Westside Gunn puts an end to the "Hitler Wears Hermes" series with the eighth chapter, a double album, divided into two: "Sincerely Adolf" and "Side B". Originally, it should have been a single double LP, however, following some unexpected, the two twin tapes are published at a distance of about one month from each other. Production is mainly done by The Heartbreakers team, consisting of Camoflauge Monk, Denny LaFlare and Conductor Williams, with five, four and one rhythm respectively. The other beats are provided by King JVY B, Sovren, Daringer, Madlib, The Alchemist, JR Swiftz, Nicholas Craven, Beat Butcha, Jay Versace, DJ Green Lantern and Sadhugold. As in "Side A", Westside Gunn reserves a lot of space for guests: Benny the Butcher, Conway the Machine, AA Rashid, Jay Electronica, Chase Fetti, Flee Lord, Heem, Mach-Hommy, 2 Chainz, Armani Caesar, Billie Essco, Keisha Plum, Jay Worthy, Larry June, TF, Rome Streetz, Stove God Cooks, Tiona Deniece, AZ, and Tyler, the Creator.
The intro consists of plucked guitar strings and lively drums, the title pays homage to "Brodie Lee", a recently deceased wrestler. "End How You Start Intro" is a second introduction: is the first of a long series of fantastic samples, here King JVY B brings "Mother's Theme (Mama)" by Willie Hutch. The rhythm is velvety, beautiful, AA Rashid offers the intro in spoken word, it's one of the best things of the season, the comparisons with Popa Wu are deserved. Track number three is the first in rap, it's hard and tight: "Hell on Earth, Pt. 2". Tribute to one of Mobb Deep's signature songs and its apocryphal sequel. Sovren is called to a tough task: to make a beat that is a tribute to Havoc. His production is perfect: a few piano keys in loop, chopped and looped male soul samples, haunting and fantastic, drum midtempo, dirty and dusty, the beat is left to breathe. Great attack by Westside Gunn, he delivers bars with smooth, hardcore, focused, dope rapping.
Suddenly, beautiful bridge, with a interlude from Andrae Crouch's "Soon and Very Soon": the sample is flawlessly cut as the choir is starting to chant "hallelujah", so, that they sound like a kind of adlibs to launch the next MC, Benny the Butcher. He too delivers hardcore, smooth, rough, kills the track, preceding Conway, third excellent attack, then he also kills the cut with a hardcore, velvety, unstoppable flow, one of his best performances. The song is one of the best of the year. Jay Versace creates a wonderful soundscape for "Free Kutter": smooth horns, elegant piano, downtempo drum, dry, lean, clean and skeletal, crisp delivery by Westside, great attack by Jay Elect who murders the song with a deeply velvety, sensational style, despite a controversial writing. "Richies" is a Gunnlib track: Madlib rhythm, Gunn rap. Lean downtempo drum machine, gorgeous sample from Soul Superiors & Sherman Willis' "Trust in Me Baby", there's a background loop with shooting scenes. Jazz interlude leading to outro, Coco Chanel's skit.
"Julia Lang" is a kind of remix of the original song: intro by Julia Lang herself, adlibs by Gunn and Trap-A-Holics, unique stanza from the MC of Buffalo, which excels, then prevails, on an untouchable production of Camoflauge Monk, boom bap with dirty and dusty drum and masterful loop. "Celine Dion" is a double track, produced by The Heartbreakers. Camoflauge Monk on first beat, drum midtempo, dry, hard, dusty, dark strings loop, to support a track with Black Soprano Family, Heem & Chase Fetti (affiliate?). Westside Gunn's velvety slow rapping, Heem performs with a slower, more syncopated, less memorable style. Chase Fetti to the last verse, slow, hardcore, honest. Outro by Jerry Lawler and Lance Russell which takes us to the second part of "Celine Dion", to the second track. Heavenly production by Denny LaFlare, dusty, dirty, perfect midtempo drum, dark and disturbing piano scale, dark samples, flawless beat. Hook by Flee Lord & WSG, single verse by Flee Lord, slow flow, fluid, confident, hardcore, sublime track.
"Best Dressed Demons" is one of the high points of this double album. Daringer's masterful production, he made school and this project itself is a remarkable demonstration of this. Sleek and gloomy piano scale, sad and, melancholy, drum machine dusty, skinny and midtempo, chorus by Mach-Hommy, regular hardcore delivery, Westside Gunn completes the track with focused, punctual, silk rapping. Dope cut. Camoflauge Monk is behind the keyboards in "Forest Lawn", posse with 2 Chainz and Armani Caesar: excellent dark piano keys in evidence on the dusty dirty midtempo drum, hard and determined, regular, pressing rhythm, fantastic in its cruelty and malice, incessant. Gunn's squeaky and annoying simple hook, he delivers squeaky and nasal delivery. Effortless, almost random, and incredibly fit delivery of 2 Chainz, great flow, then Armani Caesar takes a track that seemed destined for Chainz, with the most flowing style of the trio, hardcore, lively, energetic, youthful. Amazing, dark interlude for the outro that closes the track.
