This week in hip hop we got the Mello Music Group comp Bushido and new albums from Lil Tjay, Bankroll Freddie, and more. We also got new songs from Freddie Gibbs, oddCouple/Jamila Woods, Topaz Jones, Benny the Butcher, Pi’erre Bourne, 42 Dugg/Roddy Ricch, Brockhampton, Bree Runway, Westside Gunn, Bruiser Wolf, and more. Read on for all the rap and R&B we posted this week…

BANKROLL FREDDIE – “POP IT” (ft. MEGAN THEE STALLION)

Bankroll Freddie just released his new album Big Bank, which includes songs featuring 2 Chainz, PnB Rock, Young Dolph, Gucci Mane, Megan Thee Stallion, and more. Megan delivers a fired-up verse on the party-friendly “Pop It,” which also just got the video treatment.

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FREDDIE GIBBS – “BIG BOSS RABBIT”

Freddie Gibbs follows “Gang Signs” and “4 Thangs” with his third single since signing to Warner, “Big Boss Rabbit.”

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ODDCOUPLE – “REFLECTIONS” (ft. JAMILA WOODS)

Chicago musician/producer (and Chance the Rapper/Noname collaborator) oddCouple will release a new album called Reflections this spring, and the just-released title track is a gorgeously futuristic soul song with guest lead vocals from frequent collaborator Jamila Woods.

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TOPAZ JONES – “D.I.A.L.”

Singer/rapper Topaz Jones releases his new album Don’t Go Tellin’ Your Momma on April 23 via New Funk Academy/Black Canopy, and new single “D.I.A.L.” (which stands for “Dying Is a Lifestyle”) is very cool hip hop/funk fusion with some OutKast vibes.

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BENNY THE BUTCHER & RANSOM – “SPINELESS”

As mentioned, 38 Spesh’s TCF label and Benny the Butcher’s Black Soprano Family are releasing a joint album, Trust The Sopranos, on April 23. Here’s another song from it, “Spineless,” which finds Benny and Ransom trading fired-up verses over a lively, triumphant, early 2000s-style beat from Buda Da Future.

Benny’s 2020 album Burden of Proof is also now available on vinyl.

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PI’ERRE BOURNE – “4U”

Rapper/producer Pi’erre Bourne is back with a chilled-out dose of melodic, R&B-infused trap, “4U.”

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42 DUGG & RODDY RICCH – “4 DA GANG”

42 Dugg and Roddy Ricch are two of the brightest new voices in the melodic sing-rap genre, and they’ve teamed up for this extremely catchy new song that begins with a very prominent sample of Scorpions’ 1982 pop-metal hit “No One Like You.”

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TERRACE MARTIN – “CAN’T LET YOU GO” (ft. NICK GRANT)

The great musician/producer Terrace Martin is an expert within jazz, hip hop, soul, and more, and elements of all three of those things come through in his new single “Can’t Let You Go,” which features TDE-signed Atlanta rapper Nick Grant.

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BROCKHAMPTON – “COUNT ON ME” (ft. A$AP ROCKY, SHAWN MENDES & RYAN BEATTY)

Following the Danny Brown-featuring “Buzzcut” off their upcoming album ROADRUNNER: NEW LIGHT, NEW MACHINE, Brockhampton have shared a second single and this one features another great early 2010s breakout rapper, A$AP Rocky. It shows off a slightly chiller side of Brockhampton’s sound than “Buzzcut,” and it’s another promising taste of this new album.

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LAKEYAH – “EASY”

Milwaukee rapper/singer Lakeyah is set to follow up her great Time’s Up mixtape with In Due Time on April 9 via Quality Control. The first single is “Easy,” which is a very fine example of her ability to be melodic and hard-hitting all at once.

https://youtu.be/C8arsb2OwRM

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NEZ – “TO THE MONEY” (ft. FLO MILLI & 8AE)

Chicago producer NEZ taps Flo Milli and 8ae for this new dose of hip-house. NEZ says, “Dance music is Black music. My goal is to bring that conversation back to the forefront. Coming from Chicago I’m very much inspired by the pioneers of house and techno. This track is very exciting for me because I had the opportunity to experiment with a new sound and bring on artists that I believe in – Flo Milli and 8ae.”

