WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.160 I want you to picture a teenager sitting on a 00:00:03.160 --> 00:00:07.620 porch in southeast Washington, D .C. It's the 00:00:07.620 --> 00:00:10.880 late 2000s. And all around him, cars are rolling 00:00:10.880 --> 00:00:14.160 by blasting traditional hip hop. Right. But he's 00:00:14.160 --> 00:00:16.839 completely ignoring it. He isn't writing rhymes 00:00:16.839 --> 00:00:19.500 in a notebook or, you know, doing the typical 00:00:19.500 --> 00:00:22.120 aspiring rapper thing. Instead, he's surrounded 00:00:22.120 --> 00:00:26.300 by stacks of literary biographies. Oh, wow. Yeah. 00:00:26.519 --> 00:00:29.260 He is reading the daily newspaper front to back. 00:00:29.370 --> 00:00:32.549 Every single day he's studying the Quran and 00:00:32.549 --> 00:00:34.689 his main goal in life at this specific moment 00:00:34.689 --> 00:00:37.369 is just to write a book Which is I mean when 00:00:37.369 --> 00:00:39.310 you look at that specific set of interests It 00:00:39.310 --> 00:00:41.670 paints the picture of a future academic or maybe 00:00:41.670 --> 00:00:44.009 like a political journalist totally you don't 00:00:44.009 --> 00:00:46.530 look at a kid devouring Biographies in the daily 00:00:46.530 --> 00:00:48.710 news and immediately think oh, this is the foundation 00:00:48.710 --> 00:00:51.189 of a global music phenomenon No, not at all, 00:00:51.450 --> 00:00:54.450 but that's the wild twist here because that aspiring 00:00:54.450 --> 00:00:56.689 author didn't actually end up writing a book 00:00:56.920 --> 00:00:59.359 at least not a traditional one, with chapters 00:00:59.359 --> 00:01:01.659 and a spine. Right. His words eventually morphed 00:01:01.659 --> 00:01:04.000 into a completely different medium. Exactly. 00:01:04.680 --> 00:01:07.400 So for today's Deep Dive, we're unpacking the 00:01:07.400 --> 00:01:10.219 sources, covering Marquis Amante King, who, you 00:01:10.219 --> 00:01:12.500 know, the world knows as the Grammy -nominated 00:01:12.500 --> 00:01:16.640 rapper, Shy Glizzy. Yeah. And our mission today 00:01:16.640 --> 00:01:19.540 is to figure out how a kid raised on a strict 00:01:19.540 --> 00:01:23.120 diet of literature and local DC music essentially 00:01:23.120 --> 00:01:26.459 brute forced an entire region onto the national 00:01:26.459 --> 00:01:28.909 hip hop map. It's an incredible story. And to 00:01:28.909 --> 00:01:31.549 really grasp how he pulled that off, you have 00:01:31.549 --> 00:01:34.430 to look at the incredibly specific cultural environment 00:01:34.430 --> 00:01:37.090 he was steeped in. Yeah, the local soil. Exactly. 00:01:37.349 --> 00:01:40.349 You cannot separate his eventual mainstream success 00:01:40.349 --> 00:01:42.709 from the soil he grew up in. So let's dig into 00:01:42.709 --> 00:01:44.969 that soil a bit. He was born on December 12, 00:01:45.250 --> 00:01:47.849 1992, at Greater Southeast Community Hospital, 00:01:48.349 --> 00:01:50.829 raised right there in Southeast DC. And he actually 00:01:50.829 --> 00:01:53.909 got the nickname Shy. in early childhood, which, 00:01:53.930 --> 00:01:56.129 I mean, it feels super ironic for someone who 00:01:56.129 --> 00:01:58.090 would later demand that the entire music industry 00:01:58.090 --> 00:01:59.370 look at him. Yeah, definitely a bit of irony 00:01:59.370 --> 00:02:02.269 there. But the part of his background that I 00:02:02.269 --> 00:02:05.329 keep getting stuck on is just his intellectual 00:02:05.329 --> 00:02:08.009 appetite as a teenager. Yeah. He noted he's been 00:02:08.009 --> 00:02:10.870 a practicing Muslim since 2012, deeply engaged 00:02:10.870 --> 00:02:12.650 with the Quran, the papers, the biographies. 