louderontherepeat-blog - Tumblr blog

[louderontherepeat-blog]

A self-proclaimed underdog, 21 Savage's cousin Young Nudy shows us what he's made of on his latest project Nudy Land. Pierre Bourne's infamous producer tag rings in the title track, “Judge Scott Convincted”, which unfurls as a slow-moving introduction to the struggle Young Nudy grew up in. “Sippin’ on the lean just to make the pain fade,” he drawls, and confesses to robbing and selling drugs in the wake of an absent father. "Thirteen years old when I started doing this shit,” he tells us on “Fatsane”, the very next track. The song is insidiously catchy, not hitting quite as hard as you might expect from its lyrical content but still managing to come from a very dark place. 

The video game-like synth beats coupled with Young Nudy’s raspy, whispering voice means the album takes you a few listens to convince you of its merit, but once it does you won’t be able to get it out of your head. Tracks like “Nutsack” and “Money Makin Mitch” prove that Nudy is just as capable of creating raging party anthems as the next rapper, while “Bermuda” and “Hell Shell” really do evoke the feeling of wandering through an abandoned fairground similar to the album cover. The ironically-titled “Pussy” isn’t about women at all, and you’d be hard-pressed to find a label-mandated love song anywhere within the thirteen tracks. Indeed, this album is about masochistic power and bragging rights, leaving little room for more sensitive topics such as emotion. Young Nudy has found a way to numb it all. “No Clue” closes out Nudy Land and boasts one of the only two features on the project, this time from Lil Yachty, whose voice melts so perfectly with Nudy’s you’d have a difficult time distinguishing the two.

Nudy Land doesn’t push any boundaries, but it does present itself solidly as one of the better hip-hop albums of 2017. A no-frills production style and straightforward lyrics mean that Young Nudy is able to invite the listener inside his world, if only for forty minutes. He’s already mastered a sharpness that takes some rappers years to cultivate, a starkness that will impress even the most jaded music fan. This latest release stands as proof that Young Nudy is the one to watch as we move into the new year.