Is claiming you’re the king of your city only a year into your career a bold statement? While if you ask nearly any hip hop fan, new or old, they would almost certainly say yes, producer G.loopy’s instrumental album, King of This City may just have enough talent to back up this controversial claim.
Over the course of 19 tracks that span for 35 minutes, Loopy shows just how goods he is at making beats. From the jazz-infused “Theworldisburning/imgrind” to the atmospheric “TalKing,” G.loopy’s ability to craft original and heart-filled instrumentals is on full display. While it’s one thing to be able to put together an intuitive beat or two, it requires a whole other level of skill to be able to compile your best instrumentals into an experience that flows seamlessly and remains entertaining for nearly its entire run time and for Groovy, the charisma, and creativity he is able to embed within hip hop’s traditions is remarkable. Take a track like “Peace -NoDreams-” loopy crafts a six-minute anthem that starts out as a jazzy boom-bap ballad similar to the likes of a beat a prime MF DOOM would rap over, and as this cut progresses, loopy’s true experimental abilities come apparent as he adds a layer of synths to make the cut sound otherworldly. Creating vibes that are so sonically rich and layered yet also so fun to indulge in, loopy honestly sounds like he studied the production styles of DOOM, Madlib, and J Dilla’s and is now using his own personal coatings to create something brand new for fans to awe over. With so much creativity already on display, loopy’s already shown he is an above-average producer, and the only thing he really needs to elevate his craft is a major cosign.
As an aspiring producer, what’s even more important than being able to craft neat sounding instrumentals is also to have the ability to provide instrumentals that other rappers could paint out their own visions on, and for songs like “Wakeup!” and “Feeeelds,” there’s an array of rappers including Danny Brown, Joey Bada$$, Westside Gunn and many others that could paint out some of their most dynamic visions over these masterfully curated loops.
As far as pure beat tapes go, I’m not sure how much better you can really get from King of This City. Between its shocking amount of creativity to its purity and respect to hip hop culture at its roots, G.loopy shows he is here to stay in this rap game, and the only thing he needs to further his status is attention. When it comes to producers on the rise, very few match have both the creativity and technical skill that G.loopy has behind the boards.
Rating: 7.5/10
Written By: Mr.Fantastic