00:02:12.669 --> 00:02:15.289 Right. But the crucial musical detail, the thing 00:02:15.289 --> 00:02:18.069 that really defines his entire trajectory, is 00:02:18.069 --> 00:02:20.389 what he was not doing. He wasn't listening to 00:02:20.389 --> 00:02:23.120 rap. Which breaks... basically every conventional 00:02:23.120 --> 00:02:25.300 rule of the genre. I mean, the standard narrative 00:02:25.300 --> 00:02:28.139 for almost any rapper who reaches his level of 00:02:28.139 --> 00:02:32.479 success involves a pretty heavy phase of obsessive 00:02:32.479 --> 00:02:35.139 mimicry. Like studying the greats. Exactly. They 00:02:35.139 --> 00:02:37.740 studied the cadences of Biggie Smalls or the 00:02:37.740 --> 00:02:40.520 storytelling of Tupac or, you know, the internal 00:02:40.520 --> 00:02:44.060 rhyme schemes of Jay -Z or Nas. Yeah. Shy Glizzy 00:02:44.060 --> 00:02:46.219 bypassed that entire curriculum. The only thing 00:02:46.219 --> 00:02:48.560 he was really listening to was Go -Go. And for 00:02:48.560 --> 00:02:50.680 you listening, if you're outside the DMV area, 00:02:51.020 --> 00:02:54.520 so DC, Maryland, and Virginia Go -Go, might just 00:02:54.520 --> 00:02:57.060 sound like a genre name, but it is a distinct, 00:02:57.500 --> 00:02:59.740 deeply entrenched culture, right? Oh, absolutely. 00:02:59.800 --> 00:03:02.460 It is the absolute heartbeat of Washington, DC. 00:03:03.039 --> 00:03:06.520 Go -Go is this heavily percussive, funk -infused 00:03:06.520 --> 00:03:10.159 subgenre, and it's built entirely on continuous 00:03:10.159 --> 00:03:12.919 live instrumentation. Continuous? Like, they 00:03:12.919 --> 00:03:15.340 don't stop? Right. A Go -Go band might play for 00:03:15.340 --> 00:03:17.180 three hours straight without ever stopping the 00:03:17.180 --> 00:03:19.479 beat. That's exhausting just to think about. 00:03:19.699 --> 00:03:22.479 It's wild. It relies heavily on call and response 00:03:22.479 --> 00:03:25.639 with the audience, conga drums, cowbells, and 00:03:25.639 --> 00:03:29.199 just these relentless driving rhythms. The whole 00:03:29.199 --> 00:03:31.280 point of the music is designed to keep a crowd 00:03:31.280 --> 00:03:33.840 moving in a very specific, synchronized way. 00:03:34.500 --> 00:03:38.219 I keep thinking about it like a culinary experiment. 00:03:38.340 --> 00:03:40.620 OK, how so? It's like a chef deciding to invent 00:03:40.620 --> 00:03:43.090 a brand new pastry, right? but they have never 00:03:43.090 --> 00:03:45.330 actually tasted a traditional French croissant. 00:03:45.409 --> 00:03:47.370 Oh, I like that. Because he's pulling from a 00:03:47.370 --> 00:03:49.650 completely different sensory background like 00:03:49.650 --> 00:03:52.210 go -go rhythms and literary biographies instead 00:03:52.210 --> 00:03:55.449 of 90s hip hop cassettes, he accidentally engineers 00:03:55.449 --> 00:03:58.229 a completely fresh recipe for rap music. That's 00:03:58.229 --> 00:04:00.009 a great way to put it. And the mechanics of that 00:04:00.009 --> 00:04:02.069 fresh recipe are fascinating when you break down 00:04:02.069 --> 00:04:03.930 his vocal delivery. Yeah, let's talk about the 00:04:03.930 --> 00:04:06.310 delivery. Because when a traditional rapper hears 00:04:06.310 --> 00:04:09.409 a beat, They are subconsciously trying to fit 00:04:09.409 --> 00:04:12.430 their words into standard 16 -bar structures. 00:04:12.830 --> 00:04:14.370 They are always looking for the conventional 00:04:14.370 --> 00:04:16.370 pocket. Right, the typical boom -bap rhythm. 