In Revue- Surf (Chance the Rapper, Donnie Trumpet and the Social Experiment)

I owe my current music writing to Chance the Rapper. That sounds weird to say, but it's true. I was in a bad way before I heard his squawking juke cut "Good Ass Intro" from Acid Rap in May 2013. Depression was gripping me because I had real doubts about continuing to write. I was convinced that I had nothing creative left to say, the worst problem any writer could have. Of course that sort of fear only worsens depression because your future seems to fall apart. Chance's track pieced things back together. I won't soon forget mashing my laptop keyboard during a chemistry lecture, the words flowing as quickly as he does on the song. It wasn't a great review by any means, but dammit it got me to believe again.

I share that personal anecdote to show the inspirational effect a 22-year-old kid from Chicago's music has on people. I say "has," indicating the here and now, because Surf, his brilliant follow-up to the equally brilliant Acid Rap, will inspire people. It's too bright, warm, soulful and unapologetically upbeat not to motivate. You'll want to call and thank your grandma after hearing "Sunday Candy," the de jure closer which details Christmas dinners and rent payments made by an impossibly good-natured human. Hell it makes communion sound both lovely and sensual, which isn't easy considering it involves stale wafers (at least in my experience).

In the material world, KYLE's verse on the hybrid electro-jazz/stuttering barbershop quartet number "Wanna Be Cool" pushes me to go buyout a Payless. "Nobody f****ng cares, so why don't you just be the you that you know you are?" he asks us. Don't worry about the label, all that matters is if it's comfortable. Chance and his collaborators Donnie Trumpet & the Social Experiment hammer home the "be you" idea on follow-up "Windows," though it's in a minor key. "Don't you look up to me; don't trust a word I say," Chance warbles in his most sobering voice since he sang about Chicago murder rates on "Paranoia." Synthesizers gently fade up, horns shimmer, drums patter like morning rain, guitars are delicately plucked and organs pipe in from a desert island. Between the music and Chance's weary tone, you realize how important finding your own path is.

The music of Surf consistently inspires through its warmth. I don't know how much direct input Chance had in Donnie Trumpet & the Social Experiment's playing, but I feel like he at least said "I want to feel like I’m swaddled in wool blankets with the Sun beaming down on me." All of the album’s components fit into that aesthetic. The kitchen percussion of "Slip Slide." "Warm Enough"'s tweeting birds. Every palm-muted guitar chord in "Rememory." Migos member Quavo's pitch-shifting vocals on King Louie team-up "Familiar." They all tickle your innards enough to move you off the couch (Side note: Quavo needs to use more Autotune; he has a weird bluesman quality with it.)

Some listening to Surf will be tempted to say this album needs less guests and more Chance, but we get the Goldilocks amount of Mr. Bennett. Just when his voice might risk grating you, he disappears into brass ether. He’s perfectly comfortable with having entire tracks be instrumentals and he's doesn't seem to bat an eye when guest rappers go for his jugular. I echo Stereogum's resident music scholar Tom Breihan in saying I've never heard Big Sean or B.o.B spit the way they do on "Wanna Be Cool" and "Slip Slide." Big Sean cuts the s*** with his corny jokes long enough to illuminate the legal struggles of a younger brother, while B.o.B remembers when his roof used to leak. Had he been so candid on 2010’s The Adventures of Bobby Ray, I can imagine he would have a lot more critical cache. It's almost frightening the singular focuses he displays.

Without question that is Surf's greatest strength: Chance's ability to get others to see his vision. It's akin to what Beyoncé did on her self-titled LP. His name doesn't appear anywhere in iTunes credits, but you know it's him. No one working in rap, not even King Kendrick, could create something so endearingly goofy and seriously reflective at the same time. Whatever is inspiring Chance is inspiring anyone who is listening. 

 

In Revue- '1017 Thug 2' (Young Thug)

On Friday afternoon, while I was walking around my local grocery store, I had rap weirdo Young Thug's latest mixtape 1017 Thug 2 blaring through my iPhone earbuds. Despite the sequel to 2013's engaging 1017 Thug having just dropped the afternoon before, I'd already racked up four complete plays of the tape on my phone and was on my fifth go-round as I combed the store for guacamole ingredients. Somewhere in the chip aisle, a Cheshire cat smile crept across my face that I couldn't shake. I tried counting different tortilla chip brands, staring at the store's pristine white floors, and scrolling through my Twitter feed but nothing worked. Standing in the checkout line and leafing through tabloids didn't cut it either. The smirk affixed to my lips must've scared the new cashier who made no attempt to chat while I was paying.

I have no way of knowing if anyone else has this reaction, but listening to 1017 Thug 2 fosters giddiness in me I can't control. From the opening Autotuned mumble of "get along little doggy" in "1017 Lifestyle" to his comically antithetical croak of "I creep silent" in closer "Warrior," 1017 Thug 2 is a marathon sprint through the funhouse that is Young Thug's life in 2014. In mid-June the Atlanta native inked a deal with fledgling indie label 300 Entertainment. On July 1 Thugga appeared alongside fellow oddball A$AP Ferg and Indiana fire breather Freddie Gibbs on the mesmerizing dark twinkle of "Old English." And if all of that wasn't enough, in a five-day span he dropped a pair of tracks from two separate rapper/producer projects he promises will see light before the year ends. Needless to say these are incredibly busy times for the 21-year-old born Jeffrey Williams, which makes 1017 Thug 2 feel all the more like a victory lap.

