crisp around the edges, but I hope that no matter what, you’ll be willing to try them. Promise they won’t kill you.

Last weekend, ahead of a game night at my apartment, I decided to attempt the cookies again. Much to my disappointment, they once again expanded like crazy in the oven. My friends still ate every single one.

Doodles

In the spirit of keeping ideas small and executing on them, I want to dedicate a section to works in progress, or small ideas that have come to fruition. For this week, we’ve got this Doechii X Kaytranada—DoechiiNada? DoeTranada?—mashup that I made last night. ? I’d been thinking of the idea for a while, so it felt right to finish it so I could share it. Hope you enjoy!

I’m Ebrima, and this has been Edited for Brevity.

“I’ll take a whiskey sour.”

The bartender nodded approvingly (?) and shuffled off to make the drink. When he delivered it and I tried to pay him, he—also wordlessly, might I add—refused my money and bowed to me in thanks, as if grateful to have had a break from pouring shots for rowdy college students who never tip. The exchange was mostly just funny, but it stuck with me. It was like we had an unspoken understanding, and our shared knowledge of what a “real drink” was put us in an exclusive club together even if for just that moment.

Being an early fan of an artist’s music feels kinda like visiting a bar in your college town. Amongst all the kids pounding shitty beers and tonguing down jello shots there you are, nursing a stronger, smoother, “superior” drink. It mostly goes unnoticed, but every once in a while, someone recognizes or better yet rewards your taste with their validation, and you feel like you’re just a little better than everyone else. Cultured.

We tend to gate-keep our favorite artists while they’re still fledglings, hoping to one day cash in on the clout that comes with being a day one; A Real Fanᵀᴹ. When they’re finally doing arena tours one day and a deep cut comes on, we’ll be among the select few to recognize it in seconds while everyone else looks puzzled; to have earned the privilege to sing along word for word while the uninitiated are resigned to nodding their heads and waving their hands. It’s a potent, particular and lowkey para-social strain of euphoria, and I go nuts for it.

This whole phenomenon makes for an odd, kinda toxic relationship with the artist, as you’re simultaneously supporting them and hoping they stay your little secret forever. PinkPantheress’s “Internet Baby” is a fantastic song about this dynamic, from the perspective of an artist who’s gone from small to a household name in a short period of time.

“You’re a needy guy, but I guess I kinda like that.” She muses, initially happy to be receiving attention, to have the void she’s been pouring her art into finally speaking back to her. But as she gets larger, PinkPantheress realizes that the old fans are reluctant to make space for the new ones, stubbornly clinging to the version of her that was small enough to reply to all of their Instagram comments.

“I am not your internet baby.” She warns, wagging her finger at both the day ones with her name freshly inked on their arms, and her new fans with her pictures on their Pinterest boards.

Fortunately, I got into PinkPantheress way too late to get to gate-keep her so I’ve decided the message of “Internet Baby” doesn’t apply to me, I'm just passing the word along.. But seriously though, let’s not gatekeep. Instead, put people on.

“But Ebrima,” you begin to whine, the thing about exclusive clubs is that they don’t recruit. And I mean yeah, no one’s going around, telling others to stop drinking beers. For some reason, there’s this unspoken rule that you kind of have to happen upon your go-to drink at the bar, to just discover your favorite artists on your own. Maybe—as was the case with me—you go out with your coworkers one time, and you get a whiskey sour simply because it’s what they ordered. And you just keep getting them after that because you like the way they taste.

But there’s only one feeling that rivals being a day one fan on your own, and that’s being able to put someone else on. You wanna talk about feeling superior? Try putting your friend onto their future favorite artist. For the rest of their lives they’ll owe you, and you now share this thing together. Then they can put you on and the cycle continues ad infinitum. I know I would’ve loved to have discovered PinkPantheress earlier, and I had ample opportunity, but every time a friend mentioned her or I saw her name somewhere, I never took the dive. I won’t make the mistake again, and my friends will make sure of it.

On a separate occasion, this time while visiting a rooftop bar with my cousin, this dude comes up to me.

“That’s what you’re drinking?” He jeers, pointing to the lychee martini in my hand.

“Yeah.” I replied, matter of factly.

“That’s your drink?” He tried again, hoping that if he changed his phrasing he might elicit the response he wanted.

“Yeah dude,” I laughed, “It’s a lychee martini. Do you want to try it?”

He looked a bit taken aback, and was immediately disarmed.

“Uh, well I’ve never had it. Is it good?” He asked, a little sheepishly.

“Find out for yourself, dude.”

Don’t judge, judging is out for 2025.

I mean, don’t get me wrong, I live for the perfect transition and really enjoy hopping into Photoshop to make a custom cover, so I make them for other people. But if I want to listen to music, I’m usually selecting the exact song I want to hear, putting an album on, or shuffling my entire music library of thousands of songs. It’s worked out well enough for me so far.

I’ve kind of always been like this, but I think getting used to driving everywhere really solidified the behavior. My car had a six-disc changer, and I loved being limited to a physical rotation. When temperatures started to dip and the leaves began to change hues, I’d dust off Solange’s A Seat At The Table and MF Doom’s MADVILLAINY, ejecting Un Verano Sin Ti and Renaissance from the rotation. Literally.

When I moved to New York in the summer of ‘23, I left my car behind but the mentality came with me. As I took to walking everywhere, a pair of Airpods jammed firmly in my ears, I always had six or so albums in constant rotation. KaytrAminé, the joint project from Aminé and Kaytranada, was one of those albums, but I specifically kept going back to “Sossaup,” which featured someone I’d never heard of: Amaarae. I was immediately hooked on her babyish, high-pitched delivery, and the juxtaposition of that voice and her oft-vulgar lyrics was intoxicating. Her album Fountain Baby was swiftly added to my rotation, and a year and a half later, she still hasn’t really left it. She dropped the roses are read, tears are blue EP last summer, and I’ve been stuck on the second to last track: “T.H.U.G. (Truly Humble Under God).”

