Steve 'Flash' JuonA few months ago I looked at the prodigious RXKNephew and his “You at Thuff Tony on a Tuesday” album. Since we just happen to be in the summer months right now I decided to pay him a second visit and check out “Summer In Miami” this week. Even though that means SummerSlam is right around the corner, I still heard him talking about the Royal Rumble on “2 mill worth of licks.”
For a man who legendarily “released over 400 songs in 2021 alone” I don’t think any of his references are as seasonal as mine. I imagine that every so often RXK reaches a point where he’s recorded so much material he says “Okay it’s time to put out the product.” At least this time the album cover appears to have had a modicum of thought put into it. Rockstar Games might take exception to the Vice City asset flip, but it makes the Rochester rapper look perfectly at home drinking liquor in the Florida weather. “Trap Sunshine” also fits thematically. He spits almost stream of consciousness bars about his drug empire to a funky beat.
“Turn that porch light the fuck off!
We got heron (heroin), avoiding the law
50 grams in the PSD drawers
Auntie waving like she got pom poms”
I say “almost” because I can still see an editor’s hand in his work. RXK is prolific but not to the point of putting out inferior product just to keep feeding his customers. The proof is in the pudding on songs like the June Santana produced “She Da Homie.” Perhaps it’s a crass ode to love, but lines like “Fuck a foreign car, I woulda been walking with you/If I thought you weren’t the one, I wouldn’ta been talking to you” hit home with their bluntness. The shorty in the video with him is cute too, I ain’t gonna lie.
“Summer In Miami” continually exceeds my expectations. While some of his critics have accused him of touting conspiracy theories and advocating anti-science, I must have missed it in the 400 songs a year he puts out. With that much material it’s probably impossible for him to NOT say something that pisses somebody off. All I know when listening to “A Long Line” is that I’m not pissed, even when he leans into drug dealing tropes that are at best highly exaggerated fantasy. His story telling game is on point and punchlines like “Not Usher, ain’t no +Confession+” make me smile. What else could I ask for?
RXK is what he is and he embraces it. He’s not consulting the dictionary to impress you with his vocabulary, he’s not getting a college degree to preach theology or talk political science, he’s not trying to raise up your consciousness about the world we’re living in. He’s a rapper from Rochester telling tall tales about his hustle. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that I’m fine with that. I never needed every rapper in the game to be Chuck D or Gift of Gab (RIP). Sometimes you can just be an entertainer, and as long as RXK maintains his quality and standards from album to album, he entertains me.