2014: the year that'll go down in history for suggesting that Bill Cosby is guilty of even greater crimes than inflicting Mos Def's acting career on the general public.
"I LIKE WHAT I LIKE!" isn't just a lyric from No Type but a code to live by, so bear in mind that there are numerous conspicuous absentees from this year's list: I remain immune to the music of that lad who hails from the country where they drink milk out of plastic bags; I hated some of the year's biggest singles like Hot N*gga, Try Me, Coco, and U Guessed It; I'm indifferent to the music of current internet darlings like Tink, Run The Jewels, Chief Keef, and Freddie Gibbs & Madlib; Makonnen is a cynical novelty rapper who is only notable for looking like Rickie from My So Called Life if he'd eaten all the pies; I loved Doughboyz Cashout in CTE weed carrier mode last year, but their 2014 singles were way too Juverassic 5 for my liking; I have zero interest in all those Alt-lanta rappers like Key!, Father, Rome Fortune etc who seem to exist solely to keep The Fader in daily content.
But then who am I to take cheap shots at what anyone else listens to when the list below contains songs by Chris Brown's rapping stuntman, Tarrie Bar-B, black America's answer to Pitbull, Lil' Chris' manager's 9 year old niece, and a 35 year old Jewish version of South Park Mexican? Rap was a pleasant surprise in 2014 because lots of my favourite songs turned out to be the ones that I had the lowest expectations for or the ones which arrived enigmatically from out of nowhere. Anyhoo, check back in a day or three in case Sacha Mon Frere-Jones BiggieGeorges pops up in the comments with handy zipfiles of all the songs again as he's done for the past couple of years now.
Favourite 2013 rap songs that everybody slept on until they blew up in some way this year, or dropped too late to make 2013's list:
K Kutta - Lum Lum
Lil' Chris - Keep Your Head Up
Migos ft. Young Thug - YRN
5th Ward Weebie - Let Me Find Out Part 1
Ezale - Foreal Foreal
Priceless Da Roc - Yiken (Certified)
Ampichino - Eulogy
Agallah ft. Roc Marciano - Blaze Of Glory
D-Lo - Choppa Dance
We Are Toonz - Drop That #NaeNae
Chinx Drugz - Tell 'em
Vic Spencer ft. TREE - Profound
Skeme ft. Iggy Azalea - High Power
S.B.E - I Feel Like
RJ ft. Jay 305 - I Feel Like
Project Pat ft. Juicy J & Doe B - Never Be A G remix
Kid Ink ft. King Los - No Option
O.T. Genasis - Touchdown
Favourite 2014 rap songs:
K Camp - Oh No
King Louie - Live And Die In Chicago
Iggy Azalea ft. Charli XCX - Fancy
DJ Quik - Pet Semetary
Rae Sremmurd - No Type
YG - Bicken Back Being Bool
Slim 400 ft. TeeFlii - Kno Where The Party @
TREE - Probably Nu It
A-Wax - Jetsons
Flo Rida ft. Sage The Gemini & Lookas - GDFR
Sage The Gemini - Bad Girls
Show Banga ft. Sage The Gemini - I Been That
IamSu ft. 2 Chainz & Sage The Gemini - Only That Real (Back 2 Cali remix)
Jay Ant - Ask YB
Kool John ft. P-Lo - Bitch I Look Good
Looni - Right Now
Kap G - F**k La Policia
French Montana ft. Jadakiss - '88 Coupes
Lil' Durk ft. MeetSims - Money And Power
HS87 - Grindin' My Whole Life
ZMoney - Dope Boy Magic
CoCo Kiss, Robyn Fly & Ms. Go Ham - Side Piece
The 99 Percent - Shabooyah!
King Los - Woke Up Like This
Mic Terror ft. DJ Gant-Man - Get Off My Dick
Lil' Wayne - Krazy
Young Money - Senile
Nicki Minaj ft. Soulja Boy - Yasss Bish!!
