Pitchfork writer Alphonse Pierre’s rap column covers songs, mixtapes, albums, Instagram freestyles, memes, weird tweets, fashion trends—and anything else that catches his attention.
Nothing can get me to close a YouTube tab faster than a Giannis Antetokounmpo bar. I have no personal agenda against the Milwaukee Bucks’ star big man; in my book, he’s still in the same MVP tier as the graceful Serbian Nikola Jokić, but, please, rappers, I beg you to use your imagination. In the last few years, Giannis has taken the torch from Steph Curry as the go-to basketball reference for rappers who’ve faced too many blunts to think of anything else. (The only thing lazier might be terrible Ike and Tina punchlines.) From the hip-hop one-percent, like Drake and Kanye, to every other song in the Milwaukee and Michigan rap scenes, there’s no escape.
Not to mention that the greatest Giannis lyrics already exist. Freddie Gibbs did it best, in 2019, when he rapped, “Real Gs move in silence like Giannis/My Greek Freak we did a menage in St. Thomas,” stretching a throwaway line into a vivid image. And, of course, I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t bring up BabyTron’s “Jesus Shuttlesworth,” where he raps, “Had a better season than Giannis, got my Bucks up.” (Looks out the window wistfully thinking about when the ShittyBoyz used to rap on ’80s aerobics class music.) On the surface, that seems like the sort of line I’m ranting about, but, as the mic drop to the apex of Detroit scam-rap, it’s perfect.
For better or worse, I know I’m under the spell of Hurricane Wisdom’s uplifting singalong “Giannis,” because I’m willing to toss aside all my petty grievances and enjoy the Florida rapper’s soul cleanse. On the hook, one of my favorites of this year, the wounded vocalist heartily sings, “Thirty-four, feel like Giannis/Dirty pole, big as Giannis,” and, even though I’ve probably heard this reworked an infinite number of times, it has never sounded better. Why? Because Wisdom, from Havana (a tiny suburb of Tallahassee), fuses the tropical bounce of Florida street rap with the tenderness in the ballads of Southern and Midwestern truth-tellers. And the instrumental—flickering percussion and scattered, Broward County steel drums, merged with slow-mo, almost G-funk synths—is both melancholic and upbeat at the same time. It’s all rounded out by Wisdom’s raspy melodies, as he seamlessly toggles between no-frills aggression and lilts that hit like a sunshower.
Altogether, it’s a mix more restorative than a ginger shot. Sure, his lyrics are half-baked, but that’s fine because there is so much emotion everywhere else. As a singer, Wisdom, a Juice WRLD head, has a hardened sensitivity that recalls Lil Durk on Love Songs 4 the Streets 2. Wisdom’s croons are elastic; if he wanted, he could coo the same line three times in a row and they’d have three different meanings. In one moment, he sings, “I wasn’t too good at math/On God, I run with problem solvers,” tough and straight. He also quavers in falsetto, “Dope fein I need all it.” Faintly sung to underline the gloom.
(Quickly, it’s impossible to write about the Florida rapper who has given all his mixtapes natural disaster themes without thinking about the real hurricane that just hit the state. If you’re able, consider donating to the American Red Cross, Habitat for Humanity, and other organizations that support Hurricane Milton relief efforts.)
The rest of Hurricane Wisdom’s catalog is more of a mixed bag, with a ton of Rod Wave–inspired sulking on bone-dry acoustic guitars and weepy pianos that sound like they should backdrop dead-wife movie flashbacks. I have a soft spot for his August mixtape Eye of the Storm, though, as it feels like he’s sitting on a rocking chair on his front porch dreaming.
What could really animate the tape is a complete Florida fast-music edition; that it doesn’t have one yet is, frankly, a crime. So much of the quiet, confessional sing-rap of the South is given new life when the BPM is recklessly cranked up. (Listen to the original and fast versions of FCG Heem’s 2022 tape Shallowside Baby for a perfect example in contrast.) In fact, “Giannis” has a remix by Broward’s DJ Frisco that might be even better than the original, as the remix king shoots the track into hyperspeed while still keeping the reenergizing spirit of the vocals intact. In either form, it’s an organic, feel-good anthem, the type of track that could give any day a positive bump. Let it be the swan song of the Giannis punchlines.