Though 1017 Thug 2 is effectively a clearing house for Young Thug tracks in the Brick Squad vaults, the songs blur together like a Magic Eye picture. The production work is best described as "effervescent stomp" and when efforts like Migos feature "Sub Zero" shade towards "dark," they still inspire infectious head nodding. "Oh Ya" initially sticks out with its ghastly background vocals moaning the hook to Haddaway's "What Is Love?" but fits right in when the reptilian hi-hat tics come through. Even "Run It Up"'s opening, that reminds me of the sinister Donkey Kong start music, bleeps along with joy. Listening to such a cohesive work, you'd never know it was created by piecemeal unless you were told so.

A lion's share of the credit for 1017 Thug 2's cohesion goes to Young Thug himself, who imbues every track with the kind of atomic energy only he possesses in 2014. A big part of my (and a lot of people's) fascination with Thugga is inextricably tied to the way he'll yip, mumble, bellow, scream, bark, and laugh in the span of a single song without taking a break and somehow making it work. Occasionally Thug will need an assist, like on the C4-produced "Trigger Finger" where the glossy keyboard has to stop so he can adjust his sliding Autotune croon. Or Thugga will be in such a steady groove of stream-of-consciousness that he'll have to snap out to explain to struggling listeners what the hell he's saying. How else can you explain Thug adlibbing "green thumb" in the joyous opener "1017 Lifestyle," right after bragging "count so much money with my thumb everything I touch turns green?" He's well aware of how opaque his eccentricities can be and doesn't mind letting a little light in.

Most often though Young Thug goes nuclear without batting an eye. Atop the urgent S.O.S. keys and willful machine claps of "Let Up" he yawps what might be the tape's best line: "I've got a big mink on I'm a walking gorilla," right after promising "I'll n** on her like Milli Vanilli." He does all of that while strutting around in a pair of Air Jordan 9s, which were the first shoes Nike released after Michael Jordan retired for the first time in 1993. Rappers constantly brag about the Jordans they rock, but Thugga's one of the only ones I know that's taking it back to the retiree years. "Take It" similarly skirts "traditional" gangsta rap by wrapping threats in honest concern. "Let them choppers sing to you like Pandora and I hope you've got insurance on your daughter," he chirps over the trap-techno beat in reverse. Thug's showed up in a leopard print dress to a photo-shoot, so looking "tough" or "manly" isn't a top priority of his.

Nowhere is that more evident than on the syrup sipping love ballad "Strange Things." Young Thug's practically cooing "she say she wants to drink up some lean" as a synthesizer is gently fluffed like a goose-down pillow and bubbles steadily pop in the background. Far too often rappers and R&B singers will get lecherously forceful on bedroom songs; not Thug. He's lying on the mattress asking "do you know lean makes you do strange things?" before the druggy sex can begin. Instead of speaking the language of love, he's worrying aloud about going to prison and "making it" in his career. Thug knows romance isn't about pleasant sweet nothings, but honesty.

Ultimately its Young Thug's candor that sets him apart. Plenty of rappers would admit to being scared of incarceration, few would make that confession as they puff out their chest. While brazenly indirect, his approach is fearless. He has no problem slurring his delivery or letting out exhaustive sighs to drive home a point. Other than Migos and MPA Wicced on "Warrior," there aren't any posse appearances on 1017 Thug 2, which furthers mixtape Weezy comparisons. When Lil Wayne was in the midst of his legendary 2005-2008 mixtape run, few (if any) rappers dared to show up on his beat jacks for fear of embarrassment. So it is with Thugga. A rapper following an extended run of his vocal contortions would be 40 points down before the ball is tipped. Young Thug's so much "bigger" than most rappers right now that even "compilation" releases turn into events.

"Run It Up"

"Strange Things"

You can download 1017 Thug 2 now through Audiomack.

"Get Down" ft. Gucci Mane- Migos

Migos wouldn't exist without ATL's ultimate weirdo Gucci Mane. There's no other way to parse it. The dark, slinky (read cheap) beats they routinely pulverize were perfected by Gucci and frequent collaborator Zaytoven years ago. A line like "keep f***ing with me n**** they find you in the river somewhere in Chattanooga, Tennessee" is the sort of specific threat Guwop could rattle off without raising his voice.

So hearing two of Atlanta's best-known entities together again on a track is an incredible treat. While Migos' flamethrowing threatens Gucci's cool persona on the Gothic wobble of "Get Down", he never melts under the pressure. Somehow between flipping off the prosecution and warning local rappers "I'll put you on the local news" Gucci has the time to "snatch all the clothes out the mall like the looters do." Consider that. The man doesn't have closets full of clothes, he's got entire malls he can lay claim to. It's wise for Migos to slot Gucci second in the lineup, because his magnitude anchors everyone on the track. The promise to "hit 'em with guns made from Germany" would be out of place without Gucci's bizarre table-setting. And more than an anchor, Gucci acts as inspiration. Migos' monosyllabic intensity is turned to 11 here; every barked line could leave them hoarse. Even when Gucci Mane's kicking back, he gets others to stand at full attention.

"Get Down" will be featured on a forthcoming Gangsta Grillz compilation entitled Solid Foundation and Migos currently have Y.R.N. 2 coming down the pipeline at any time now. Gucci Mane continues to await sentencing on federal gun charges, which could net him up to 20 years in prison.