Yo! SD Raps: Mitchy Slick, Jayo Felony, A.M., Old English, Sojourn

October 14, 9:21 PMSan Diego Rap Music ExaminerQuan Vu

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There's been a surprising amount of good local rap music recently. Here's a round-up of the highlights:

Strong Arm Steady ft. Jacka "Loose Girl"
Strong Arm Steady will be releasing a project helmed by Madlib entitled Stoney Jackson. Judging from the leaks, it looks like Mitchy Slick will be getting a lot more shine. Which is great considering most people outside of SD see him as the weak link in SAS. That's not the case. This song about hoes is a great example. Fellow SAS member Phil Da Agony comes pretty hard on the second verse but Mitchy wins with the hilarious closer on the first verse: "She tell you she's a model and she's going someplace/ That ain't no website, b*tch, that's a Myspace!"

Kurupt & Roscoe ft. Jayo Felony "I'm Bout Mine"
Jayo Felony rises from the grave like Altered Beast with a guest verse on Kurupt and Roscoe's joint album, Tha Tekneek Files. It's nothing too special but new Jayo Felony needs to be catalogued.

A.M. "Everybody Wanna Live Forever"
Hip-hop duo A.M. (Acromic & MYO) are part of the new breed of "hipster" rappers. Yes, the term is pretty vague and most use it as short-hand to point out certain rappers' metro fashion sense more than anything. A.M. don't seem to wear tight jeans or brightly colored clothes. But they do share stylistic similarities to Kanye West, Lupe Fiasco, and The Cool Kidz. Which is to say they rap mostly about girls with a lot of, um, "swagger" and a pretty nice flow (well, at least MYO does; Acromic, step your flow up or stop altogether). "Everybody Wanna Live Forever" is the one song off their mixtape where they keep it real i.e. show some emotion and it works for them.

Old English - Under Surveillance
Rap duo Old English dropped their album, Under Surveillance, sometime last year though I'm just now hearing about it. It's a pretty good listen supported by solid production throughout, half the time sounding like subdued West Coast gangsterism ("Under Surveillance," "Where'd The Dago?"), the other half sounding like solid soul loops ("Black Rose Renegade," "The Dedication"). Rapper Savior Self comes across as the clear leader of the group, especially when he goes off on his paranoid tangents. It recalls the conspiracy theorist sides of Tupac and Scarface, both artists to whom Old English pay homage. Savior Self isn't quite there yet but, if he digs deeper, he could get there.

Sojourn ft. Big Rec "Human Resource"
Sojourn's debut album, Sojournalism, is a disappointment. Sojourn is a great rapper, able to flip syllables with the effortlessness of, say, Pharoahe Monch. But he stays really preachy throughout the album (note to rappers: there IS a way to have a message and not be preachy) and the production is absolutely limp. It's a bad sign that the standout track on the album doesn't even feature Sojourn's rapping. On the interlude "Human Resource," Sojourn provides the beatbox while Big Rec, um, catches wreck. It's an excellent display of showmanship and provides the album with a much needed high energy boost.