This week’s guest on Uproxx Sessions is Smrtdeath, a genre-bending rapper and singer from Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, singing his defiant anthem, “Too Far Gone.” Mashing up emo and punk influences with hip-hop production sensibilities, Smrtdeath is part of an underground movement that doesn’t follow the conventional rules of popular music. Smrtdeath himself takes things a step further, refusing to abide by the conventions of fashion, as well, as seen on the cover of his November album, Somethjng’s Wrong (that’s not a typo).
On “Too Far Gone,” Smrtdeath addresses any potential criticisms of his lifestyle head-on: “Living on my time, give a fuck about what they say,” he snarls. “All of this advice but it’s coming from no pain.” On that same note, he’s previously spoken about the encouraging messaging behind his music. “You’ve got to remember that things can be better,” he said. “You will come out on the other side.”
UPROXX Sessions is Uproxx’s performance show featuring the hottest up-and-coming acts you should keep an eye on. Featuring creative direction from LA promotion collective, Ham On Everything, and taking place on our “bathroom” set designed and painted by Julian Gross,UPROXX Sessionsis a showcase of some of our favorite performers, who just might soon be yours, too.
The RX is Uproxx Music’s stamp of approval for the best albums, songs, and music stories throughout the year. Inclusion in this category is the highest distinction we can bestow, and signals the most important music being released throughout the year. The RX is the music you need, right now.
There’s no shortage of confidence on Lil Tjay’s latest full-length album, Destined 2 Win. The 22-year-old Bronx, New York native arrived with the assurance of an upperclassman on his swaggering debut, True 2 Myself, in 2018 and the scuffs and scrapes he’s taken since have done little to dull the sparkle in his eye as he guides the listener through 21 tracks displaying his wide-ranging abilities. However, you know how the saying goes: a Jack of all trades is a master of none, and that aphorism holds true despite the poise with which Tjay bears himself on his shape-shifting sophomore album.
There’s a lot to be said for the sort of confidence Tjay projects here. Some of us go 30 years or more without ever finding the level of intoxicating self-belief that allows him to write song titles like “Born 2 Be Great” without a hint of irony. Of course, self-belief and self-awareness seldom go hand-in-hand; whether that’s a boon to this album or a drawback depends on your point of view. I’m ambivalent; on one hand, I’m impressed by how deftly he dips into each stylistic tureen from which he draws his inspiration. On the other hand, I really wish that his own artistic voice would cut through the noise more distinctly, showing us who he is both as an artist and a person.
For instance, as Tjay metamorphoses, chameleonlike, between hood motivational speaker on propulsive tracks like “Hood Rich” and “Run It Up” and heartbroken, crooning lothario on “Irregular Love” and “Calling My Phone,” it gets increasingly difficult to pin down a unique worldview or dodge the sense that we’ve heard all this before. However, there’s an undeniable polish and panache to the proceedings that lends the sense that Tjay really put a lot of thought and effort into these songs to make them sound as catchy and captivating as possible.
When Tjay wants to party, “Move” and “Oh Well” provide plenty of the body-first, brain-second energy that makes such tracks work at their highest levels, then, when he tells us “Love Hurts,” he makes us believe him, worrying such juicy lyrical bones as “I see you postin’, that just put me on alert.” He’s certainly a product of his generation, pain-watching an ex’s social media and reacting in real-time, even as he admits “I know you feedin’ off of what I started first.”
Wearing his inspirations on his sleeve can bite him at times; his outright Drake impression on “Born 2 Be Great” is a microcosm of how much his flow treads in the footsteps of his forebears — ones who still have firm grasps on the pop culture zeitgeist. It also highlights just how little actual innovation he’s doing here. The singsong delivery he uses for most of the project has more-or-less been done to death and the beats, with their church bell chimes and menacing major chords, provide suitably ominous backdrops for his middling boasts and vague threats.
Through it all, his confidence carries, though. There’s a plainspoken earnestness that comes with that lack of self-critique or self-doubt. Few lines will stand out, but he sticks the landing on every one of them. By not taking huge swings, he rarely misses, offering a satisfying listen that doesn’t overstay its welcome, even if the back half of the album tends to drone. At 21 tracks, things could really drag, but instead, he brings the overall run time in at a crisp hour and five minutes, owing most of the dead weight to bonus tracks, which consist of older releases such as the Justin Bieber-sampling “None Of Your Love,” which was likely tacked-on to improve streaming metrics.
Although Destined 2 Win doesn’t offer many surprises or tremendous strides in character development for the burgeoning star, it does its job as a showcase for his burnished songwriting well enough to justify its existence. Eventually, Tjay’s young fan base will want more from him than empty flexes and generic “made it out the struggle” rhymes, and Destined doesn’t do quite enough to convince that he’ll be able to deliver when that time comes. His swagger is enough to coast on for now, with his charm as an artist and gift for imitation giving him a smooth surface to glide on while he figures himself out. Hopefully, no one scratches that surface before he does.
Destined 2 Win is out now on Columbia Records. Get it here.
