Not much worth mentioning was given free this past week. The week was headlined by Blue Sky Black Death, who unveiled their new project with Nacho Picasso, and Warm Brew, who streamed their kooky vibes ahead of release, but both will cost you to own. There was, of course, that uber-early Jay-Z mixtape that was released and recouped before it could be properly celebrated, but that last thing this column stands to do is give HOV any more shine (see here). That leaves us with Wrekonize, the motormouthed Miami emcee whose new EP Sunny Winter arrived exactly when we needed it.
After dropping a pair of gratis mixtape albums in mid-2014, Wrekonize flips back to original raps on this galactic 5-song run. Like much of his library, you can cop it for free, but unlike many other entries, Sunny Winter finds the once and former battle rapper moonwalking over producer Hippie Sabotage’s Sunny EP from last March.
Wrek comes out the gate floating over Hippie Sabotage’s spacey beats.”Push Gets to Shovin” is perhaps the best example of this, with Wrek bragging that he “gets space head,” which is fitting given the UFO noises that Hippie Sabotage works into the background. What we have here are transmissions from an extremely technical emcee who knows how to balance the elemental and the concrete. “Talking Walls” finds Wrekonize tripping out and waxing ethereal, whereas “Your Soul” is a more straight-up boom bap track that props the emcee up on a busy snare line and soul samples.
But the most noteworthy element of the EP is Wrek’s punctate flow that chops Sabotage’s beats to slivers. Wrekonize breathlessly takes on the expanse of every track, filling each song to the margins with his swift vocals. It can be hard to keep up with the lyrics, which means it’ll take repeat listens to get underneath the theatrics, which is fine, you’ll want to do that anyway.
