The Audacity of Dope

Abel continues his ascent to stardom with the official visuals for “Rolling Stone,” which serve as a bit of a metaphor for his growing popularity since taking the net by storm last year and signing to Universal a few months ago.  It’s an interesting evolution to watch, especially for someone who started his online promotion by purposely hiding his image and shrouding himself in mystery.  I never realized these lyrics work so well for both the base level relationship concepts he’s singing about and the pressures of maintaining a fan base as he crosses over to a major label.

The video wasn’t the most exciting, but the song itself is still a great record.

Statik & Term take us out to Tokyo with the video for my favorite record off their second collaborative album, 2012.  Anytime you start a video with a shot of that intersection used in one of my favorite movies of all time, Lost In Translation, I’m probably going to love the cinematography.  My only wish would have been to get Big K.R.I.T. in the video and use his verse from the remix.  Still dope though.

Kish is next up.

Shout to Che and David. Dopeness from NZ.

I don’t know if it’s the video of the year, but it’s certainly my song of the year. I only wish they had visuals for the entire 10 minute piece.

Honestly, the verse was ill, but Mack rocking that jacket on BET is all you need in life.  And for all my label homies that hit me up about Mack pretty much every week, check the rhyme starting at 1:42.  That should answer your questions…

The homies Eighty4 Fly and Jon Jon Augustavo have linked up for another great video from the town, this time for “Cool Kid” off Eighty4’s Colors project. Download the entire tape right here.

My favorite part of this whole Seattle movement is that everyone is legitimately down for each other. Every time someone in the scene drops a video, you see countless homies making cameos and showing support. We’re all going to look back on these days as special moments in Seattle’s music history. I hope this never stops.

My guy Dones is one of the more underrated cats around, but hopefully that all changes with the release of his upcoming debut album, California Dreaming, dropping later this year.  Feeling this record.  White people: don’t rap along with the hook though, please.

Been too busy lately to do much blogging, so I’ll be catching up on some content that I missed over the last few weeks. First up, the official video for Miguel’s “Adorn,” which has skyrocketed into a smash record recently. We played this on SNSS when it first leaked and we’ve been running a couple other records that Migs has dropped too (my current jam is “Do You…“).  They’re all leading up to the release of Kaleidoscope Dream, dropping in October.

SNSS listeners will remember us playing this cut heavy when it first dropped a few months ago and now we get some visuals from Steven for “Don’t Have You.”  Fairly straightforward video, but the song itself remains one of my favorites of 2012.  Fans of The Weeknd, Pharrell, Cudi, Frank Ocean, etc. should enjoy this one.