Lil Nas X and “Montero (Call Me By Your Name)” have been everywhere lately, and now, that includes the Game Boy Advance, Nintendo’s handheld video game console that was discontinued over a decade ago.
A Twitter user known as pynnion shared a 36-second video of some of the “Montero” video playing on a Game Boy Advance system and wrote, “My mom took my phone so I’m watching the call me by your name music video on my gameboy @LilNasX.” The rapper was amazed by what he saw, as he shared the post and tweeted, “how is this real.”
As pynnion noted, this was achieved by using specialized software to convert the original video into a file format the Game Boy Advance can read and then putting the converted file on a “flash cart,” which is essentially a blank Game Boy Advance game cartridge that users can load their own game files onto. Presumably, the video format used is the same one Nintendo used back when they used to make Game Boy Advance Video cartridges that contained movies and episodes of TV shows. Somebody else did this recently when they converted Tenet for Game Boy Advance playback.
Watch “Montero (Call Me By Your Name)” playing on a Game Boy Advance above.
Diddy, the founder of the network Revolt TV, has penned an open letter to General Motors to call them out for their performative activism. According to Diddy, GM claims they support Revolt while simultaneously making them fight for advertising money. Diddy ended his letter by demanding that corporate America “reinvest an equitable percentage of what you take from our community back into our community.” However, since Diddy himself has a history of underpaying smaller artists, many saw his words as hypocritical.
Sharing an open letter to GM on Revolt’s website, Diddy wrote:
“When confronted by the leaders of several Black-owned media companies, General Motors (GM) listed my network, REVOLT, as an example of the Black-owned media it supports. While REVOLT does receive advertising revenue from GM, our relationship is not an example of success. Instead, REVOLT, just like other Black-owned media companies, fights for crumbs while GM makes billions of dollars every year from the Black community. Exposing GM’s historic refusal to fairly invest in Black-owned media is not an assassination of character, it’s exposing the way GM and many other advertisers have always treated us. No longer can Corporate America manipulate our community into believing that incremental progress is acceptable action.
Corporations like General Motors have exploited our culture, undermined our power, and excluded Black entrepreneurs from participating in the value created by Black consumers. In 2019, brands spent $239 billion on advertising. Less than 1% of that was invested in Black-owned media companies. Out of the roughly $3 billion General Motors spent on advertising, we estimate only $10 million was invested in Black-owned media. Only $10 million out of $3 billion! Like the rest of Corporate America, General Motors is telling us to sit down, shut up and be happy with what we get.”
After Diddy shared his open letter, though, many called him out for doing the same thing.
There’s too many stories about artists having to eat cat food for survival under Diddy’s umbrella for him to be writing an open letter to corporate America.
Chicago rapper and activist Noname agreed with critics, pointing out that Diddy is close to being a billionaire. “diddy… about a 150 million away from being a BILLIONAIRE diddy is shaming white corporations for a capitalist business model he almost completely replicated,” she wrote. “abolish the black capitalist industrial complex.”
diddy… about a 150 million away from being a BILLIONAIRE diddy is shaming white corporations for a capitalist business model he almost completely replicated
Another woman shared her own story, claiming Revolt approached her and asked her to make content without pay. “Diddy, it starts with us,” she wrote. “I was recently approached to host a show for Revolt and it came without pay. We cannot keep knocking white folks for their disrespect towards minority creators while doing the same thing to each other.”
Diddy, it starts with us. I was recently approached to host a show for Revolt and it came without pay. We cannot keep knocking white folks for their disrespect towards minority creators while doing the same thing to each other.
Dreamville singer Ari Lennox links up with YouTuber-turned-R&B-ambassador Queen Naija on her latest single, “Set Him Up.” In somewhat of a thematic 180 from her last all-female duet with Jazmine Sullivan, “On It,” Ari and Naija take unfaithful men to task on their unconventional crossover. The track follows a loose storyline of two friends catching up on their racy escapades with their new lovers — only to realize that their new “lovers” are the same man.
This leads to the duo forming a plot to “set him up” with a dinner invite with an extra plus-one. The two share their delight at the prospect of playing out their revenge fantasy, which involves bringing the philandering fiend to his favorite restaurant, only for both women to confront him; “Ooh, girl, I cannot wait to see the look upon his face,” smirks Naija.
The collaboration is the latest in a string of duets featuring Lennox, including the aforementioned “On It” and Lucky Daye’s “Access Denied.” The increasing frequency of releases suggests that Lennox might be working on a follow-up to her fan-favorite 2019 debut album Shea Butter Baby.
Meanwhile, Queen Naija has been prepping the deluxe edition of her debut album, Missunderstood…Still, with an expected release on April 16.
Listen to Ari Lennox and Queen Naija’s “Set Him Up” above.
Shelley — FKA DRAM — has a new album dropping in April, his first in over four years. Since then, he’s gone through a musical reinvention, a physical transformation, and a couple of name changes, but the biggest change to his life was the passing of his mother last year. The duo was close; in 2017, they released a holiday EP together, dueting on the Christmas classics “Silver Bells.” According to Shelley, she’s also the reason for his upcoming album’s release date, April 29.
