• Rating:
Two of the most unique names in today's hip-hop scene join forces to give birth to a chameleonic and stunning work, which clearly distinguishes itself from the choices of other notable performers in the genre and has no equals in a musical year that has so far left the writer rather lukewarm.
JPEGMAFIA, stage name of Barrington Hendricks, has always been a loose cannon. Both a producer and a rapper, he spews out denunciatory rhymes over oblique melodies and unexpected samples. Incapable of compromising, Peggy – as he is known in the tags that also appear in this album "SCARING THE HOES" – is the equivalent of a glitch in the matrix, an anomaly in the music market. Danny Brown, on the other hand, has built a career on raw and autobiographical lyrics, cautionary tales about the spiral of drugs and sex from which he himself doesn’t seem to have escaped (shortly before the release of the album in question, he announced the beginning of a guided rehabilitation process), seasoned with sharp irony and sung with a distinct demon-like pixie tone. The two have known and respected each other for a long time, but their collaboration hadn’t produced tangible results until this album, whose release has dwarfed their disastrous appearance on a Rockstar Games livestream as the most important moment of their collaboration.
Entirely produced by JPEGMAFIA, "SCARING THE HOES" draws its premises from the Internet culture, in which it is immersed to the core. The official merchandise includes shirts parodying RateYourMusic and alternative CD covers with the phrase "JPEGMAFIA blocked you." The album title, emblematic, refers to the meme suggesting that playing excessively experimental music through a Bluetooth speaker might intimidate and distance the girls one is romantically interested in. The lyrics of the eponymous track closely mimic the described cliché (Stop scaring the hoes / Play that shit'll have them touch their toes / "We don't wanna hear that weird shit no more / What the fuck is that? Give me back my aux cord") and adds a good-natured reproach from the forty-two-year-old Brown towards today’s rappers (Where the autotune at? / Give a fuck about a trap). Several times throughout the messy tracklist, it expands on this last topic: such is the case with "Jack Harlow Combo Meal", in which Danny Brown attacks the eponymous trapper mainly on a moral integrity level. Harlow has recently completed a lucrative deal making him a representative of the fast-food chain KFC; hence the song title.
The remaining lyrics touch upon, with surrealism, sarcasm, and frequent boutades, themes dear to the two protagonists. Rich, therefore, are the references to drug consumption (Is it the ket, the meth, the weed, the lean, the molly, the boy or the blow?, from "Fentanyl Tester") and the invectives against inequality, abuse, and lack of attention towards the African American community (Uh, it's black AOC / No matter what they try to say, they can't K.O. me, from "Muddy Waters"). It’s not surprising, then, the high number of references to musicians from even diametrically opposite worlds (not only Eazy-E, Freddie Gibbs, De La Soul, Dr. Dre, and Run the Jewels, but also Jimi Hendrix and the Prodigy): Brown had cited Joy Division and Nine Inch Nails in his most successful solo work, “Atrocity Exhibition.”
The same genreless approach is found in the musical component. JPEGMAFIA chose to create an album in the '90s manner, preferring the limitations of the Roland SP-404, an out-of-production sampler, over the convenience of a DAW. The creativity in sampling is unmatched: Peggy draws heavily from soul and RnB tradition ("Fentanyl Tester" combines vocal chops from Kelis’ "Milkshake" with breakbeats and synthesizers that wouldn’t sound out of place on the Wii Sports soundboard), doesn’t shy away from gospel territories ("HOE" and the oversaturated "God Loves You") and also demonstrates a surprising love for the Japanese world (the ethereal sample on which "Kingdom Hearts Key" is based, as well as the Japanese ads opening "Garbage Pale Kids" giving it an unexpected industrial touch).
To be fair, not everything works perfectly in this bacchanal. Although “SCARING THE HOES” is undoubtedly an ongoing work, one that has no intention of hiding its cracks, it's hard not to view "Orange Juice Jones" as a misstep, particularly after the splendid first part of the album. The sample, this time from a young Michael Jackson, isn’t sufficiently reworked and travels on frequencies too similar to Danny Brown’s voice, which gets buried in the mix. Similar chemistry issues between the curly-haired rapper and the bases created by his collaborator occur in "Jack Harlow Combo Meal" (a lounge number that takes off only when JPEGMAFIA enters, also showcasing his vocal talents in a non-chorus full of autotune), in "Shut Yo Bitch Ass Up", and in the tail end of the lead single "Lean Beef Patty".
JPEGMAFIA feels decidedly more at ease over certain soundscapes, showcasing old-school-inspired flows in "Muddy Waters", taming the menacing stride of the title-track (this time it's mandatory to mention the Death Grips, due to the similarity of the vocal sample to MC Ride's style) and unleashing all his aggression in the album’s bangers. These, in fact, coincide with Danny Brown's best performances. "Burfict!" is the most striking example: more than a duet, it’s a ludo gladiatorio perfectly orchestrated, where Brown and Hendricks exchange rhymes face to face, announced by grandiose trumpeting and cheered on by an enthusiastic audience.
The production has a chance to shine especially in tracks with a solid and defined structure. "Steppa Pig" (yet another nonsensical title), the album's true highlight, takes its time, alternating perfectly interconnected sections and showcasing all the pop potential of JPEGMAFIA’s production. Even in a project aimed at "scaring the hoes," in a sea of absurdities – one above all, the telematic jumpscare of "Orange Juice Jones" – an extraordinary melodic sensitivity emerges, capable of making the work accessible to many.
Five stars are almost provocative, given certain obvious mixing flaws and the total lack of compositional coherence, but "SCARING THE HOES" is a Dionysian tableau of rare vibrancy, the experimental hip-hop album that a scene (by extension, given the authors' popularity) mainstream that – apart from a few well-known names – for years has too often looked outward for inspiration and fallen into the trap of trends. For now, album of the year by far.
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