With artists releasing songs at a fast and furious pace it's difficult for the average hip-hop head to keep track of it all—no matter how tapped in they are. That's why we created The Ones, a daily roundup of the best new rap tracks you need to hear curated by the Levels team. We sort through all the new songs—across all the platforms and subgenres—so you don't have to. Thank us later.
Jacquees - “Jaded (Quemix)”
The music industry still cares about copyright laws even if Jacquees doesn't, so his remix, aka “Quemix,” of Ella Mai's “Trip” was ripped from from the web recently. His latest (and hopefully sanctioned) Quemix is his take on Drake's “Jaded.” Jacquees continues to bring the cadence of a popping Atlanta rap star to the world of R&B. Jacquees always makes the tracks his own, flipping everything into violent, petty, and jealous love anthems aimed at his latest fling's man: “That's why I'm not with nobody, because I don't want to kill nobody.”
The Alchemist - “94' Ghost Shit [ft. Conway The Machine and Westside Gunn]”
The Alchemist meshes a gorgeous rapid-fire key loop with some grimy '90s drums and lets the Griselda Records duo of Conway The Machine and Westside Gunn run wild. Conway has got his dirty bars and vivid imagery ready to go: “Free them niggas locked in cages who was gettin' blocks of yayo through/Them the niggas I dropped my pagers to/Them young niggas with 30-shot glocks to flame at you.” And Westside Gunn checks in for a high-pitched, tough-talking hook: “Woo on me, kick rocker/Load the MAC up and gift shop it.”
Lunchbox - “CapriSun”
East Harlem's Lunchbox drops a track for the quickly approaching winter with a cold beat produced by himself and Crackhead. “Caprisun” feels like that pitch black 6 p.m New York winter where the only thing preventing frostbite is the Carhartt knit cap at the top of your head. And Lunchbox's verse is just as ice cold, letting everyone know he is with the action: “Chopper gon' squeeze like Capri Sun.”
Zubin - “all u do is take" [ft. Coldhart and mue mue]”
On “all u do is take” Zubin, of Philly's Working On Dying collective, grabs a beat from his fellow Misery Club supergoup members Nedarb and Foxwedding. The dreamy yet spiteful love song showcases the talents of all three artists: Zubin's vocals are crisp, Gothboiclique's Coldhart drops in for some depressed in the club bars (“Now I'm at the strip club throwing ones up”), and mue mue closes it with some melodramatic dream pop vocals (“My heart bleeds for you”).
BobbyRaps “Wash My Hands” [ft. Chief Keef]
Whenever Chief Keef slides into the picture, know that he is about to steal the spotlight. Keef takes a beat from Saint Paul, Mn.'s BobbyRaps and resurrects the AutoTune crooning that he perfected on Thot Breaker. BobbyRaps completes the track with some ad-libs and a verse at the back end but his main job is to not get in the way of an emotional Sosa.
Check out yesterday's Ones, and listen to new rap from Jacquees, The Alchemist, Lunchbox, and more on our Spotify playlist, Apple Music playlist, and SoundCloud playlist.