Camoflauge Monk is perhaps the person who picked up Daringer's heavy legacy the most. It's like True Master has taken the scepter of RZA, and the Heartbreakers are a bit like the Wu-Elements. While comparisons to Wu-Tang may not be appropriate, it's the easiest way to make it understood. This beat, the beat of "Why I Do Em Like That", is a Daringer. That piano scale comes into the track with a frightening and impressive elegance, it's sad, it brings you melancholy, nostalgia and hope, wisdom and understanding, it's phenomenal. It's allowed to breathe for about half a minute. Thank you. Then the producer places the drum, impeccable, it does not dominate the piano, it accompanies it, like a walking stick in the middle of the road cloaked in autumn leaves. On this heavenly soundscape, you expect one of the best MCs in history to arrive sooner or later. And it comes, in fact, is Westside Gunn, from Buffalo, GxFR.
His entry is almost more elegant than that of the piano, then he delivers velvety, with one of the best flows of him, dope. His hook, manifesto of his typical lyricism, beyond the vicious and criminal lines, beyond his annoyingly shrill and nasal, sung performance, is suffering and desperate, almost reflective. Billie Essco enters velvety as butter and delivers at his finest, focused, confident, rough, creating a good contrast to the melodic piano. Hook, then Keisha Plum's criminal outro, overbeat. Plaintive soul sample looped tight by Nicholas Craven, delivery back n forth between Mach-Hommy and Westside, good flow of both, there's a fantastic rhythm in the background, boom bap with excellent bass, almost inaudible drum. "TV BOY" is the Buffalo artist's latest solo cut: the pendants of WSG are back in the background, dark and distorted piano, the drum is perfect, midtempo, just far enough to give more restlessness to the beat, rhythm that gives Silenthillian vibes, beautiful, beautiful. Top performance by Beat Butcha & Daringer. The rapper brings out amazing, dynamic flow, and blows the beat away, great track.
Camoflauge Monk puts spectacular production on the table, wonderful strings, midtempo drum, it could go on for seven minutes, and it does. Short stanzas for Westside at the beginning and TF at the end, longer verses for Jay Worthy and Larry June: they all do a remarkable job, they have a slow, steady, inspired, confident flow, but I want to put the emphasis on Jay Worthy, he ripped the piece with a superior performance. When the homeless man starts singing R. Kelly, you realize that seven minutes have flown by, absurd. The piano of "Eddie Kingston" is sick, it must necessarily come from a genius: JR Swiftz, as predictable. He pairs this frenetic piano with another piano scale in the background, or rather maybe two, in loop, one lighter and another heavier, with dusty midtempo drum machine: WSG pulls out bars in a slow and dirty way, then Rome Streetz arrives and takes the track with a regular, hardcore, uncatchable style, it's one of the best of the moment.
Gem by Alchemist for "Ostertag", a solo by Stove God Cooks, former protagonist of "Side A": beautiful and elegant jazz loop wrapped in vinyl sound, almost inaudible, light drum downtempo, Cooks' entry is one of the best things of this double album. Then comes a thing even better, it's the gorgeous arched bridge that The Alchemist suddenly inserts. The MC delivers bars with a slow, powerful, flowing style. There's a splendid interlude as outro. "Munch" is one of the best beats produced by Conductor Williams, I believe and hope that I will have to repeat this phrase often in the future. Skit from Michael Jackson's "Thriller" music video, boom bap, light drum downtempo, jazz soul sample, excerpted from "Sunshine and Promises" by The Finishing Touch, distorted so they still sound melodic and accessible. Dusty rhythm left to breathe, Westside Gunn performs a verse delivering slow, velvet, calm, energetic. Tiona Deniece in the second verse is a blessing, galactic voice on a stellar production, which precedes the now iconic outro.
"99 Avirex" is produced by DJ Green Lantern: piano keys, melodic female soul sample, distorted and vibrant dirty downtempo drum, Stove God Cooks chorus, then AZ & Westside Gunn deliver a verse each in a magical cut. Track number eighteen is "The Fly Who Couldn't Fly Straight". Boom bap production, dry, dirty and dusty midtempo drum, distorted male soul sample, third distorted rhythm in a row, it's creepy, dark and haunting, Twin Peaks' Black Lodge vibes, great vibes, dope vibes. Superlative attack from Tyler, the Creator, he runs smoothly effortlessly, exchanging short verses with Gunn: it's close to being a back n forth cut, easily killed by one of Tyler's best performances, fresh, smoothness, unstoppable.
