Album: Sidewalk Exec
Artist: Bodega Bamz
Released: April 14, 2015
Label: 100 Keep It Recordings & Duck Down Records
Say it with me now… Bo-de-ga. Bodega, Bodega BO-DE-GA… that’s El Rey. Not just the corner store blunt spot in New Yitty. That’s Bodega Bamz.
Learn that name. Memorize that name. A fucking sap if you haven’t already.
Word is bond. The harlem representative got that cold flow, that heat rock. That cuban link 2016 shit. That’s right papi… keep the champagne for instagram.
This is straight from the blocks where the work is real. If you ain’t familiar, now you know. The aspirations of many youth today is to become exactly what the title of this work is. Sidewalk Exec. That’s like a self made boss. And if you can raise yourself to that level, you deserve all the juice, cuz you had to have paid your dues.
V’Don scores a superb project and capitalizes on all of the potential that was promised on their earlier collabs on “Strictly 4 My P.A.P.I.S.” It’s part boom bap, part trill wave, but definitely all spine-tingling bust your shit open type beats that allow Bodega Bamz to paint his world in vivid smokey technicolor and classic new york gangster noir.
Grab your shinebox and your stack of nickels and be prepared for some Goodfella ass shit on this project. Bamz flips Black Robs “Whoa” in a way on the menacing “Billy Batts” acknowledging how “your man won’t SHOOT, your goons won’t SHOOT, your crew won’t SHOOT, your bitch won’t SHOOT, your moms won’t SHOOT, your pops won’t SHOOT, your step father’s baby’s mother’s brother won’t SHOOT.” Nah’mean tho? The judge still ain’t whoa….
The album is hard body from top to bottom. From the “I gotta story to tell” inspired crime novella of “Raw Deal” to the half a mill a fiend spends on white powder in “Cocaine Dreaming”… this is definitely the rotten apple at it’s finest. This is a new chapter in criminology. Check out the cult film “The Streets Owe Me” for the proof in the pudding.
A$ton Matthews laces the hook on “Invoice” and Lil Eto represents for the Tan Boys on “Killa.” And the cultural influence of Alpo and Rich Porter is made omnipresent thru the sampling of the film, Paid In Full, on the song, “Everybody Eats (Interlude)”
But by far, the most slamming joint on the album is the Flatbush Zombies assisted “Bring ‘Em Out.” Make sure you check out the trippy ass visuals.
The album closes with “I’m Ready” featuring a phone conversation between Bamz and the late great Puerto Rican R. Kelly, aka Rice’N Beckford, aka Pretty Gordo, but best known as A$AP Yams. It’s good to hear the two of them making plans for success and enjoying life. Rest in Peace Yamborghini… and long live king yams and his influence on the sound of hip hop.
Cop the album on iTunes now.
And for all the Cozy Boyz out there…. Bodega Bamz will be performing alongside A$ton Matthews in Los Angeles at the Los Globos Nightclub on Saturday May 30th courtesy of Chinky Eyed LA.
– You know ya man’s Drop Jewelz.
Follow