00:04:16.689 --> 00:04:19.790 Exactly. But when your entire musical foundation 00:04:19.790 --> 00:04:22.829 is go -go, where the groove never stops and the 00:04:22.829 --> 00:04:25.029 vocals are basically just another percussive 00:04:25.029 --> 00:04:27.629 instrument leading a crowd, you attack the beat 00:04:27.629 --> 00:04:29.269 differently. You're not looking for the same 00:04:29.269 --> 00:04:32.629 pocket. Right. Shaig Lizzy's cadence has this 00:04:32.629 --> 00:04:35.410 bouncy off -kilter rhythm to it. He raps with 00:04:35.410 --> 00:04:38.029 a distinctive swing that really carries the DNA 00:04:38.029 --> 00:04:41.189 of a lead talker in a go -go band. But see, it's 00:04:41.189 --> 00:04:43.730 one thing to have this unique go -go infused 00:04:43.730 --> 00:04:46.730 sound naturally bubbling up in southeast DC. 00:04:47.370 --> 00:04:49.550 Yeah. Having a cool sound is basically useless 00:04:49.550 --> 00:04:51.589 if you're geographically trapped in a city with 00:04:51.589 --> 00:04:54.110 zero rap infrastructure. Yeah, that was a massive 00:04:54.110 --> 00:04:56.350 hurdle. Like if you're in Atlanta or New York 00:04:56.350 --> 00:04:59.470 or Los Angeles, there are massive studio systems, 00:04:59.670 --> 00:05:02.410 right? You have A &R reps going to clubs. You 00:05:02.410 --> 00:05:05.149 have established labels. The DMV just didn't 00:05:05.149 --> 00:05:07.689 have that machine. They were effectively invisible 00:05:07.689 --> 00:05:10.009 to the major label system at that time. So how 00:05:10.009 --> 00:05:12.689 do you fix that? Well... The strategy he deployed 00:05:12.689 --> 00:05:15.230 to overcome that invisibility was just sheer 00:05:15.230 --> 00:05:18.250 overwhelming volume. He treated the release of 00:05:18.250 --> 00:05:20.910 music like a relentless siege on the local market. 00:05:21.189 --> 00:05:22.949 And let's look at the timeline of that siege, 00:05:23.089 --> 00:05:25.750 because it is exhausting just to read. It really 00:05:25.750 --> 00:05:29.370 is. Between 2011 and 2013, he goes on this insane 00:05:29.370 --> 00:05:32.509 mixtape grind. We're talking about no brainer, 00:05:32.730 --> 00:05:36.009 streets hottest youngin, law, fly money, fire 00:05:36.009 --> 00:05:39.100 rap, and law too. Six full -length projects. 00:05:39.240 --> 00:05:41.879 Six of them, in a highly compressed time frame. 00:05:42.199 --> 00:05:44.319 How does flooding the market like that actually 00:05:44.319 --> 00:05:46.160 force the industry to pay attention? Because 00:05:46.160 --> 00:05:48.500 it creates a scenario where you are literally 00:05:48.500 --> 00:05:50.759 unavoidable. You have to remember, in the mixtape 00:05:50.759 --> 00:05:54.120 era, the blog ecosystem dictated who was next. 00:05:54.180 --> 00:05:56.620 Right, the DatPiff days. Exactly. If a kid from 00:05:56.620 --> 00:05:59.519 DC drops one tape, a blog might miss it. But 00:05:59.519 --> 00:06:01.620 if he drops six within two years, every time 00:06:01.620 --> 00:06:04.160 a hip -hop journalist opens DatPiff or a regional 00:06:04.160 --> 00:06:06.000 blog, his name is just sitting right there. Just 00:06:06.000 --> 00:06:08.920 staring at them. Right. And that consistency 00:06:08.920 --> 00:06:12.399 builds a localized fervor. The streets and the 00:06:12.399 --> 00:06:15.180 DMV start treating him like a superstar. And 00:06:15.180 --> 00:06:18.000 eventually that localized heat radiates outward 00:06:18.000 --> 00:06:20.259 until the national media has to cover it just 00:06:20.259 --> 00:06:22.620 to stay relevant. And the media definitely caught 00:06:22.620 --> 00:06:26.189 the heat. By 2012, Complex Magazine featured 00:06:26.189 --> 00:06:29.149 him on its list of 10 new DMV rappers to watch. 