The conversation around rap’s song of the summer is too boring and outdated; I’ll leave that for the mainstream podcasts. For me, it’s much more interesting to think about it on a smaller and more personal scale, finding the songs from Michigan or Florida or the Dominican Republic that I can’t get enough of, and wondering how they reflect or upend the sound or mood of the rap coming from that area. Here are the 11 rap songs of the summer that I can’t get out of my headphones.
Lil2Posh: “Shopping Spree”
Here’s the scene in “Shopping Spree”: Lil2Posh and his girlfriend head out to the mall so he can shower her with gifts to show his affection. Sweet! Except that, once they get there, he scraps that idea and instead just buys himself a bunch of new outfits and accessories. You know, a little Balenciaga, a dash of Marni, and a Gucci belt, as well as a new diamond necklace and dermal piercing. Bringing back the fluorescently bright synths and melodies of Chicago bop—the light, dancey, and Auto-Tuned swag music of the early and mid-2010s—Lil2Posh sounds like he’s laying on his stomach in his bedroom styling his Sim on the computer. Pulling off a more nasally version of Chief Keef’s sing-raps around the time of “Save That Shit” and “Macaroni Time,” 2Posh lands on a mood that is really dreamy and fun, even though he refuses to apologize for cheaping out on his girl: “She want me to please say sorry/I’m not so sorry.”
Tha Hot Girls: “We on Fire”
There’s a bunch of poppin’ bounce girls in New Orleans right now, including Tha Hot Girls. As far as I know, they’re a bounce clique whose schtick seems to be remaking old Hot Boys songs. Evidence: A few months ago, they turned “I Need a Hot Girl” into “I Need a Hot Boy,” naturally. And, more recently, they gave the same treatment to “We on Fire,” dressing it up with a jerky flip courtesy of bounce staple BlaqNmilD and gender-flipping the “What kind of boy?” lyrical structure into “What kind of girl?” in a way that would make the Sporty Thievz proud. OK, now hit me with your concerns:
Alphonse, aren’t Tha Hot Girls just a glorified cover band?
Maybe. But the world would be a better place if there were more Hot Boys cover bands.
Isn’t this song extremely unoriginal?
Actually, I don’t think so. Bounce music is a genre built on repurposing the same sounds a thousand different ways and finding ways to distinguish the songs in the nuances. Here, it’s how elaborate their ways of hyping themselves become as the song goes on: “What kind of girls do you know got groupies?/Oooh, she really savage and she throw two Gs.”
Should Tha Hot Girs try something else next?
Hell no! They should remake all of Get It How U Live!! while they’re at it.
Kamaiyah: “Self Made Self Paid” and 4TheWinn: “Vangundy”
Kamaiyah’s First Lady of the Mob is her best tape in years, thanks to her work with DJ Idea, the California producer with old B-Legit-type beats on lock. Specifically on “Self Made Self Paid,” the Oakland native’s easygoing G-funk melodies and boss raps have an edge to them that feels incredibly true to the modern-day West Coast rap crooner. The same modern-retro feel is apparent on 4TheWinn’s “Vangundy,” which was probably my most played IG snippet of the year until it officially dropped this week. The track is also produced by DJ Idea, and fully loaded with all the vintage Bay Area whistles and two-stepping percussion, and 4TheWinn brings a from-the-gut flow that is only slightly less toned-down than the drill happening over in Stockton. Listening to the tracks together, it’s like having Northern California rappers of the 2020s time travel back to 1999.
Pop Kreep: “Alley” [ft. Jodot Kreep]
As much as I love the “club-drill” of 41, the “sexy drill” of Cash Cobain and friends, and the way they absorbed elements of drill production into a gentler sound that could go off at parties and in clubs, nothing hits like the real thing when done right. Enter Pop Kreep and Jodot Kreep’s “Alley,” a pitch-dark, ghoulish, relentless inferno. I haven’t been knocked over like this by the sheer unbridled energy of a New York drill cut since the early days of SweepersENT. What does it is the demonic church bell beat and Pop and Jodot’s fast-paced snarling flows, which combine for an atmosphere as chilling as the priest’s supernatural death scene in The Omen. To make it even more visceral, the duo are kind of hilariously squawking “kreep” over and over like it’s a spell and spitting bars that could have been said by Three 6 Mafia in their Triple 6 Mafia days: “Gotta walk through the darkness to get to the light.” This is pure feeling; this is drill.
