With a daunting cascade of releases spewing from the likes of DatPiff, LiveMixtapes, Bandcamp, and SoundCloud, it can be difficult to keep up with the overbearing yet increasingly vital mixtape game. In this column, we aim to immerse ourselves in this hyper-prolific world and share our favorite releases each month. The focus will primarily be on rap mixtapes — loosely defined here as free (or sometimes free-to-stream) digital releases — but we’ll keep things loose enough to branch out if/when we feel it necessary. (Check out last month’s installment here.)
The Underachievers - It Happened in Flatbush
The Underachievers, a New York hip-hop duo best known for signing to Brainfeeder and beefing Troy Ave, hit a miraculous triple (if not the home run fans have been waiting for) on their third mixtape and fifth overall release, It Happened in Flatbush. Borrowing Flatbush Zombies’ psychonautic mysticism (but thankfully not as much of it as they snatched on last year’s Evermore: The Art of Duality), Pro Era’s critical attention to rap’s formal roots, and Schoolboy Q’s flow (lol), AK and Issa Gold finally seem to be interested in and capable of transcending their touchstones and nudging New York rap beyond its monomaniacal crisis of “authenticity.” Sure, It Happened is, much like its Pen & Pixel-tier artwork, rough around the edges and peppered with artifacts that should have perhaps been excluded. Like their influences and collaborators, these guys rely on the contrast between catchy hooks (see “Never Win” and “Gangland” for starters) and spacious bridges to a general fault. Still, instead of the muddy maximalism one might expect from another FlyLo-approved hip-hop act, The Underachievers’ aesthetic is built carefully from simple elements that they seem increasingly capable of manipulating. Now about switching up that flow…