00:06:29.189 --> 00:06:32.009 Which was a big deal. Huge. And then the very 00:06:32.009 --> 00:06:34.569 next year, in 2013, they upgraded him to one 00:06:34.569 --> 00:06:37.329 of 15 unsigned rappers who should get a deal. 00:06:37.649 --> 00:06:40.810 The momentum was undeniable. But the review that 00:06:40.810 --> 00:06:42.970 I think really captures his essence during this 00:06:42.970 --> 00:06:45.889 era comes from the Washington City paper. They 00:06:45.889 --> 00:06:48.449 reviewed his law mixtape and described him as 00:06:48.449 --> 00:06:51.509 less polished and more frenetic. Spot on. And 00:06:51.509 --> 00:06:53.350 they specifically pointed out that his hooks 00:06:53.350 --> 00:06:56.709 are repetitive and droning, but also hungry and 00:06:56.709 --> 00:06:59.370 catchy. See, when you are dropping six projects 00:06:59.370 --> 00:07:02.230 in two years, polish is a luxury you cannot afford. 00:07:02.350 --> 00:07:04.410 Yeah, no time for polish. And frankly, it's a 00:07:04.410 --> 00:07:06.810 luxury you don't even want. Frenetic and hungry 00:07:06.810 --> 00:07:08.810 are the exact qualities that make a regional 00:07:08.810 --> 00:07:11.569 mixtape legend. The repetition they mention isn't 00:07:11.569 --> 00:07:13.949 a flaw, it's a feature. Right. It goes back to 00:07:13.949 --> 00:07:16.480 the go -go thing. Exactly. It goes back to that 00:07:16.480 --> 00:07:19.100 go go influence creating a hypnotic loop that 00:07:19.100 --> 00:07:20.980 just gets stuck in your head. So I want to look 00:07:20.980 --> 00:07:22.660 at a quote he gave to the fader because it's 00:07:22.660 --> 00:07:24.180 a pretty bold claim. And I really want to know 00:07:24.180 --> 00:07:27.560 if it holds up. OK, let's hear it. In 2014, he 00:07:27.560 --> 00:07:31.240 tells them DMV still didn't become a thing. Yeah. 00:07:31.480 --> 00:07:33.980 Nobody opened up a lane for DMV rap. I opened 00:07:33.980 --> 00:07:36.300 up my lane. I opened up glizzy gang lane, the 00:07:36.300 --> 00:07:38.839 southeast DC lane. And then he doubles down on 00:07:38.839 --> 00:07:42.579 this later in 2017 saying, I got a whole. culture, 00:07:42.740 --> 00:07:45.519 the D, the M, and the V to put on for it. I look 00:07:45.519 --> 00:07:48.740 at that 2014 quote, and I have to wonder, is 00:07:48.740 --> 00:07:51.980 this just standard rapper hubris? Like, is he 00:07:51.980 --> 00:07:55.319 just talking big for an interview, or is it historical 00:07:55.319 --> 00:07:57.360 fact that he single -handedly wheeled this region 00:07:57.360 --> 00:07:59.579 into the spotlight? To judge that fairly, you 00:07:59.579 --> 00:08:01.800 really have to look at the landscape of DMV rap 00:08:01.800 --> 00:08:04.199 right before him. The immediate counterargument 00:08:04.199 --> 00:08:06.600 people always make is Whale. Right. Whale was 00:08:06.600 --> 00:08:09.079 huge. Whale found massive mainstream success 00:08:09.079 --> 00:08:12.399 years earlier, but Whale's trajectory was completely 00:08:12.399 --> 00:08:14.579 different. He aligned heavily with established 00:08:14.579 --> 00:08:17.199 industry players outside the city, and his sound 00:08:17.199 --> 00:08:19.620 shifted toward a more traditional backpack rap 00:08:19.620 --> 00:08:22.699 -turned -pop style. Oh, I see. What Shy Glizzy 00:08:22.699 --> 00:08:25.639 is claiming in that fader interview is the establishment 00:08:25.639 --> 00:08:29.339 of a raw, street -level, unapologetic, Southeast 00:08:29.339 --> 00:08:32.960 DC lane. He didn't dilute it. Exactly. He didn't 00:08:32.960 --> 00:08:35.320 assimilate into an Atlanta trap sound. He didn't 00:08:35.320 --> 00:08:37.460 try to sound like a New York boom bap artist. 