Posting a photo of the pair on Instagram, Shelley explained that he pushed back the release date of his album to his mother’s birthday in honor of a favor she did for him before her death. As he expands in the caption, “Before she passed I played her my upcoming album and I begged her to promise she wouldn’t play it for anyone else. She held her promise and took the music with her beyond this life.”
For Shelley, the new release date is his way of paying her back. “Her birthday is April 29th, so I’m pushing my album Shelley FKA DRAM’s release date to April 29th as not only my gift back to her, but my promise to play it for the world.”
To promote the upcoming album, fittingly titled Shelley FKA DRAM, Shelly has presented the rollout in the form of a mock late-night talk show, which provided a smooth framing device for the videos for singles “Exposure” and “Cooking With Grease.”
It’s been a strong week of firsts for Florida rapper Rod Wave. Earlier this week, Billboard confirmed his first No. 1 album, SoulFly, and Wednesday night, he made his late-night debut on The Tonight Show performing the emotive album single “Tombstone.”
The pre-recorded performance appears to take place at a boathouse on the Everglades, which provides a sparkling background as Rod and his band play a stripped-down, moody rendition of the reflective track. With just a piano and a trio of backup singers, Rod wrings every last drop of emotion from the heart-swelling single, wisely letting his voice — the true star of SoulFly — take center stage.
SoulFly — Rod’s third album after Ghetto Gospel and Pray 4 Love — reached No. 1 behind a massive streaming push, which included singles “Street Runner,” “Tombstone,” and the Polo G-featuring “Richer,” which accumulated the bulk of the streams on the album. Another likely factor was his placement on XXL’s 2020 Freshmen cover, exposing him to the wider audience that helped him make the jump from Pray 4 Love‘s No. 4 debut to SoulFly‘s chart-topping first week. One thing’s for sure: Rod Wave is now a bona fide star.
Watch Rod Wave’s “Tombstone” performance for The Tonight Show above.
Last summer, Logic released No Pressure, which ended up being his final album before he announced his retirement from music and his pivot to streaming on Twitch. Now, though, the (former?) rapper suggests that he might make a return to music on a short new song he shared yesterday, “Tired In Malibu.”
The song runs for just a minute, and after some lines about Elon Musk, Animorphs, and wrestling, he concludes, “Retired for a minute, but I guess I’m back, man.”
Back in July, Logic explained why he decided to retire, saying, “I just wanted to retire because I’m over it man. Not even in a negative way, I’m just over it. I love music and I’m gonna continue to make music on my own. I can’t not just make music. It’s a journal for me. It’s how I express myself. It’s how I heal, but with Logic, I’m stepping away. And the thing is, too, I’m not trying to make it this big show like, ‘Oh my God,’ because it’s not that deep. You either believe me or you don’t man. I don’t give a sh*t. I’m over here doing my thing.”
Lil Nas X is diversifying his empire. Aside from music, he recently released a best-selling children’s book, C Is For Country. Now he’s getting into video games, as he has released a new one based on his “Montero (Call Me By Your Name)” video, called Twerk Hero.
In the browser game, the player controls a 3D model of Lil Nas X, facing backwards with his hands on his knees, in full twerk position. The player is instructed to “grab the booty and hit the incoming temptations,” and when players drag Lil Nas X’s rear end around, there are some impressive jiggle physics at play as his butt hits incoming quad-directional indicators, much like Guitar Hero or Dance Dance Revolution.
Last month, Benny The Butcher dropped his The Plugs I Met 2 EP, which featured production exclusively from Harry Fraud. The nine-track effort presented features from 2 Chainz, Fat Joe, Rick Hyde, French Montana, Jim Jones, and the late Chinx. Aiming to keep it alive for a bit longer, Benny and Hyde join forces for a reflective video for “Survivor’s Remorse.” In the visual, the two rappers take viewers on a trip through their past lives and discuss the close calls they encountered, all of which would have resulted in unfortunate circumstances if things did not go in their favor.
The Plugs I Met 2 is the sequel to Benny’s highlight 2018 project, but the second installation in the series didn’t arrive without some controversy. After hearing Fat Joe’s verse on one of the project’s song, “Talkin’ Back,” a number of fans criticized the rapper for anti-Asian comments. On it, Fat Joe raps, “Track me in and out of court, Harvey Weinstein / Threw that white up in the pot, gave ’em pipe dreams / And watch it spread like the Wuhan virus / Do ’em dirty for the low like Wu-Tang ’Sirus (ODB).” He later responded to the backlash in a tweet, writing, “I’ll adress the Benny verse i did that verse a year ago when the news was calling it the wuhan virus before they called it COVID i support and love all my asian brothers and sisters never hate.”
You can watch the “Survivor’s Remorse” video above.
The Plugs I Met 2 is out now via Black Soprano Family. Get it here.
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