Hello, this is Yelawolf…

Slacken your waistband, slot your old bling (Elizabeth Duke sovereign rings) on your fingers, put your 40oz (bottle of volvic) in a brown bag, grab your gat (banana/large novelty pencil/can of deodorant), pull a really mean face, and get ready to cruise down to rapper town!

As you can clearly tell from the opening paragraph I have a very adept, intuitive relationship with rap music. I find it easy to relate with many of the themes explored within hip hop/rap culture; growing up in a house with other people in it, there was often violence and friction in my youth – my sister once threw a toy car at my head (almost hitting me) and when our mother bought us foam replica gladiatorial pugil sticks one Christmas it was obviously only a matter of months before they had to be taken away. Too many broken vases. Plus I had such muscles, even at age 8, that there was really very little challenge for me.

These days however, with my youth behind me, the ratio at which I listen to rap music and non-rap music is akin to the ratio between the good films and the bad (very very bad) films that Danny Dyer has been in; i.e. I very (very) rarely listen to hip hop these days (discounting electronica and turbo crunk, naturally). My palette is somewhat broader now.

Hence, I was surprised when I recently discovered rapper Yelawolf and found myself genuinely enjoying his music, despite the fact that his songs tend to deal with the heavily clichéd subjects of rap that I had grown so bored of and, in some cases, held in high disdain; guns, the purely aesthetic appreciation of women, boozin’ it up (in clubs no less), cars, and druggles.

There is simply something about Yelawolf’s whole style that I find in some way magnetic, such is its idiosyncrasy – looking more like a punk rocker than a rapper and yet with a lyrical ability that allows him to hold his own on a track with no less than Wu-Tang Clan stalwart Raekwon.

This however, I must stress, is not the main reason for my indulgence in his music. My simple enjoyment comes from the hard hitting 808 drums and the washed out thump of the heavy bass that permeates most of his songs. It’s no coincidence that the songs of his I genuinely enjoy are the ones in which the bass hits hardest…

Anyway, it’s about time for you to make your own mind up I reckon, here are a couple of tracks. The first comes with a nicely produced video and a ridiculously heavy chorus, the second is a little lighter in mood…

Having recently signed to Interscope you can expect to hear a lot more from Yelawolf in the coming year. And you’d be a fool to bet against hearing a collaboration with Eminem in the near future, taking into account Yelawolf’s desire for it to happen (“I’m absolutely up for it. I would love to work with Em. I’m a fan, so I’m definitely going to pitch it. I gotta take advantage of where I’m at.”) and the fact that they’re now on the same label…

If you want more now, you can download Yelawolf’s whole mixtape album FOR FREE here > Trunk Muzik