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TIANA MAJOR9 – “REAL AFFAIR” (REMIX ft. VINCE STAPLES)

British soul singer Tiana Major9 is releasing the At Sixes and Sevens Remixed EP this Friday (4/2), and it features the recently released “Same Space?” remix ft. SiR as well as this just-released remix of “Real Affair” with Vince Staples. It’s a syrupy soul song that was already great but Vince’s verse makes it even better.

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BREE RUNWAY – “HOT HOT”

UK rapper Bree Runway follows her great 2020 project 2000AND4EVA with a new single, “HOT HOT,” which finds her offering up a very fun dose of R&B-infused pop.

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WESTSIDE GUNN – “JULIA LANG” & “TV BOY”

Westside Gunn is releasing Sincerely Adolf #HWH8 — which will be the final tape of his Hitler Wears Hermes series — this year, and he’s just put out two songs from it. You can read more about them here.

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KIPP STONE – “FAYGO BABY” (ft. CHUCK STRANGERS)

East Cleveland rapper/producer Kipp Stone will release a new EP, Faygo Baby, on May 11 via Closed Sessions. It features the Statik Selektah-produced “Manic,” as well as the just-released title track, produced by D’Artizt and featuring Chuck Strangers. It’s a very appealing dose of psychedelic rap.

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BRUISER WOLF – “I’M A INSTRUMENT” (ft. DANNY BROWN)

Danny Brown’s Bruiser Brigade label continue their onslaught of 2021 releases with their third project of the year, Bruiser Wolf’s Dope Game. J.U.S. and Fat Ray, who each previously released an album on Briuser Brigade this year, appear on the album, and almost the whole thing was produced by Raphy (except the last song, produced by Knxwledge). Like the previous albums, Danny executive produced and he makes sure to appear on a track, “I’m A Instrument.” Danny brings star power to the track, but it’s hard to keep your ears off Bruiser Wolf. “Nobody sounds like this, I got my sound, I’m a instrument,” he raps. And, yeah, it’s very true.

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SONS OF KEMET – “HUSTLE” (ft. KOJEY RADICAL & LIANNE LA HAVAS)

UK jazz leader Shabaka Hutchings remains insanely prolific. Having released a new Shabaka and the Ancestors album last year and a Comet Is Coming album the year before that, he’s now back with a new Sons of Kemet album, Black To The Future, due in May. The first single features UK rapper Kojey Radical on lead vocals with backing by Lianne La Havas. Read more about it here.

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In the market for new vinyl? Benny the Butcher’s great 2020 album ‘Burden of Proof’ is now available on vinyl and you can pick it up in the BrooklynVegan shop.

For even more new songs, browse our daily ‘New Songs’ lists. For more hip hop news, browse our ‘Hip Hop News’ category.

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10 Best Rap Albums of 2020

10. Armand Hammer – Shrines

billy woods and Elucid remain two of the most prolific, consistently great artists in the world of underground abstract rap, both separately and also together as Armand Hammer. Shrines is the duo's latest album and one of their best. With contributions from Earl Sweatshirt, Moor Mother, R.A.P. Ferreira, Quelle Chris, KeiyaA, Pink Siifu, Fielded, Akai Solo, Curly Castro, Navy Blue, Kenny Segal, and others, Shrines is an ornate, spacious album that manages to sound abstract and direct at the same time. It favors hazy production and dizzying metaphors, but it makes as much of a point about the societal and political landscape as this year's more militant protest albums. It's an album that takes several listens to reveal itself, and it just gets more rewarding each time.

9. Flo Milli – Ho, why is you here?

No matter what mood you're in, as soon as you hear "Flo Milli shit!", you know you're in for some of the most irresistible rap of 2020. The 20-year-old Alabama rapper broke on TikTok with her 2019 singles "Beef FloMix" and "In The Party," and she followed that up this year with her debut project Ho, why is you here?, featuring those two songs and ten others cut from the same energetic cloth. She's got the charisma, confidence, uniqueness, and catchiness that you usually don't hear until an artist's second or third project, and she's already beating some of her forebears at their own game.

8. Pop Smoke – Meet The Woo 2

One of the biggest tragedies in rap this year was the murder of Pop Smoke at just 20 years old. Any young life being taken is awful, but Pop Smoke's death shook the rap world especially hard because he was one of the genre's most promising new stars. He was putting the Brooklyn drill scene on the map, thanks to a unique, undeniable sound that combined the innovative production of UK drill with the kind of booming delivery that has dominated New York rap since the late '80s. Pop was distinctly New York without sounding like anyone who came before him, and he packed Meet The Woo 2 -- the last release of his lifetime -- with a barrage of songs that begged to be played again and again. As good as the album is, it sounds like an artist on the cusp of something even greater. (Another album, Shoot For The Stars Aim For The Moon, was completed and released after his death, but it's a little too overcrowded with guests and Pop didn't have the final say in it.) Still, Meet The Woo 2 would've been 2020's best rap albums even if Pop Smoke was still here. When he declared himself "the king of New York" on its single "Christopher Walking" in January, he already sounded believable.

