K'NAAN ft. RESIDENTE, RIZ MC & SNOW THA PRODUCT
Immigrants (We Get The Job Done) ★★★★
Taken from Lin Manuel Miranda's Hamilton Mixtape, and featuring a sample from that musical's Yorktown (The World Turned Upside Down), We Get The Job Done is an unapologetic tribute to what the song calls America's "ghost writers" – ie the undocumented immigrants whose invaluable contributions to the running of the country routinely go unnoticed. All four MCs are from immigrant backgrounds so, presumably, they know of what they speak.
LEO MORACCHIOLI
Whatever, Wherever ★★★
Frog LeapStudios Leo Moracchioli is a musician and recording studio owner from Norway who specialises in giving familiar pop favourites the heavy-metal treatment in popular YouTube videos. Here he takes Shakira's smallest and most humble international smash hit and reimagines it as performed by Metallica, with a hint of Madness thrown in for good measure. (While you're there, his unhinged take on Adele's Hello is also very entertaining.)
XO TOUR Llif3 ★★★★
Atlantic
I spent most of last week traversing the back roads of northern Georgia. The two big songs currently popping on Atlanta’s hip-hop and R&B radio stations are
Bad Things
by Machine Gun Kelly and Camila Cabello, which grazed the Irish charts earlier this year, and this dark offering from rapper Lil Uzi Vert. Who keeps requesting it? We know it can’t be his friends. Because all of them are dead.
MIDLAND
Drinkin' Problem ★★★
Big Machine Hauling ass through East Tennessee this week, meanwhile, I noticed the country music stations broadcasting out of Nashville can't seem to get enough of this debut single from Texas three-piece Midland. Singer Mark Wystrach says he's got a drinking problem. But he has no problem drinking it off.
