King Louie And Mick Jenkins Manipulate Time With Their New Music

• RYAN LOWRY
• Mick Jenkins

I gravitate toward songs that convey the feeling that time is being altered somehow, as if the world around you is slowing down, speeding up, or freezing momentarily. King Louie accomplishes this on back-to-back tracks from his new mixtape, Drilluminati 3. On “Where I Come From” Louie raps about neighbors dying in the street; he delivers his lines with a solemn grit that hints at the sense of helplessness that comes with the territory. C-Sick’s somber production on “Where I Come From” employs a glistening synth line that sounds like it was ripped from a video game and given a dose of lean. It’s a slow burn that seeps into the downcast “Clique’d Up,” which features OVO singer PartyNextDoor cooing smoothly to set the mood and Louie rapping through a cloak of Auto-Tune. On both tracks time seems to move at a more sedate pace.

Leor Galil writes about hip-hop every Wednesday.