Soulja Boy - Wassup
BeatKing ft. Kirko Bangz - Friendly
Rich Gang ft. Rich Homie Quan & Young Thug - Freestyle
Young Thug - Eww
T.I. ft. Young Thug - About The Money
Ola Playa ft. YSL - Don't Move
PeeWee Longway & Quez of Travis Porter - Use Me
MPA Shitro Sanchez - Justin Bieber
Big Sean - Paradise
Yowda ft. YG - That's How It Go
Lil' Debbie - I Do My Thang
Ben J of New Boyz - Save It For The Birds
Speaker Knockerz - Erica Kane
Vic Mensa - Down On My Luck
JuJu ft. Tragedy Khadafi - Thriller
Kurious Jorge - Best In The World
Mouse On Tha Track - Liberation (The Cut)
Lil' Boosie - I'm Wit' Ya
Dorrough Music ft. Lil' Boosie - Beat Up The Block
Wiz Khalifa - We Dem Boyz
Snootie Wild ft. K Camp - Made Me
Vince Staples - Blue Suede
DB Tha General - Motel6 Intro (Phatasm)
Uncle Murda ft. Keyz - Same Way
FaBo - On The Table
Smoov-E ft. Clyde Carson - What's It Gonna Be?
Caskey - So Bad
Kendrick Lamar - I
Heaven ft. Lil' Chris - Don't Shoot
City Shawn ft. D-Lo & Show Banga - Bitches
SD - Circles
Too $hort - 19,999
Gangsta Boo & La Chat - Can't Sit With Us
Fetty Wap - Trap Queen
Lucci - Kno No Better
HD of Bearfaced ft. G-Dirty - Don't Like Me
Grip Plyaz - Flexin'
Jackie Chain - Party Girls
The Jacka ft. Dru Down & Joe Blow - The President's Face
Young Lox - Legion Of Doom
B.o.B ft. Ty Dolla $ign - Drunk AF
Snow Tha Product ft. Ty Dolla $ign - 1 Time
Lupe Fiasco ft. Ty Dolla $ign - Next To It
Rich Boy ft. The Game - Ridin' Thru My City
Jae Murphy ft. The Game, Eric Bellinger & Problem - You Playin' (This Could Be Us)
Famous To Most - #Whip
(Though I usually stop #Whip at the 01:15 mark because the song then takes a major nosedive. That first minute and change is the hardest shit since Nigel Benn, though.)
Some additions to the 2014 favourite songs list:
Fabolous ft. French Montana - Ball Drop
Ca$h Out - I Want The Money
White Gzus - Top
Bonus beats - Generic list post: rappers lending their vocal talents to great non-rap singles this year edition.
PS - I don't care that the Kurious song is only 2 days old because I ripped the MP3 and its been in steady rotation ever since.
ReplyDeleteIt's acceptable to bend the rules a bit in what's turned out to be the worst year ever for NY rap.
Obv I think putting Keef in a category with Gibbs & RTJ is criminal although for other reasons than their fans do, but otherwise I think you captured this year's anti-zeitgeist pretty well.
ReplyDeleteLurk lurk lurk
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QmZIL8hkhZE
ReplyDeleteHaddaway's What Is Love? is the one degree of separation between Wilson Cruz and Crime Mob.
ReplyDeleteGonna go in with this list over the weekend. Props.
ReplyDelete"Makonnen is a cynical novelty rapper who is only notable for looking like Rickie from My So Called Life if he'd eaten all the pies"
ReplyDeleteI CAN'T BREATHE.
No Gucci?
ReplyDeleteI didn't check for any Gucci this year, tbh.
ReplyDeleteSo, are we all prepared to admit that Stalley's fake Dom Kennedy song with Ty Dolla $ign was better than any song Gunplay dropped in 2014?
(Not that Gunplay falling off particularly mattered anyway when I came across Lum Lum a year after it was first released, and Stitches dropped Brick In Yo' Face.)
I really should have included Brick In Yo' Face here, but it didn't it into my rotation because I never got around to dling the MP3.
