Just over a year ago my inbox was gifted with a cut that broke through my self imposed rap boredom, retroactively kicking up my receptors for sound stimuli. Somehow, the file escaped my archives shortly after. Now by designed surprise, the track finds its way lifted from the vault and up for grabs for those tracking the lab work of Sacramento rapper/producer Wrathmatics. Instantly met with an enigmatic use of Asian-inspired harp, continuously looping over vinyl popping and a mixed bag of drums and bass, the audible translation was purposefully cerebral at the instrumental level. The aforementioned soft plucking is subtly enchanting, an unsuspecting flip for what I knew would be a hip-hop track in the following seconds. A long time favorite of the DC tribe, Wrathmatics has more often offered up only his production craft, but this time he felt the beat was too good to hand over and took the matter of providing bars on himself. The resulting verses weave introspective stanzas and word play, cunningly matching the heady musical accompaniment the whole way. The contagious hook, expanding a reiteration of the track’s nomenclature, is also met by the illusion of a gong accelerando and another mysterious use of some sort of foreign string instrument expertly sampled. As is overtly obvious by my words previous, many pieces of the total construction elicit a sense of primal nostalgic engagement both distant and familiar. Now the second full solo vocal offering, the first since “Supreme” in August of 2013, Wrath is likely warning us that he is poised to hand over more gems in the near future.
