These are my additional thoughts on the albums ‘Liquid Swords’ by GZA and ‘Grey Area’ by Little Simz after spending more time with each album. Enjoy!
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100 gecs – 1000 gecs
21 Savage – Without Warning
A Tribe Called Quest – Low End Theory
Baby Keem – The Melodic Blue
Backxwash – I LIE HERE BURIED WITH MY RINGS AND MY DRESSES
BROCKHAMPTON – Saturation
Bone Thugs-n-Harmony – Creepin on Ah Come Up
Childish Gambino – Because the Internet
Clipping. – There Existed an Addiction to Blood
Danny Brown – Atrocity Exhibition, XXX
Death Grips – The Money Store, Exmilitary
Denzel Curry – Taboo, Unlocked!, Melt My Eyez See Your Future
DMX – It’s Dark and Hell is Hot
Drake – Take Care
Earl Sweatshirt – Doris
Frank Ocean – Blonde, Channel Orange
Freddie Gibbs – Pinata
Injury Reserve – By the Time I Get to Phoenix
J Cole – 2014 Forest Hills Drive
J Dilla – Donuts
Jay Z – Reasonable Doubt, Watch the Throne
JID – The Never Story
JPEGMAFIA – Veteran, All My Heroes Are Cornballs, LP!
Ka – Honor Killed the Samurai
Kanye – College Dropout, Late Registration, Graduation, 808s & Heartbreak, MBDTF, Yeezus, Life of Pablo, Ye
Kendrick – Section.80, Good Kid Mad City, To Pimp a Butterfly, DAMN, Untitled Unmastered, Mr. Morale and the Big Steppers
Kenny Beats – Louie
Kid Cudi – Man on the Moon
Kids See Ghosts – Kids See Ghosts
Lauryn Hill – The Miseducation of
Little Simz – Sometimes I Might Be Introvert, Grey Area
Mac Miller – Swimming, Circles
MF DOOM – Madvillainy, Mm Food
Michael Jackson – Thriller
Nas – Illmatic
Nicki Minaj – Pink Print
NONAME – Telefone
Notorious B.I.G. – Ready to Die
On Man – Self Titled
Outkast – Southernplaya, ATLiens, Aquemini
Playboi Carti – Die Lit, Whole Lotta Red
Pusha T – Daytona
Richie Russo – Make Believe
Run the Jewels – RTJ 1, RTJ 2
SZA – CTRL
Teyana Taylor – KTSE
The Weeknd – House of Balloons
Three 6 Mafia – Mystic Stylez
Travis Scott – Astroworld
Tupac – Me Against the World
Tyler the Creator – IGOR, Flower Boy, Call Me if You Get Lost
Vince Staples – Hell Can Wait
Wu-Tang – 36 Chambers, Liquid Swords
source
If you want to dive in to some more grime maybe look at SlowThai, Nothing Great About Britain!
My favorite acronym GZA uses is in “living in the world today” at the end of his verse he uses “Father You See King the Police” for
F.U.C.K the police. Took me a few listens before I figured that out. Just GZA’s cool ass way of writing
When it comes to vocabulary it makes me think of a Lupe Fiasco bar 'I like my pictures in word form.' i can't wait till you finally get to wu-tang forever and hear ghostface's verse on impossible
7:01 aesop rock enjoyers' are typing_
Wonder if you go 4 for 4 coming Friday 🤞🏻
if you want great grime music, you should react to jme's "grime mc". His newest album, and is just a long list of solid grime songs from a clever lyricist with a hard delivery. Definitely think you should check it out!
one great album with some great songs and a lot of meaning is nothing great about britain by slowthai, im pretty sure you'll really like it
Great albums
For Grime albums you gotta do Skepta’s Konnichiwa, Wileys’s Godfather and Kano’s Made in the Manor
Please react to days before rodeo by Travis Scott
@bob the poppop also Return of the 36 chambers from Ol Dirty Bastard is also dope you should check that out along with Tical From Method Man they’re rugged and raw and RZA’s beats are dope along with Only Built 4 Cubin Linx too I hope in the future you check those out keep these great videos man 👍🏾👍🏾👍🏾
Bob, the new Little Simz album is, dare I say, even better than Grey Area and SIMBI. It's like a baby of both, it's concise like GA but epic and deep like Introvert.