ReplyDeleteHe simultaneously outdid Gunplay's Jump Out and gave Florida the T-Bo & Mike Da Hustla it deserves.
hook that kurious mp3 up
ReplyDeleteAny chance someone might re-up the Best of 2012 or older zips that have expired? I was a little late to the party.
ReplyDeleteFuck La Policia, Party Girls, Know Where The Party @ Im Wit Ya & No Type>>>>>
ReplyDeleteAh here I missed that Zmoney song.
Nice one, sitting tight for them rars
Can't wait to go through these, many of my own favourites on there too.
ReplyDeleteNot sure if you're an E40 fan (then again I'm not really myself) but Chitty Chitty Bang Bang knocks and had a great Ty Dolls $ign hook.
My guy who htmled this post for me fucked up a few of the links. Just corrected them.
ReplyDeleteI didn't even realise "Coco" was by the same guy who did "Touchdown"
ReplyDeleteyou're buggin on DBC
ReplyDeleteThanks for putting me onto "Lum Lum" and "Freeze Tag Booty".
ReplyDeleteJustin from Complex made a playlist out of the songs on Spotify
ReplyDeletehttps://twitter.com/BrotherNumpsa/status/543468533049745408
Thanx for all the work been enjoying those monthly lists too
ReplyDeleteCheers to Justin.
ReplyDeleteDrew, I'll have a good peruse of that DBCO list you made.
ReplyDeleteBut out of their tracks I did hear, none of them were fuckin' with Woke Up, Mob Life or Hella Ice.
JUVERASSIC 5
ReplyDeleteHAAAAAAAAAAAAAH
It was either that or B.G. Duckling.
ReplyDeleteAdded Lucci's Kno No Better to the list. Song was already honourable mention status, but it now deserves to be in there foreal foreal after soundtracking my christmas shopping adventures this afternoon.
lol speaking of which you any take on the recent NO/Cash Money nostalgia (that 2Chainz song, Manny Sauce, theres a heap of other examples incl a lot of people from the boot)
ReplyDeleteAmazing job boyo!!
ReplyDeleteAlex MacPherson is gonna call you out for not having any Angel Haze.
ReplyDeleteIt makes total sense that MacPherson looks like Elliot Rogers since they're essentially the same person: dude with a vast entitlement complex who has a creepy fetish for women and a loathing of the working class.
ReplyDeleteElliot Rogers probably knew how to make a sandwich tho
ReplyDeleteWE NEED THEM RARS ALREADY
ReplyDeleteObligatory Best Rap Songs of 2014 by The Martorialist : http://bit.ly/1GNKE46 / http://bit.ly/1zpwgid
ReplyDeleteKurious drops his first good song in 20 years shockah!
ReplyDeleteKudos to BiggieG.
ReplyDeletethanks BiggieGeorges, I appreciate it and i'm sure a lot of others do as well!
ReplyDeleteBiggieG smuggling Lil' Debbie songs into Joe's iTunes.
ReplyDeleteMuch love to BiggieG. Gonna re-visit some of these in the whip this week
ReplyDeletelex recently got shit on in the fact comments for being a terrible hypocrite and then begged Fact to delete all the comments.
ReplyDeleteelliot rogers comment is otm. little lord fauntleroy with a sleazy sex tourist dad.
That's my listening for the rest of 2014 sorted.
ReplyDeletecheers man
ReplyDeleteI can't believe We Dem Boyz hasn't been ruined for me yet. That shit is a future Jacamo advert waiting to happen, but until then it's my favourite Wiz solo song since 2008.
ReplyDeleteWhoa. How did I miss that HD & G-Dirty joint?
ReplyDeleteWhat was your prior favourite Wiz song if you don't mind me asking.
ReplyDeleteWe Dem Boyz really doesn't do it for me unfortunately.
Say Yeah
ReplyDeleteMezmorized was cool, but that Drumma Boy + 8Ball & MJG song with the same sample was better.
In hindsight, I wish I'd switched the Mic Terror and Kid Ink choices to N.W.G and Body Language respectively.
ReplyDeleteSuch a great lists to start, thank you! Thumbs up!
ReplyDelete