Mike Mike: “I Got Something for You” [ft. Yonaa]
Sorry to Huda and Jeremiah, but the most toxic couple of the summer is Mike Mike and Yonaa on “I Got Something for You.” The Milwaukee duo, coming on the heels of the massively underrated twerk anthem “Shake It,” play the roles of that one couple defined by lies, cheating, and jealousy that for some reason won’t break the hell up. I might be underselling it, because Mike and Yonaa are really on one, pushing the story to places that even the craziest soap operas would never go. Within the first 40 seconds, in their seamless back and forth over a gentle club bounce, Yonaa reveals that she’s smashing Mike’s friend and Mike tells her he’s been hiding a baby from her on the side. From there, it gets only more absurd and unhinged. Yonaa threatens to off his side girl and frame him for it, and she also says she’s going to break his car down. Meanwhile, Mike, on the defense, getting run off the floor by Yonaa’s threats, comes up with a fantasy of her smoking hookah at the club laced with fentanyl. Kind of Hitchcockian. It’s gotta be the most fucked up anti-romance song of the year.
1Up Tee & Babyfxce E: “Need Dat”
One of my favorite micro-trends is those beats that find ways to update vintage G-funk. I’m thinking YL and Subjxct 5’s Dre homage on “Tha Chronic,” the smooth synths on Big Sad 1900’s “Come Find Us,” and the flip of Tha Dogg Pound’s funky sex romp “Let’s Play House” on “Need Dat.” Sure, flipping “Let’s Play House” is a cheat code, considering Daz Dillinger’s beat is the kind of all-time stuff that makes life feel like an eternal pool party, but Michigan’s 1Up Tee and Babyfxce E, one of the rap duos of the year, are up to the task. Both in full-on player mode, they imagine scenarios they would get into if they spotted a girl so fine it blew them away. Of the two, Tee is ready to settle down, thinking about booking beachy getaways to Thailand and fighting her man for her hand. E, meanwhile, is the unabashed womanizer, having sex in the whip and explaining to a girl’s boyfriend that they only kissed a little bit. I would consider it Michigan rap’s version of an ’80s sex comedy, if the booming flip didn’t make it also kind of romantic.
YMC Ant: “Block Flow” [ft. DanLeveledUp and YMC Backz]
Smashing together the bluesy melodies of the Deep South and the get-money raps of the Northeast, Baltimore has had a fascinating signature sound for years now, even if the music has often washed over me. That was until I heard YMC Ant’s 34/7. He might be smoothly sing-rapping, but the feeling is more like one of those hustle-heavy 2000s Philly freestyles where they’re rapping so hard that you can see the sweat dripping down from their foreheads even in 240p. That’s especially the case with “Block Flow,” as Ant and his boys DanLeveledUp and YMC Backz fly through got-it-from-the-mud raps over the kind of celebratory horn beat that makes you want to go blow your next check on the stupidest shit possible. Real bottle poppin’ music! And, if you’re into that, you’re in luck, because a few weeks ago, Ant and them dropped a whole mixtape full of these posse cuts.
Little Homie & Huan62: “Natural”
Back when I was writing blogs about Drego and Beno and Teejayx6’s scam rap, I never thought I’d see the day when the sound of Michigan rap went worldwide. Now, all these years later, their signature form of bouncy punchline rap has branched out so far that you have dudes out in the Dominican Republic like Luis Brown and Lil Naay who seem like they’ve studied their fair share of Skilla Baby and BabyTron. My favorites of the wave are Little Homie and Huan62, because, on “Natural,” they put their own local spin on it. Together, they merge the upbeat sing-songy feel of street rap–inflected dembow artists like El Alfa and Rochy RD with the spirit of the loose-lipped back-and-forths you might find on Rio and Mike tapes. I have no idea how we got here, but I’m with it.
45GBaby: “Rider (Remix)” [ft. Chicken P]
In a just world that wasn’t so busy arguing about Ian freestyles and Drake subliminals, we would be having daily discussions about Chicken P. Everything he touches gets better, and he has been going toe-to-toe with a few of the best rappers in the Midwest and South for a minute now. 45GBaby’s “Rider” didn’t even need his touch—it was already a smash with the way the track merged the loose-limbed vibe of lowend with the high-speed bag-chasing fantasies that FayFay and Ghost have had on lock for the last year or two. But the Chicken P remix is, in my book, an instant classic of Milwaukee rap. His verse is short and lightly Auto-Tuned, but gives the track an extra boost of personality and lines that feel like an entire story in a few words: “Paid 10 hoes’ rent/My bitch cuss me out, I’m like, ‘It’s just 10,000.’” Put him on everything.
Lil Yab: “Golden Child”
There’s been plenty of good rap out of Florida this year—El Snappo singles made fast and slowed down, Hurricane Wisdom’s “My Niggaz,” whatever Wizz Havinn gets up to—but the laidback funk of Lil Yab’s “Golden Child” is the one. Yab, who is from Fort Lauderdale, lays down two minutes of easygoing stunting while his voice is engulfed by a bassline that rumbles like a Harley. He doesn’t fight with the beat, though; instead, it makes you listen closer, an effect that reminds me of listening to one of those raw pre-1996 Cash Money tapes, like U.N.L.V.’s Straight Out tha Gutta. It’s such a cool sound that I’m willing to forgive the music video for being one long Cybertruck flex.