Somehow, one just knows, when they listen to the first three seconds of a track, that they’re going to be listening to something good for the next five minutes– possibly a repeat or two too. “Stalin’s Lapel” by Leon Flames is such an example– you will want to read this review to understand what it is that truly makes me say what I do about this track.
The beat kicks in right from the first second– a nice, smooth flow building up to tasteful saxophones wafting around in the background, complimenting an old-school West Coast kind of flow. As an old-school rap aficionado, the whole package presented to me was something that immediately got me bobbing my head like the producer himself on the console. While this track incorporates a lot of modern themes in its lyricism, it still manages to present and deliver them in a quaint, tasteful, buttery flow that had me hooked right from the first bar.
The adlibs take a modern turn, and are tasteful in nature. Leon rhymes hard, with complex syllable rhyming that extend to many lines at once, and I loved the whole rhyme scheme here– I may never be able to say enough about it.
The mix is tight, unapologetically so. The vocals are front and center, and they sound like business right from the get go. The intstrumental in the background has this beautiful jazz vibe to it with the played bass, the Rhodes pianos and the saxophones that chime in from time to time.
Overall, “Stalin’s Lapel” by Leon Flames is an unapologetic return to the roots of old-school hiphop, with the power of today’s production and modern themes. This is the kind of song that teaches me, the old dog, that new tricks can be old-school too, and refreshingly so. Check out the track here!
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Discovered via http://musosoup.com