Throwback rapper movie corner: Mack 10 and Fat Joe in Thicker Than Water
There’s a twist at the end of Thicker Than Water, Mack 10 and Fat Joe’s L.A.-set bro-down, more unexpected than the reveals of The Usual Suspects and The Sixth Sense. I won’t spoil it, so I’ll instead say that the 1999 movie’s congenial tone is even more surprising. Written by Ernest Nyle Brown, known for his contributions in the skate world, Thicker Than Water stars Mack and Joe as rival gang members who bond through their musical ambitions. Unexpectedly, their friendship develops through scenes that are low-key, funny, and heavy on realistic conversations. At some points, the flick feels like the hood version of a ’90s Richard Linklater movie. (Go ahead; tell me I’m buggin’.) Of course, there’s plenty of violence and rapper cameos (Ice Cube, MC Eiht, Big Pun, Krayzie Bone, and Cypress Hill’s B-Real), as you’d expect from a low-budget hip-hop shoot-’em-up. Yet the story always circles back to Mack and Joe’s brotherhood and the tightrope they walk to maintain it. Rap stars can be sensitive, too.
BriStackz: “Everywhere”
Good news, or maybe bad news, depending on your Milwaukee lowend mileage: Two new BriStackz mixtapes in the same week. One is The Female Goat, six tracks’ worth of hectic Certified Trapper-esque freestyles. The other, Stackz World, my preference of the two, is similarly chaotic but with beats that basically turn her sound into lowend-pluggnb. Take “Everywhere”: the twinkling, foggy instrumental feels like waking up after blacking out and her fast-talking madness is chilled out with a splash of Auto-Tune. Like Hook on “Uber Therapy,” you get the sense that even she doesn’t know what’s about to come out of her mouth next. If she did, I’m not sure she would have rapped, “Why would you nut in my fuckin’ hair?/You know that shit took me like 20 hours”—but songs that feel like a one-take voice memo are part of her charm.
Pablo Skywalkin: “Hot and Ready”
Last week, I binged Flint rap menace KrispyLife Kidd’s new food travel show, a no-budget YouTube series where Krispy and his hungry-ass friends chow down at a popular restaurant. It’s a little awkward—everyone but Krispy seems confused by the premise—but it’s pretty good. In the third episode, the guys make their way to viral Bed-Stuy slice shop Cuts & Slices, where Krispy contextualizes the pizza by mentioning that, in Michigan, all they eat is Little Caesar’s. I thought of that moment while I watched Pablo Skywalkin’s weirdly funny new video for “Hot and Ready.” The Detroit rapper, who’s been rejuvenated ever since April’s handclap-heavy Trapper Flow, turns up in the Michigan-born pizza franchise to put a goofy twist on their slogan: “Had to take my chain off it’s too heavy/When these hoes see it they got hot like Hot-N-Readys.” If I had to guess, Pablo probably freestyled this at 2 a.m. while waiting on his DoorDash order—though, in a way, all of his songs this year have that exact same energy.
Prettifun: “Quarters Pennies”
There are a ton of Pi’erre Bourne Mini-Mes gallivanting around, but Prettifun might be the best. After producing the only two Che songs that have really moved me (“Pizza Time” and “Miley Cyrus”), the Charlotte rapper-beatmaker put out two mixtapes in two months that both sound like sprinting through a daisy field. The first, Pretti, is mostly self-produced, and the newest one, FunHouse, slots their sunkissed, head-in-the-clouds sing-raps onto bubbly beats by internet favorites like Ginseng, Misogi, and Iankon. Iankon is behind “Quarter Pennies,” a lovey-dovey audio meet-cute. As is the Pi’erre way, Prettifun’s lyrics are mostly secondary to the sugar rush, though small details—like the Denny’s run-in that turns into a hookup—elevate the vibe into something a little more heartfelt.
