Headphones & Backpacks

Grieves and Budo are currently putting the final touches on their debut on indie powerhouse, Rhymesayers Ent. This is the first single off of that project, which is titled Together/Apart. While there has been no official release date for their album, it is expected to see a Summer release.

“Pack it Up” features live instrumentation including a smooth guitar and horns, which has been Budo’s forte with his recent productions. Grieves’ lyrics revolve around trying to get a girl to like him. It’s a pretty simple love song, but Grieves carries the track with his charming lyricism: “I got a pretty good feeling that we could make a perfect couple / ‘Cause I’m a pretty decent listener and love to cuddle.”

Grieves & Budo are about to hit the road starting in April to tour with Atmosphere, Blueprint, Sab the Artist, and DJ Abilities for The Family Tour.

This single along with his Confessions of Mr. Modest EP released last year, makes Grieves’ up-coming album one of the most anticipated Indie Rap albums of 2011.

Atmosphere – Just For Show by rhymesayers

Here’s the first single off of Atmosphere’s The Family Sign, which is the group’s first album in 3 years. The Nate Collis guitar-driven track features Slug airing out his grievances with a love gone awry. The album, due in less than 2 months now, is supposed to be the group’s most personal and mature effort to date, with tracks about love, family, and death.

Tracklisting:

01 My Key
02 The Last to Say
03 Became
04 Just For Show
05 She’s Enough
06 Bad Bad Daddy
07 Millenium Dodo
08 Who I’ll Never Be
09 I Don’t Need Brighter Days
10 Ain’t Nobody
11. Your Name Here
12. If You Can Save Me Now
13. Something So
14. My Notes

Ohio emcee, Stalley released his latest mixtape project last week titled, Lincoln Way Nights (Intelligent Trunk Music). The bearded emcee made a lot of buzz in 2010 appearing on tracks with Curren$y and Ski Beatz. With his aggressive flow and distinctive voice over Columbus beatsmith Rashad’s production, makes Intelligent Trunk Music one of the best mixtapes released in the last few years.

Stand out tracks include an ode to the late/great Pimp C on “Monkey Ish,” “Tell Montez I Love Her,” “Hard,” and several others. This mixtape is full of bass heavy, hard-hitting beats and Stalley’s sharp word play. A lot of the mixtape’s lyrical content revolves around bass and autmobiles, which are popular in mainstream hip hop, but Stalley is able to rap about these things with the type of lyricism and creativity that is rarely heard on the radio.

Stalley has a bright future ahead of him. He is Ohio’s BEST up-and-coming emcee (sorry Cudi, Chip, MGK, and others) because he has mainstream tendencies mixed with a unique voice and style that gives me flashbacks of early 2000s Freeway (or maybe it’s because of the beard).

Below s the music video for his first single off the mixtape, “Slapp.”

Click Here To Download or Stream Mixtape