Future & Young Thug – “SUPER SLIMEY” review

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If it wasn’t enough that Future dropped his self-titled album & HNDRXX earlier this year along with Young Thug dropping Beautiful Thugger Girls mixtape back in June, the 2 Atlanta, Georgia trap superstars are now coming together with a surprise collaborative mixtape. The opener “No Cap” sees Future & Thugger getting braggadocious over an eerie beat from 808 Mafia co-founder Southside & then on the next track “3”, they channel their inner pimp over a futuristic-ish (no pun intended) trap instrumental from DY. The song “All da Smoke” is a party anthem with a fitting cloudy trap instrumental & the track “200” is yet another braggadocious tune, but this time with more of an atmospheric trap instrumental from Tre Pounds & Wheezy. The track “Cruise Ship” is a Thugger solo cut & I love how insanely energetic he sounds over this dreamy trap instrumental.

The song “Patek Water” is basically Young Thug & Offset rapping about not wanting to go back to being broke & not only was I disappointed that Future only did the hook on here, but Offset’s line near the end about “her sucking on semen” made me cringe a little bit. However, Future makes up for it by having the track “Feed Me Dope” to himself as he raps over a sinister instrumental. The song “Drip on Me” sees Future & Thugger linking back up once more to get mafioso over a wavy instrumental & then the track “Real Love” is an spacey sex tune with Future sounding more slick to set the vibe in contrast to Thugger sounding hype. The track “4 da Gang” is another Future solo cut, but with him talking about how nothing’s changed & repping his Freebandz crew over another cloudy beat from Fuse.

The song “Killed Before” is another Thugger solo cut & despite the verses being decent, I really love how he got London on da Track to bring back that country rap vibe from Beautiful Thugger Girls. The penultimate track “Mink Flow” gets back to the braggadocio bars over a hard beat from Mike WiLL Made-It & with the closer “Group Home” venting about their break-ups, Future’s verse is more sad & Thugger’s is more fittingly hostile considering the fact that he broke off his engagement with his ex-fiancée Karlae recently.

Modern trap fans would dream of someone as unique as Future doing a collab project with someone as versatile as Young Thug & in the end, I think this is better than the Drake & Future collab mixtape What a Time to Be Alive that they did back in 2015. Sure it’s not super lyrical, but I see that Future has a more natural chemistry with Thugger then he did with Drake. On top of that, the production is almost as lively & the deliveries are just wild

Score: 3.5/5

SZA – “CTRL” review

After a series of countless delays following the release of her fantastic Z EP back in 2014, Top Dawg Entertainment’s 1st lady SZA is finally releasing her full-length debut. The album kicks off with the track “Supermodel”, where basically SZA telling her ex that she cheated on him on Valentine’s Day to understandably get back at him for going out to Vegas that day & the instrumental has a wavy guitar along with some bass & some organic drums. The next song “Love Galore” with Travis Scott seems to follow that opening track up, as it talks about her ex wanting to get back with her when she doesn’t over some wailing synths. The track “Doves in the Wind” is a dedication to pussy with a spacey instrumental & the guest verse from Kendrick Lamar fits into the song perfectly. The song “Drew Barrymore” reflects on a low self-esteem version of SZA herself & not only does the instrumental on here enhance the emotion of the song, but it’s also infectiously catchy. Especially with the strings near the end of the track. The track “Prom” is pretty much SZA promising herself to get better as she gets older & the instrumental will make you wanna throw a party. The song “The Weekend” talks about being this guy’s side chick during the weekends (hence the title) & while I love the spacey synths at the beginning along with how the smooth keys throughout, the cliché snares just sound meh to me. The track “Go Gina” talks about this guy bringing her out of her character when he’s around her & the production from Ging primarily has these winking chimes & some drums throughout most of it, but the tension building strings during the last 20 seconds of it are beautiful. The song “Garden (Say It Like Dat)” is pretty much SZA telling this guy that she loves her & even though I appreciate, the trappy production on this track sounds so painfully generic. The track “Broken Clocks” talks about how SZA’s moved on from her ex for the better, despite him still talking about her & while I do enjoy the trophy vocal sample on here, the hi-hats are just average for me. The song “Anything” sees SZA asking her ex if he knows she’s alive & the instrumental on here has this fantastically galactic tone to it. The short but sweet “Wavy” sees SZA singing about how bad as Hell she is as well as looking for a way out over a dreamy instrumental & while James Fauntleroy’s voice does sound muffled during his hook, I still enjoyed it. The song “Normal Girl” is pretty self-explanatory, as it talks about wanting to live the life of a normal girl over a spacey instrumental. The penultimate track “Pretty Little Birds” with Isaiah Rashad is basically the 2 talking about wanting to be together for the rest of their lives & the instrumental is very smooth. Especially with the jazzy trumpets that pop in right before Zaywop’s verse. The album then closes out with the track “20 Something”, where SZA is passionately hoping that she doesn’t lose all of her friends & doesn’t die while she’s in her 20s over nothing but an acoustic guitar that enhances the beauty of this closer. When it seemed like TDE was never gonna release this album, it was well worth the 3 year wait. The production is luscious for the most part, it’s well-written & SZA’s vocals sound both very focused & passionate. If you enjoyed SZA’s early mixtapes & Z as much as I did, then I don’t see why you wouldn’t like this. She’s been one of my favorite R&B singers of this current generation & walking away from this seeing her improving herself just makes me really happy

Score: 4/5