Monday Mixtape, Vol. 34

Music is like so many other things in life - it’s cyclical. Sometimes we have a decade or more of great music, and other times it’s a stagnant regurgitation of better music.

Rap right now is on the upswing. Everyone will always be nostalgic of 90s rap, and I can thank A Tribe Called Quest, Biggie, Nas, Dr. Dre, Snoop, Tupac, Wu-Tang Clan, Mos Def and Taleb Kweli, Big L, Naughty by Nature, Big Pun, OutKast, Eminem, DMX, Little Brother, The Pharcyde, Jurassic 5, Gang Starr, and many, many more I’ve failed to mention.

But in the past five years we have had Kanye’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, Kendrick Lamar’s good kid, m.A.A.d city, Frank Ocean’s Channel Orange, Drake’s Nothing Was The Same, Kanye’s Yeezus, Run the Jewels Run The Jewels 2, and then in 2015 alone: Kendrick Lamar’s To Pimp A Butterfly, Lupe Fiasco’s Tetsuo & Youth, Drake’s If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late, and Future’s DS2.

The last time I was listening to this much rap was back in college when I completely immersed myself in the world of 90s rap (since I spent most of my life in the 90s as a chubby kid rocking out to grunge music wearing No Fear t-shirts with a bowl cut).

I’m immersed now and as a byproduct, I’m immersing you.