The face of New York and they dont like it.... if you wanna change that make ya music sales & beat me on the charts. As For now shuttup and just watch me.

A post shared by DAY69 IS OUT NOW !!!!!!! (@6ix9ine_) on Mar 1, 2018 at 1:06pm PST

 

I thought I’d take some time to highlight how another rapper from New York easily deserves the title, well at least a hell of a lot more than the eccentric newbie, and this is the hip-hop collective Pro Era’s prodigy, Joey Bada$$. 

For me, lyrically Joey is on par with the other leading rappers of our time such as Kendrick Lamar and his fellow TDE members, Earl Sweatshirt, J.Cole, Freddie Gibbs, and Danny Brown (although personally, I have him second to only K dot).

He has been ripping up the hip-hop scene since his highly acclaimed debut project 1999, which he released at the tender age of 17. As a project, 1999 was a revert back to boom bap type rap which was badly needed by the hip-hop scene and highly requested by hip-hop fans worldwide, who after the mixtapes release touted Joey as one of rap's new saviours. 

It taught us that Joey is hungry, humble, and passionate about the culture, having incorporated a number of sick instrumentals from the likes of the legendary J Dilla, MF DOOM, and Lord Finesse, as well as his Pro Era compadres Chuck Strangers, and Kirk Knight.  In my opinion 1999 stands on its own as one of the greatest hip-hop projects to emanate from the big apple in the last decade or so.  

To follow his outstanding first project, the badmon returned the following year with more heat in the form of his second mixtape Summer Knights which took its name off 1999’s first track. Summer Knights is a great project that is often overlooked, and believe it to be near enough if not equal to his highly regarded 1999.

The mixtape features production from the usual suspects, and also sees the hot collaborations between Joey and the seminal DJ Premier on “Unorthodox”, Joey and the Alchemist on “Trap Door”, and the track “Word is Bond” produced by Statik Selektah with whom Joey would go on to make many more records with. Sadly Summer Knights also features a track dedicated to Capital Steez, an incredibly talented rapper and extremely close friend of Joey who unfortunately took his own life in late 2012.  The track is called #LongLiveSteelo.

In 2015 he released his debut studio album B4.Da.$$ which again featured a stellar line up of producers. Overall it can be classed as a good album, however with two classic mixtapes to live up to, perhaps Joey set his bar too high and thus B4.Da.$$ didn’t perhaps have the same impact it could have. With that being said, I would say B4.Da.$$ is one of those records that gets better with time, and I often find myself going back to it.

Two years later in the heated socio-political climate of Trump’s America, I believe Joey stepped up his musical prowess with the release of his aptly named All-AmerikkkanBada$$. This album acts as a social commentary, with Joey confronting an addressing a number of important issues, mostly stemming from the experience of being a black man living in a racist nation. 

In this way perhaps it was his answer or equivalent to Kendrick Lamar’s fantastic To Pimp a Butterfly, which released in 2015. It shows a vast development and reconceptualisation of Joey as a rapper and artist and is quite different from his boom-bap origins.

Subsequent to this fantastic album’s release it wasn’t long before Joey jumped back on his grind churning out a number of fire-new tracks for the fans, and its perhaps on this basis that I would argue for his coronation, especially when a hype-based, multi-hair coloured, alleged with sexual misconduct, and with only one trashy mixtape is trying to claim the title for himself.

One of the first tracks he put out after AABA, and a personal favorite is, “500 Benz”, and unlike its title might imply, it is not a braggadocios, but rather an ambient and reflective track, with production from the slick Statik Selektor, a favourite and commonly used beatsmith of Joey’s. A different post AABA link-up between the two is the mellow guitar laced track “Too Lit” which like “500 Benz” is straight flames.

At the start of 2018, on his 23^rd birthday, Joey dropped the banger “King to a god” with Pro Era member Dessy Hinds, produced by Nastee. Another new track by Joey is “Thugz Cry” which is an ode to one of his biggest inspirations the eternal Tupac Shakur. This track again is produced by Nastee with help from Adam Pallin, and taking a sample from Prince’s “When Doves Cry” as Pac previously sampled on the postmortem track “When we ride on our enemies”. 

An additional new track of his which is also an ode to a musical inspiration of his is “Gazzolina” which features and is produced by Pro Era affiliate Kirk Knight. The track samples the track “Gazzillion Ear” (Album Born Like this) by the infamous New York villain MF DOOM, and on his verse Joey displays development and articulation of his rapping skills by spitting in a lower voice than he usually does, imitating his mask faced idle. This track was released in December 2017.

Two more amazing tunes Joey has released recently in February are with Chuck Strangers, an early compadre and fellow Pro Era member. The first of these tracks is another of my top Joey tracks to date entitled “80 Blocks”, insane lyrics over an emotive instrumental constructed by Chuck Strangers, the only drawback is that this tune is perhaps too short, and I feel an Earl Sweatshirt feature would have put the track on a whole new level.  Shortly after the pair released “Style Wars” although this track belongs to Chuck which is set to feature on his pending album Consumers Park scheduled to drop imminently (some time this month with some suggestions on the 16^th).

A much more recent track by Joey which came out earlier this month is his “Kings dead remix” and while I mentioned the whackness of another rapper in this piece, this remix features the controversial newbie XXXTentacion.  

Whilst this track still displays some dope lyricism the content in Joey’s verse is perhaps too money orientated betraying his humble character, furthermore his track accomplice (XXX) has some serious questions that need answering, and unless Joey knows more than we do, which is quite likely, I personally would have preferred him to refrain from associating himself with acts like XXX, especially if the allegations are true(and if they are that cunt should be in prison).

Lastly, is most recent track having dropped a mere couple of days ago is “King of the jungle” which is perhaps an answer to Takeshi’s claims. Produced by Salaam Remi, the track is a fast-paced rock sampling lyrical masterpiece. The track also features a sample of Biggie Smalls, and Joey unleashing a mad lyrical verse that we have grown accustomed to him spitting time and time again. Perhaps my only qualm is again that the song is rather short.

Finally, if you also consider the fact that Joey ghostwrote Post Malone’s hit single “Rockstar” which charted at number 1 in a myriad of countries and is perhaps ironically his most successful composition yet.  Thus for me if there was ever any doubt about Joey, it is after these tracks that he has cemented his place at the top of contemporary East Coast rap, and I personally believe the sum of all his great content renders Joey at least in the top 3 of the new generation of rappers. As still a young artist I’m sure there will be a lot more from New York city’s hip-hop monarch.