ALBUM REVIEW: Gangstagrass Cooks Up a Summery Blend on ‘The Blackest Thing on the Menu’
Corbie Hill
Posted On June 10, 2024
Gangstagrass’ The Blackest Thing on the Menu is a summer record.
It hearkens back to the late ’90s, when a certain music reviewer was a teenager. It sounds like speeding aimlessly down country roads in a rusted old hatchback, windows down, cranking burned CDs through blown speakers. Thing is, it summons this very specific nostalgia by mixing two genres widely considered polar opposites at the time.
Gangstagrass (photo by Melodie Yvonne)
While 2024 is the year of Cowboy Carter, Gangstagrass has been plying the junction of country and rap since 2007. Broader pop culture has finally caught up with what musicologists, record collectors, and Gangstagrass have been telling us for years: that Black culture is foundational to both country and hip-hop and that these genres have more in common than record label marketing would have us believe.
This takes the pressure of breaking new ground off The Blackest Thing on the Menu and allows it to be what it is: a solid collection of summer jams.
“I’m coming back for everything that is mine / the bill’s been paid for by ancestors along the line,” Dolio the Sleuth raps in “Sankofa,” his hope for reparations buoyed by sunshiney production. While there’s an OutKast-and-Old Crow-walk-into-a-bar vibe for the record overall, moments like the “Sankofa” chorus draw directly from top-40 pop-rock (in this case, the 1998 hit “Hooch”).
Opener and standout track “The Only Way Out is Through” pairs Jerry Douglas’ world-class dobro with a memorable, grassy hook. “Obligatory Braggadocio” is anchored by a playful and catchy takedown of bro country. “Palette” nods to Black Pumas while “Up High Do or Die” echoes DMX.
“They say bravery is favored by fortune / The enslaved don’t want the world, just their fair portion,” R-SON the Voice of Reason rhymes over minimal, head-nodding production in “Mother.” On this GZA-evoking track, Gangstagrass’ emcees outline ecological disaster and the weight of white supremacy. R-SON continues: “The only thing that scares America more / than smart young brothers out to settle the score / is the older cats who stepped through the door / took the medicine for ’em, to show ’em what they’re not settling for.”
A few lines later, R-SON’s hip-hop verse is answered by “Danjo” Whitener’s rolling banjo.
It’s the sound of solidarity.
Gangstagrass’ The Blackest Thing on the Menu is out June 14 via Rench Audio.
