![]() ![]() Toliver leans into the weird as he opens his verse by taking his girl to Denny’s – he can’t quite match up, but he still fits right into Keem’s world with a solid verse, Keem returning to close out the track with some off-the-wall whistling in place of some lines. Don Toliver appears on “cocoa,” but Keem still takes the hook and delivers once again on a raucous and catchy melody. Keem’s many personalities do a lot of the work to carry things without any features, but the ones that do show up all make the most of it. Still, he certainly doesn’t outshine his cousin, who introduces the track with a relentless, frenzied verse that spans two beats incredibly well. ![]() Lamar and Keem trade bars again on single “family ties,” where Lamar brings back the technical flows he is known for to a huge degree with one of the year’s strongest verses. Over five minutes and two more beat-switches, Keem and Kendrick seemingly try to outdo each other in making the most bizarre track that still sounds fantastic – whether it’s Keem’s baby voice, Kendrick’s bug-eyed “top of the mornin” hook, or Keem over-enunciating everything – plus the highly percussive yet operatic beat is genuinely great without a gimmick. After another brief, slower-paced breather of an interlude, we’re dropped into “range brothers,” which is one of the most addictive tracks of the year simply because of how off-kilter it is. Dropping some zany punchlines, it quickly becomes clear that Keem is simply out to have fun and push the boundaries of the most goofy and strange material he can – something that, interestingly enough, is only exacerbated when he gets on tracks with his typically heady cousin. The following track “pink panties” immediately switches the vibe again as Keem transports us back to the early 2000s with a chorus that sounds like it could have been a prime 50 Cent track playing at the club – in reality, it’s sampled from lesser-known rapper Che Ecru. He turns unexpected lines into anthemic hooks with the sheer power of his conviction. Keem dominates the track from all angles with relentless flows, verging from a charged-up, excitable yelp to calmer, confident deliveries and even one in a growling lower register. The track begins with a brief introspective intro, about the only time Keem is serious on the project, before dropping into a hard-hitting beat and triplet flows, a psychedelic James Blake-style transition, and finally switching up his flow with another bass-rattling beat interspersed with interludes from Latin-pop superstar Rosalia. Keem is a new and exciting voice in the hip-hop landscape, and while this is far from a masterpiece, it shows that there might be one coming in the future with a little more practice.Īs far as an introduction to Baby Keem’s artistry, there’s not much of a better one than opening track “trademark usa,” which runs through three beat switches and what seems like three or four different rappers on the track based on the many different approaches he takes. ![]() It’s all a little bit messy and undercooked, Keem throwing ideas at the wall that don’t always necessarily come together into something great, but that’s honestly part of the appeal. Keem is also a producer, lending his beatmaking abilities to nearly every track here, which is all the more impressive because of how many beat switches there are. Keem runs through different voices and motifs as much as his world-famous cousin does, but instead of using them for character work and social commentary, Keem uses the unique talent for fun party tracks instead – think of him as a fusion of Lamar and Playboi Carti. Drawn to his eccentric vocal inflections, spastic style and outlandish, comedic bars, The Melodic Blue is a lot more of exactly what people were likely looking for. Smartly capitalizing on his sudden wave of momentum, 20-year-old Baby Keem releases his debut studio album when interest in his work is at the highest – it dropped only a couple weeks after Keem appeared on tracks by both Kanye West and cousin Kendrick Lamar.
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