Steve 'Flash' JuonIf you know GDP from our previous reviews you know that he’s a lyrical cross between Tame One and Young Zee – and if you don’t you just found out. G’s got his own label now – Smokers Cough – probably because the mainstream wasn’t catching on to his dope (figurative and literal) New Jersey rap style. There’s also a chance they never would have. On GDP’s new album “#$ (Hash Money)” he’s unapologetically making skits with his producer Space Jesus about making something he calls “Royal Oil” – which ends with a comically large explosion.
Reviewing GDP albums usually leaves me feeling I should be in a chemically induced fugue to better appreciate his perspective, but the best I could do here was to throw a few cans of Tecate in the deep freeze for an hour. To be honest I wouldn’t have cared if I had left them in too long and they turned into beercicles – Tecate is pretty nasty and only drinkable either when it’s nearly frozen cold or when you’re already lit up on something to begin with. GDP spends the majority of “#$” bragging about his altered mindstate and how it’s either a clever pun on social media “hash” tags or how being blazed somehow actually generates money – when usually it just burns it up. (That’s the reason I had foul ass Tecate in my garage – it’s dirt cheap.)
“Who all the new girls on YouTube, doing powder?
She thought I’d go all cuckoo without her
But boohoo, I’ll leave her how I found her
Flounder – cut off, at the jump off
with a jump off, getting sucked off
All these patties with the cum sauce
Eat her whole salad, bun tossed
Cause you’re not really on tour dog – that’s just a one off
Distraught – don’t know what you oughta do with your life
All we do is smoke oil out of water pipers”
Space Jesus is described as a “bass guru” in the press material, but I’d describe him as one of those techno-electronic producers that everybody is trying to go Nicki or Rick Ross with. This is not necessarily a bad thing for GDP, who could use any entry into the commercial world he can get while simultaneously advocating (or using) so much dope. “Good Rumors” featuring Shape is that kind of electro-pop I never thought I’d hear from the Jerseyite, but it works on this song.
Perhaps it’s not surprising given the experimental sound of the album that Chippy Nonstop would have a cameo on the closing track “Molly Cynus” along with Shape. In fact I would have been disappointed if there wasn’t some sort of “Molly” pun here. GDP’s style is not for everyone. He sometimes sounds like he’s having trouble staying awake, or keeping his breath control from one bar to another, but it all hangs together in an oddly compelling way – much like listening to Pacewon or Noreaga. If you like your experimental raps to be rolled, dipped and smoke then GDP’s got your wet.