Approaching the halfway point of 2015, one local hip-hop release has taken up an unexpected slot in my rotation: Ty Money’s Cinco De Money. I say “unexpected” because I initially balked when the rapper dropped this mixtape on May 5. The title and its corresponding release date initially struck me as cheesy, and it took a couple weeks to get past my knee-jerk reaction and give it a full listen. Somewhere down the line I found myself cycling back to Cinco De Money on a daily basis.
Ty’s a fierce performer, which reflects the intensity of his lyrics. He spins tales of doom and gloom that convey a sense of life beyond, say, collecting money and gun violence. On somber closer “Over and Over” Ty fondly raps about his infant daughter, and though the line “she run through Pampers like over and over” threw me off at first, I’ve since come to see it as a sign of how much every detail of his child’s life rests on his mind. Needless to say I’ve been listening to this track and Cinco De Money, well, over and over.