7. Conway the Machine – From King to a GOD

2020 was Griselda's biggest year yet, and it was also a very big year for group member Conway, who released two very good EPs -- LULU (produced by The Alchemist) and No One Mourns the Wicked (produced by Big Ghost Ltd) -- and the even better full-length From King to a GOD. Instead of sticking to one producer like he did on the EPs, FKTG was made with a slew of producers (Alchemist, Hit-Boy, DJ Premier, Havoc, Beat Butcha, Daringer, Murda Beatz, etc) and it features an array of throwback rap sounds that blend together smoothly. Conway also brings a lot of different ideas to the table himself, from instant-classic street-rap anthems ("Lemon") to cyphers ("Juvenile Hell" with Flee Lord, Havoc & Lloyd Banks; "Spurs 3" with Benny the Butcher and Westside Gunn) to one of 2020's most powerful protest songs ("Front Lines") to one of 2020's most heartbreaking ruminations on grief ("Forever Droppin Tears," which pays tribute to the late Griselda producer DJ Shay). Conway's earlier releases proved he could rap, but FKTG proves he can craft an in-depth album that takes you on a journey with all kinds of thrilling, unexpected twists and turns.

6. Boldy James – The Price of Tea In China / Manger On McNichols

Detroit rapper Boldy James released four albums in 2020. All of them were good, but The Price of Tea In China (produced entirely by The Alchemist) and Manger On McNichols (produced entirely by Sterling Toles) were exceptional, and in entirely different ways. The Price of Tea In China is Boldy's third project with The Alchemist, and those two have a chemistry that clicked more than ever on this album. The Alchemist had a landmark year, blessing Freddie Gibbs, members of Griselda (who Boldy is now signed to) and others with some of the finest smoky, jazzy production in his catalog, and The Price of Tea In China is no exception. It's hypnotizing from start to finish, and Boldy sounds calm but menacing as his voice casually cuts through the mix, making for a deadly counterpart to The Alchemist's beats. Guest verses come from Freddie Gibbs, Benny the Butcher, Vince Staples, and Evidence, all of whom sound carefully curated into the mix.

On the other hand, Manger On McNichols is a multi-layered, live-band jazz-rap album, as immersive as modern jazz-rap classics like To Pimp A Butterfly and Room 25. It's an album that was in the making for over a decade (and includes an appearance by DeJ Loaf, recorded before her career took off) that Sterling and Boldy kept going back to and kept tweaking. It was worth all that work; not only is it nothing like any of the other albums Boldy released this year, it's really not much like any other rap album released this year. The instrumentation is genuinely breathtaking, and Boldy supplied Manger On McNichols with some of his most remarkable verses.

5. Benny the Butcher – Burden of Proof

While Benny the Butcher's Griselda groupmate Westside Gunn spent 2020 perfecting Griselda's unique take on '90s-style New York rap (more on him in a minute), Benny jumped ahead a few years with his own rap revival. His latest album Burden of Proof was entirely produced by Hit-Boy, who blesses Benny with the kind of rich, soulful production that you might've heard Jay-Z, Cam'ron or Jadakiss rap over in the early 2000s. The beats are less gritty than you're used to hearing Benny rap over, but he has not softened his blow one bit. He stuffs the album with hard-hitting come-up stories and knockout punchlines, and he's not only one of the most skilled MCs around but he's got the memorable songs to back it up. Burden of Proof has his catchiest hooks and biggest guest spots (Lil Wayne, Big Sean, Rick Ross, etc) yet, and if the added accessibility means this was the first Benny the Butcher album that a lot of people heard, that's not a bad thing at all. It's both a victory lap and a fine introduction.

