The music week in review: 2 Chainz, Young Thug, Lorde, Big Boi & more
The summer is rolling along and the music releases are coming hot and heavy.
Let’s sift through the bullshit and give you what you need to be listening to, and looking out for.
2 Chainz – Pretty Girls Like Trap Music
After dropping numerous singles over the last weeks and months, 2 Chainz comes through with the highly-anticipated Pretty Girls Like Trap Music and it lives up to the hype.
I mean, we knew 2 Chainz wasn’t about to let us down, but with production from the top tastemakers in hop-hop, as well as A-List features, Pretty Girls is a certified contender for hip-hop album of the summer.
Young Thug – Beautiful Thugger Girls
So Young Thug put out a country/folk/hip-hop album and it’s pretty wild.
Intended to be a “singing album,” the beats may be a little too hard to qualify as soft rock, but there’s definitely a lot of acoustic guitar and Thug is certainly singing.
Thugga really keeps pushing the envelope and changing what it means to be a modern hip-hop artist. Eternal shouts out to Thugga.
Lorde – Melodrama
Lorde released her second album on Friday and it confirms her as a pop powerhouse.
Her songwriting is complex, sarcastic, funny, poignant, and often perfectly describes the emotions of being a young person in 2017, and beyond.
Any skepticism about the young New Zealander’s place within the pop lexicon will surely be squashed with this latest release, it is rather astounding from such a young artist.
Big Boi – Boomiverse
One half of the best duo in hip-hop history has dropped his fourth major project as a solo artist, one of which was a collaborative effort with indie electro rock band Phantogram.
Boomiverse shows Big Boi continue to find a diverse sound, with Big Boi executive producing the album himself. There’s some great features on Boomiverse and Big Boi still has the punchlines on deckington.
Calvin Harris – “Feels”
After dropping a video earlier this week with brief snippets of the songs on his new album, Calvin Harris dropped a new single off Funk Wav Bounces Vol 1, featuring Pharrell, Katy Perry, and Big Sean.
It’s hardly the most interesting song I’ve ever heard, but this song, as well as Harris’ whole damn album (slated for June 30th), will surely be bumping all summer.
DJ Khaled & Rihanna
The lineup to this song seemed a little too extra, and there is ample thirst on this track (PARTYNEXTDOOR did in fact co-write it), but the Carlos Santana sample plus Rihanna is just too groovy to resist.
Bryson Tiller should probably chill out a little bit, but this track is pretty great. Asahd Khaled truly blessed another one.
Queens of the Stone Age – “The Way You Used To”
Queens of the Stone Age have just been making good-as-shit rock music for over 20 years. Josh Homme et al. dropped “The Way You Used To Do” earlier this week, with a promo trailer for their new album, Villains (due August 25th), produced by super-producer Mark Ronson.
I’m sure Villains will give us more of the same Queens of the Stone Age-style driving rock music that we’ve been waiting for since 2013’s Like Clockwork.
Action Bronson – “Let Me Breathe”
Action Bronson dropped a new track and announced a new album, Blue Chips 7000, executive produced by Harry Fraud. “Let Me Breathe” is a Fat Boys sampling romp in typical Action fashion, “white Range Rover blowin’ trees all in it.”
Shoutout the Fat Boys, though, Harry Fraud must’ve dug deep into the vinyl collection for that sample.
Majid Jordan – “One I Want” ft. PARTYNEXTDOOR
Drake’s favorite OVO proteges teamed up for this latest release and it’s pretty much what you would expect from both.
The bounciness of the production suggests these dudes have been spending some time in Miami away from the Toronto cold.
The Majid and PARTY combination seems pretty natural, here’s hoping to some more collaborative work from these dudes.
Aminé – “Turf”
Fresh off a week that saw an XXL Freshman list spot and news that his hit song “Caroline” went three times platinum, Aminé comes through with his new song “Turf,” showing the Portland native at his contemplative best.
“Turf” is representative of why Aminé is so highly thought of within hip-hop circles, surely there’s a lot more to come from Aminé.