GRIME
there is not so many great grime albums because grime culture is about BEING GREAT MC more than crafting great albums, a lot of best grime things comes from radio and club sets or clashes BUT there are some great albums or compilations released as albums
the best introduction u can have to grime is probably DJ Magic – No Hats No Hoods Edition 1 2009; this is DJ Mix released as album that was showcase for many artists in 10s
Dizzee Rascal – Boy in da Corner 2003; is the most iconic grime album, first from the genre that won Mercury Prize (most prestigious music awards in UK, Simz won it for SIMBI last year)
Skepta – Konnichiwa 2016; 2nd grime album that won Mercury Prize, it's mostly grimy but with US influences since Skepta was very present in US scene during that time (he did collabs with Drake, Carti, Rocky etc)
Wiley – Godfather 2017; Kanye West of GRIME, literally with all pros and cons lmao
Jme – Integrity and Grime MC; Skeptas brother he have some corny lines but both albums are great anyway, some people say he is even better than Skepta
Kano – Hoodies All Summer 2019; it's UK hip hop not grime but Kano IS grime legend and there is one of the best grime tracks of all time on this album. sweet album Simbi is huge Kano fan and they did some tours together
Ruff Sqwad – White Label Classics; probably the greatest instrumental album/compilation
there is no point to listen to that 25 minutes "track" because u can watch it as documentary on youtube, it's named "Like I Never Left"
there is also other thing on his youtube named "Track by Track Commentary", it's like 30 minutes and worth to watch even more than this documentary in my opinion, nothing that gonna blows ur mind but it's fun to hear his perspective about creating particular tracks
You should give Killarmy – Silent Weapons for Quiet Wars and Camp Lo – Uptown Saturday Nght albums a listen. You will not be disappointed.
Bob, it's highly unlikely that you will do another GZA album reaction, but I highly recommend listening to his discography on your own time. He gets sharper every album and there are specific clever songs similar to 'Labels' that you will find incredible. I will leave those at the bottom of this comment so you can check them out asap. Take care.
Fame
Animal Planet
Queens Gambit
0% Finance
Can’t wait for DS2
hope you feel better Bob! My fam and I have been sick for the last 4 months! Since school started. And it hasn't even been covid. Off and on – healthy for a few days and sick again! Its crazy out there right now.
also – its better than 36 chambers. Liquid Swords is a much wiser album. A much more mature album.
also – request! SEASON OF THE SICCNESS by Brotha Lynch Hung – probably the most shocking rap album of all time.
Since you very much like Killah Priest on B.I.B.L.E. you should consider listening to his first solo album Heavy Mental. It's a gem which is full of these kind of lyrics.
Welcome to the 5%er rabbit hole haha. A lot of rappers or just prominent people in the black community are into it. I think some of the concepts are interesting, like the namesake: 85% of people (especially religious people) are controlled by 10% of the world's elites, and 5% of people are enlightened and actually get the point of spirituality. BIBLE picks apart many of the reasons organized religion actually prevents free thinking, which is the opposite of being spiritual and searching for answers. I'm Christian, but undoubtedly there are many who misuse religion for power, or use it as an excuse to judge others and perceive themselves as innocent. But really, a relationship with God should be about self improvement and helping each other be better.
But then there's the black supremacist side of 5%ers. They're an offshoot of The Nation of Islam (not to be confused with normal Islam), which believes white people were an experiment gone wrong by a mad scientist. In any case, their basic tenet is that we were all originally black (might be true but who knows) but then take that to mean being black is closer to God since we were made in God's image. It's usually also related to the conspiracy theory that the Israelites/Jews were black, and that at some point, white people changed history and claimed that they were the real Jews. This is a big reason why Kanye is in trouble right now. He bought into the conspiracy (maybe a while ago) but is taking it even further. In reality of course, Jews were middle Eastern, and are generally seen as white now because of intermarriage with European people after the destruction of Jerusalem and their migration out of the area. But being as it's an ethnicity, some black people are Jews, like Drake.
So yeah, there are some interesting things to think about, some of which are true, like the white image we think of Jesus as being false and based off of Cesare de Borgia, the son of perhaps the most evil pope ever. But…it takes things much to far and extrapolates real black/brown erasure into something just as racist.
Bob you should listen to Pray for Paris by westside gunn
Please sir, react to sza’s new album sos. Please. It just came out and I can not fucking wait for you to get a load of this!!
That boy camera looking clean
Bible is not about being a 5 percenter, those people dont know what they talking about. Most wu tang is 5 percent. But killah priest was talking about the hebrew Israelite belief.
If you're really into lyrics and strong vocabulary, you should check out masterpiece albums like Rip the Jacker by Canibus and Doe or Die by AZ. AZ is the guy that rapped with Nas on "Life's a bitch".