Culture Greyhound

Habits and Contradictions is growing to be one of my favorites of 2012 for sure. And now Q has dropped an awesome new track for the summertime. Crank it on the weekend!

Once every three months I list the best of what I heard in albums/songs/remixes for the quarter. I do this to personally keep up with all the awesome music I hear, as it ultimately helps me at the end of the year when I do my overall listing for the previous twelve months. I also do it to introduce you cool cats to tunes you may have missed independently.

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Interscope’s rap roster just got a lot more awesome: Top Dawg Entertainment has confirmed a joint venture today with Interscope/Aftermath, which features the emerging Black Hippy collective. That crew includes none other than my two new favorite rappers, Kendrick Lamar and Schoolboy Q. This is great news for the up-and-comers, especially Lamar, whose latest upcoming album this summer will be released on the major label. Expect to hear big things from these guys in the months ahead.

Kendrick Lamar is the breakout star of the Black Hippy collective, a foursome of rappers changing the LA rap game. Probably the one delivering the darkest themes, however, is Schoolboy Q; his debut Habits and Contradictions is a far cry from the contemplative, more upbeat Section.80. Almost everything in the album is aggressive, pessimistic, and raw. While his colleague prefers to analyze our generation and current situation amongst the aura of weed rap wooziness, Q’s vibes are less pensive and more cynical. The drug haze remains in the production, but Lamar is for those who let their mind wander. Q might be smoking, but he never strays too far from the harsh realities around him.

Listen to Habits and Contradictions on Spotify.