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Image via DT Blanco
5 On It is a feature that looks at five of the best under-the-radar rap findings from the past week, highlighting new or recently discovered artists, or interesting obscurities.
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Image via Slim Slater
Slim Slater – The Slim Slater Tape
Cleveland’s Slim Slater popped up on my radar two weeks back with his clever, gleefully ignorant songs “Bitch Took A Loss” and “Airport.”
His new mixtape The Slim Slater Tape feels deservingly eponymous: It’s an extension of the aforementioned two singles, twenty-two songs of excellent, often simple production, humorously disrespectful rapping, and the crystallization of a style. If you don’t like Slater, you’ll find The Slim Slater Tape interminable; if you do like Slater, The Slim Slater Tape is easy to let play from start to finish—even if twenty-two songs is probably ten too many for any artist, let alone an emerging one. In spite of occasional lag, the tape is carried by Slater’s production choices and wit.
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Image via DT Blanco
DT Blanco – Vanity
Austin, Texas’ DT Blanco was responsible for one of my favorite songs of the last two years, “Flexa$”—one of the earliest entrants in 5 On It. Vanity, Blanco’s first full body of work, expands on the promise of “Flexa$,” a collection of excellent beats accompanying the rapper’s deliberate flow, at times echoing 2 Chainz and Pimp C in ways that showcase the difference between embodying inspiration and biting predecessors.
Blanco’s greatest strength lies in her beat selection, understanding the spectrum of sounds—the mellow lilt of “Mademoiselle,” the jazzy cloud-hop of closer and standout “Beyond Fate,” and, of course, the hypnotic thump of “Flexa$” (which remains every bit the hit-in-waiting)—that complement her voice and bring the best out of her particular style.
A directly related aside: When I wrote an article about homosexuality in hip-hop a year and a half ago, several of the comments noted that it doesn’t matter whether you’re a gay or straight rapper, just a good or bad rapper. Many of these comments were a little less tactful than I’ve been here and also pose an argument that isn’t without its flaws, meritocratic though it may be. Yes, quality of rapping is far more pertinent than sexual preference when judging a rapper (which is to say the former actually matters, the latter doesn’t at all), but it is difficult to ignore the fact that DT Blanco raps openly about having sex with women, broaching the topic of her orientation without turning it into a “talking point.”
There’s a larger, more nuanced conversation to be had here—one about the seeming double standard that exists for how male and female rappers who talk about same sex love or intercourse would be received, one about how to effectively introduce these kinds of conversations through music without being didactic, one about the openness of hip-hop as it ages and advances culturally—but it feels important to note that Blanco’s honesty on record—bold without being showy or deliberately political.
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Image via Chaboki
Chaboki – “Handle That”
Back to back weeks of 5 On It featuring quality Chicago street hip-hop (and, out of pure coincidence, an artist affiliated with last week’s entrants Young Famous and 600Breezy).
Toronto-born, Chicago-raised rapper Chaboki’s “Handle That” is exactly the sort of catchy, druggy post-Chief Keef rap that doesn’t seem to come out of the Windy City often enough for my taste. Built around a hook that makes hypnotic use of the title phrase, “Handle That” burrows its way into your brain before you finish listening to it.
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Image via Ezko
Ezko – SleEP EP
Maryland’s Ezko typifies one of the recurring classes of artists in 5 On It: the young rapper with technical gifts, figuring out how to tell his story or finding compelling topics to rap about. His new EP SleEP feels like his strongest step yet, a worthy use of his ability and ear for old school-leaning beats that don’t feel hopelessly stuck in the past.
The heart of the project is the trio of “Afrodite,” “Piece of the Pie,” “Sucka 4 Luv,” perhaps the clearest examples of what Ezko can do when he focuses his attention on narrative and worldly details rather than celebrating his skills as a rapper (or other similar “real rap” platitudes that plague the tape in places). It’s a brief glimpse of Ezko’s potential in flight, a rapper capable of effectively channeling his forebears and observing his daily reality.
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Image via Loaf Trembo
Loaf Tembo ft. Tre Amani – “Zen”
When I first received an email about Loaf Tembo and Tre’ Amani’s “Zen” from North Carolina singer/producer Brent Faiyaz, I was intrigued. I respect Faiyaz’s music, so I imagined we might have similar taste (a rule about trusting certain sources addressed in a past 5 On It title). Intrigue gave way to quick skepticism: I didn’t like “Zen” at first listen.
I had to go back two more times to find the kernel that ultimately convinced me Tembo and Amani merited coverage. “Zen” sounds cut from a less angry corner of Los Angeles-based lo-fi king Bones’ cloth. With production that seems influenced in equal measure by southern hip-hop and 90s metal, “Zen” echoes Bones’ music for disenfranchised suburbanites. In Trembo’s words, the song details “2 people going about problems with themselves and things around them that can’t really be controlled—just venting to each other to get stuff out in order to be aware of the problems and to accept one’s own flaws and ultimately find inner peace i.e. ‘zen.'”