4. Westside Gunn – Pray For Paris

Griselda were no oversight success. They had been grinding for years by the time they released their major label debut and first crew album (WWCD) in late 2019, and that album proved to be a breakthrough and helped turn 2020 into their biggest year yet by a longshot. They began the year with a highly-publicized Fallon appearance, all three core members (Westside Gunn, Conway the Machine, Benny the Butcher) went on to release landmark solo albums, they recruited crucial new members, and they now regularly collaborate with some of the biggest rappers and producers around. The album that kickstarted their prolific 2020 output was Pray For Paris, the first of like a dozen Griselda-related releases in 2020, first of three Westside Gunn albums in 2020, and one of the best projects to ever come from the Griselda camp. Westside Gunn is a visionary, and he mapped out this album expertly. The crackling, psychedelic production (courtesy of The Alchemist, DJ Premier, Camoflauge Monk, Beat Butcha, Daringer, Jay Versace, and others) is hypnotic throughout, the guest verses are perfectly placed -- from usual suspects like Conway, Benny, Keisha Plum, Boldy James, Roc Marciano, and Freddie Gibbs to bigger names like Tyler, the Creator and Joey Bada$$ -- and both WSG and his guests filled the album with hooks and lyricism that keep you coming back for more. For years, the Griselda team has been tapping into a sound that hearkens back to '90s NYC rap but feels totally new and fresh, and Pray For Paris took that sound to the next level.

3. Run The Jewels – RTJ4

Run the Jewels feel like an institution at this point. Back in 2012, when El-P and Killer Mike -- two respected veterans who were nonetheless still more or less underground figures -- linked up for Killer Mike's R.A.P. Music, it seemed like a match made in heaven, and the creative synergy that fueled that masterpiece hasn't waned in the slightest. Each new RTJ joint reliably delivers raucous mayhem, tongue-in-cheek humor, righteous fury, and El-P's over-the-top, trunk-rattling cartoon-rap production that still doesn't sound remotely like anything else. RTJ4 dropped at a time when it felt like we really needed it, in the midst of the George Floyd protests that were gripping the nation, and as such it feels like a particularly potent entry in their catalog. The bangers that make up the opening of this album--"Yankee and the Brave (ep. 4)," "Ooh La La," "Out of Sight," and "Holy Calamafuck" already feel like classics, songs that seem tailor-made to score action movies and turn up parties for years to come. And the second half, as is their custom, is where things get real, with Killer Mike's verses on "Walking in the Snow" hitting with particular force as he cooly diagnoses and then brutally excoriates the fucked-up totality of American life that leads to a tragedy like the George Floyd murder. Like a lot of great protest art, Run the Jewels understand that anger and joy often go hand and hand, and RTJ4 delivers a cathartic truckload of both. [Rob Sperry-Fromm]

2. Megan Thee Stallion – Good News

2019 was the year Megan Thee Stallion made her mark, and 2020 was the year she took the world by storm. She was involved in two of the year's biggest and best songs ("WAP" with Cardi B, and her own "Savage" remix featuring Beyonce), and when she suffered a shot to the foot (allegedly by Tory Lanez, who has been charged with the shooting), she turned the awful situation into a chance to speak out about protecting Black women, criticizing the Breonna Taylor case in the process. Her whole whirlwind year is reflected in Good News which opens with a diss track against her shooter, displays the New York Times op-ed she wrote about Black women on the cover art, and houses the "Savage" remix alongside three other hits and a handful of songs that should be hits (and still might be). Megan's story would've dominated this year no matter what Good News sounded like, but Megan released a collection of songs that back up how much of a celebrity she's become. Good News reminds you that Megan got to where she is by being a genuinely great rapper; it's her strongest, most cohesive statement yet.

1. Freddie Gibbs & The Alchemist – Alfredo

Freddie Gibbs has one of the great voices in rap, an instrument whose gravelly punch can dance effortlessly over luxurious piano and strings as easily as it can thump with tangible venom over menacing bass drum hits. On Alfredo, The Alchemist provides him with a rich sonic tapestry over which to deploy his best-in-the-game dexterity and power. There's the groovy, shoulder-shaking rat-a-tat of "God Is Perfect," the driving, queasy bassline-as-gun-to-the-head boom-bap of "Frank Lucas," the laconic, loungey smoothness of "Something to Rap About." It's simultaneously a throwback to the East Coast rap of the '90s and something greater than mere nostalgia, the Alchemist's production combining with Freddie's distinct delivery to produce the ineffable thrill of the new. Freddie has always been great at adapting his style to different producers, and here the Alchemist feels like the perfect match for his old-school ethos and new-school power, resulting in that rare producer-rapper union where, when you're listening, you can't imagine one without the other. [R.S.F.]

See the full top 50 here.