The Ones: Boldy James and The Alchemist’s “Carruth”
With artists releasing songs at a fast and furious pace it’s difficult for the average hip-hop head to keep track of it all—no matter how tapped in they are. That’s why we created The Ones, a daily post to highlight the song you need to hear curated by the Levels team. We sort through all the new songs—across all the platforms and subgenres—so you don’t have to. Thank us later.
Boldy James and The Alchemist - “Carruth”
Boldy James’ raps are bleak; the 36-year-old has been through enough trauma for multiple lifetimes. “My friends came and went, but most of them was murder victims,” he says emotionlessly on “Carruth,” the intro to his new album, The Price of Tea in China. Like the entirety of the project, “Carruth” is produced by The Alchemist, who has made a career of teaming up with underappreciated talents like Boldy. The Beverly Hills-born beatmaker lays the Detroit emcee’s words over a slow burning instrumental; the chilling piano and woozy vocal sample sounds ripped from the soundtrack of a tragic love story. The production elevates Boldy’s concrete-hard delivery, which can sometimes sound monotonous, to elegy. Boldy James and The Alchemist are the perfect pairing, and together they make hip-hop devoid of all hope.
Check out previous Ones, and listen to new rap from Boldy James and The Alchemist and more on our Spotify playlist, Apple Music playlist, and SoundCloud playlist.
Originally Appeared on Pitchfork