Denny LaFlare is the author of the rhythm of the last real track of this double LP: boom bap, drum downtempo, dry, hard, dusty and dirty, perfect, sample from "Camouflage" by Eloise Laws, splendid piano scale elegant, melancholy, sad, powerful, enveloping. Rhythm left to breathe, Rome Streetz enters and kills the track, inspired, confident, hardcore. Gunn's classic entry, slow flow, thoughtful, even sings, before a touching tribute to MF DOOM. "BYE BYE" boasts a dominant trombone provided by Denny LaFlare, followed by a poetic solo by Keisha Plum, overbeat: there's no other artist who could have closed this series of mixtapes. Keisha Plum has been present throughout the "HWH" series since the second chapter, often with the task of opening or closing projects with her own contribution. She represented. She has always done a remarkable work.
All the greatest hip-hop artists have released a double album: 2Pac, Biggie, Scarface, OutKast, Nas, UGK, Jay-Z, Wu-Tang, Mobb Deep. "Side B" completes Westside Gunn's double album. This tape, twin of "Side A", consists of 20 tracks, 64 minutes of material. The production and rap are even better than the tape released a month earlier, and that project was difficult to improve. The rapping is astonishing, the music is heavenly. Personally, it's a classic mixtape that fortifies the double album among the best releases in the Griselda catalog: it's a coherent, robust, brilliant, amazing, excellent project, has imperfections, but boasts numerous masterpiece tracks and is one of the best releases of 2021, any genre.
"Westside Gunn was the illest of the 2010s and 2020s, he's a Legend." I can write it even now, in 2021, without fear of denial, it's undeniable. Griselda's run was one of the best in the history of the genre, sudden and impressive. In this period, a resounding rain of releases by the artists of the group has fallen, there was a whirlwind cyclone of publications that swept the underground circuit, where quality often went hand in hand with quantity, which led to releases considered to be among the best of the hip-hop decade. There have been few mistakes, from every point of view. [The run] has confirmed the return of gangsta rap and mafia rap to the East Coast and established coke rap as the favorite sub-genre of the NY underground scene. It proved that it's possible to make a strong rap track with just one verse done well on a good rhythm. The hook was used purely for aesthetics and, sometimes, as the only rare commercial concession. It brought back the back and forth. It brought back the boom bap. It brought back jazz rap. It brought rap back into rap songs.
It saved hip-hop in one of its darkest periods, when it seemed that there was no one able to save it and that it could not be saved anymore, it seemed dead. Inspired by the best artists of the 90s and 2000s, co-signed by the best, collaborated with the best, paired, surpassed and beat the best. It has intricated that set of random words that aesthetes have elegantly called stream of consciousness. In addition to all this, what has allowed Griselda to obtain and maintain a large following after so many years, is the selection of rhythms: if you take any of the releases in this vast discography at random, there's a real possibility that you will find yourself in front of a very good production, and a very good rapping. Westside Gunn, and more generally Griselda, has proven to have the best ear in hip-hop and is the only act of the best ever to present this very high level of music quality. If you take any of the other great hip-hop acts, there are more likely to be a handful of albums with excellent music and the rest of the discography to be composed of questionable music. OutKast may have a better selection, and a few others. No one else can compete.
The eighth and final installment of the series is one of the best double albums in hip-hop history: it's up there with "Wu-Tang Forever", "All Eyez on Me", "Life After Death". Ultimately, this Griselda run was a blessing. It had been expected for years, I had been waiting for it for years. It has arrived. Today, everyone is complaining about these releases, because the culture of complaining is stronger than before, ignorance is still strong: these complaints make no sense, from covers to titles, from verses to hooks, from rapping to singing. The title, homies, where have you been for the past ten years? How did you miss the other seven chapters? This isn't the "II", damn it. Although yes, «this ish feels like "2". This ish sounds beautiful.» When, in the future, the lament will turn on other releases and other artists, and only the content will remain, Griselda's entire catalog will be rediscovered as one of the best of its kind, like gold buried in the seabed. For fans of jazz rap, boom bap, gangsta / mafia and coke rap, this is certainly not the place to start, may be disappointed with the poor standard of most of the material from all the other artists on the circuit, but it's certainly a wonderful point of arrival.
Rating: 9/10.
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