I think this is a great track to start 2025 with, because throughout the whole thing, it’s hard to tell whether Amaarae is praying, or setting intentions. Isn’t that what all New Years resolutions are? Anyway, whatever it is, she drops the motto / mantra for 2025:

“I don’t fold under pressure,

I don’t fall under pain,

Tomorrow might be better, but I’m looking forward today.”

Happy New Year y’all. Amaarae in for 2025.

The days leading up to December 31st, 2023 were quite eventful. I returned to The Gambia for the first time in four years, reunited with childhood friends, and attended my first Gambian wedding. When it comes to the last day of the year though, I actually have no idea what I did. There’s only one thing I remember, really. I got a notification from the YouTube app.

“Dude,” I called out to my brother, “Carti just dropped.”

“2024” had all of the markers of a new Playboi Carti era. He debuted a new voice, ditching the baby voice for a husky drawl. His style had changed, and he had a new adlib: See-yuh! But on December 31st, 2024, we all know that no album materialized. A lot of other things happened though.

I had an unexpected career pivot, but in a great way. I moved in with one of my best friends. I made friends, and grieved others. Had my first real breakup. Tried some new things with my hair. Actually began to learn to cook. Witnessed probably the greatest hip-hop beef of all time. Had my first Ramadan away from home. Started writing again. I finally saw Childish Gambino, twice. Once for free. I even touched the man’s hand. I listened to so much great music.

There’s a lot more that I’m leaving out, but I’m tired man. I spent today with my little sister. We ate bagels at Brooklyn Bridge Park, failed to get pancakes at Golden Diner, and made charm bracelets. We’re now going to a friends for a lowkey NYE kickback.

Anyway, great year. Thank you so much for reading my words. I hope 2025 brings more of them, and everything you’re hoping for. Not holding my breath about Carti tho.

See-yuh!

As soon as the bus door hissed open, I clambered aboard, hurriedly making my way toward the back of the bus where my best friend was sure to be.

“Dude, dude, dude!” I squeaked excitedly, pushing past the students clogging up the aisle, my pubescent voice barely cutting through the din. I finally reached the back of the bus, where sure enough, Daddy—his real name, by the way—was sitting, waiting for me.

“What’s up dude? What is it?” He asked, extending his hand which I quickly clasped, unable to contain myself.

“I have a girlfriend!” I finally announced. Daddy’s eyes went wide.

“You’re lying!” He shouted. “Boy, say billaahi! How? Who is it? Does she go to this school?”

I laughed.

“No dude, in the game!”

The girlfriend in question was Yukiko Amagi, one of the characters in my favorite video game, Persona 4 Golden. I had finally figured out how to date her, and she and my character were now going steady. Daddy’s face fell, reminded of just who it was he was talking to.

“You fucking idiot.”

I was never allowed to hang out after school, which is when I felt like all of the good stuff happened. Every once in a while I’d get on the bus in the morning to find I’d missed yet another canon event, and I’d be unable to join the conversation, resigned to listening and trying to piece it together.

Whaaaat, he asked her out?

Did you really have sex?

Y’all smoked marijuana? For real?

My fomo waned when Persona 4 Golden came into my life. It’s a JRPG murder mystery set in the small fictional town of Inaba. You play as a transplant high schooler, and spend the game solving the murder case, but also just…doing high school things. You can join after-school clubs and get a part time job, but also spend time forging bonds with other students.

This game latched onto me like no game before it. I related so much to the well-written characters, the anxious teens trying to figure out who they wanted to be, while fighting against who they were allowed to be. The game also just oozed personality; vibrant menu screens, detailed backgrounds and slick character designs. The soundtrack, comprised mostly of J-Pop and J-Rock, played a huge part in this. It was bright and upbeat, fresh but nostalgic, and the songwriting was poetic, mostly focused on love. I had trouble discerning the exact lyrics at times, but I loved the shimmering texture of the songs that soundtracked my character’s footfalls.

My favorite song was “Signs of Love.” It was the track that played every time you booted the game up or reentered your home, and you’d be greeted enthusiastically by your little cousin each time.

“Welcome home!” Nanako would say cheerily without fail, her greeting acting like a beat tag for the song as it kicked off. I loved the bassline, the strings that stab as the song kicks off, the organ that underlines the first few lines.

“Signs of love overshadow bad dreams,

Baby, don’t worry cause, you ain’t alone.

Only time, running days without nights,

Tears pass through.”

Pretty soon, I was no longer dejected to be headed home at the end of the day. I was counting down the hours until I could once again roam the streets of Inaba, to go hang out with my friends at the food court, piecing together the murder case over croquettes and soda.

Persona 4 Golden is probably my favorite video game of all time. I love this game so much, I’ve got a tattoo dedicated to it. I own it on three different platforms. This was the first piece of media to ever make me cry, to make me realize the power of a well written character and a bangin’ soundtrack. It deserves its own essay one day, so I won’t get too crazy with it here. But it got me through some tough times.

The soundtrack is still in my rotation today. It helped me power through many a study session in school, and I still throw it on today whenever I feel like I really need to lock in. Because it’s the song that plays whenever you boot up the game, I’ve probably heard “Signs of Love” more than any other, but I’ve never gotten sick of it. When I hear it today, almost 12 years later, it just feels like a hug.

“Welcome home!” I hear Nanako saying in my head. Good to be back.