00:08:37.820 --> 00:08:40.279 He forced the national industry to consume the 00:08:40.279 --> 00:08:43.759 raw DMV sound on its own terms. So within that 00:08:43.759 --> 00:08:46.490 specific context, it is historical fact. Okay, 00:08:46.669 --> 00:08:49.230 so the local lane is officially carved out. But 00:08:49.230 --> 00:08:51.289 dominating the local blogs and carving a lane 00:08:51.289 --> 00:08:53.409 doesn't automatically... buy you a ticket to 00:08:53.409 --> 00:08:55.490 the Billboard charts. There has to be a catalyst 00:08:55.490 --> 00:08:57.629 to break the dam. And that catalyst arrived in 00:08:57.629 --> 00:09:00.250 2014. That's when he releases the Young He -Fe 00:09:00.250 --> 00:09:03.009 mixtape. Ah, yes. That project contains the track 00:09:03.009 --> 00:09:05.549 Awesome, which becomes his massive breakthrough 00:09:05.549 --> 00:09:09.129 solo hit. It ultimately climbs to number 45 on 00:09:09.129 --> 00:09:12.269 the U .S. Hot R &B hip hop songs chart. I want 00:09:12.269 --> 00:09:14.629 to dissect Awesome for a second, because we just 00:09:14.629 --> 00:09:16.490 talked about the Washington City paper calling 00:09:16.490 --> 00:09:20.669 his style repetitive and droning. Yeah. So what 00:09:20.669 --> 00:09:23.750 is the mechanism that takes a track with those 00:09:23.750 --> 00:09:26.409 specific qualities and makes it the one that 00:09:26.409 --> 00:09:30.250 suddenly gets AP Rocky's attention. It's all 00:09:30.250 --> 00:09:32.090 about the space in the track. The production 00:09:32.090 --> 00:09:35.009 on Awesome is incredibly sparse. There isn't 00:09:35.009 --> 00:09:36.730 much going on behind his voice. Right. There 00:09:36.730 --> 00:09:38.970 isn't a massive wall of sound competing with 00:09:38.970 --> 00:09:42.389 his vocals. This leaves wide open space for his 00:09:42.389 --> 00:09:45.730 highly unique, slightly nasal vocal tone to cut 00:09:45.730 --> 00:09:48.029 right through the mix. It really pierces through. 00:09:48.169 --> 00:09:50.710 And in a radio landscape that was dominated by 00:09:50.710 --> 00:09:52.669 artists trying to sound incredibly aggressive 00:09:52.669 --> 00:09:55.909 or overly polished, this high -pitched, almost 00:09:55.909 --> 00:09:58.529 mocking sing -song delivery sounded completely 00:09:58.529 --> 00:10:00.929 alien. It was disruptive. And disruption attracts 00:10:00.929 --> 00:10:03.669 the heavyweights. AAP Rocky and 2 Chainz jump 00:10:03.669 --> 00:10:06.370 on the official remix. Which was huge. Insane. 00:10:06.690 --> 00:10:10.889 That remix alone pulled 750 ,000 SoundCloud streams 00:10:10.889 --> 00:10:13.779 in its first week. For anyone who remembers 2014, 00:10:14.379 --> 00:10:16.240 three -quarters of a million streams in a week 00:10:16.240 --> 00:10:19.100 on SoundCloud was a seismic event. It really 00:10:19.100 --> 00:10:22.419 serves as the ultimate cosign because when artists 00:10:22.419 --> 00:10:25.759 of that magnitude jump on your track, it signals 00:10:25.759 --> 00:10:27.700 to the rest of the industry that you are the 00:10:27.700 --> 00:10:29.559 new center of gravity. Right. Everybody else 00:10:29.559 --> 00:10:32.120 has to pay attention now. Exactly. The institutional 00:10:32.120 --> 00:10:35.139 validation immediately follows. Fact magazine 00:10:35.139 --> 00:10:38.419 names him one of 10 rappers to watch in 2014. 00:10:38.980 --> 00:10:42.879 And by 2015, he secures a spot on the XXL freshman 00:10:42.879 --> 00:10:46.200 class cover. which back then was the defining 00:10:46.200 --> 00:10:48.799 kingmaker of that era. Oh, absolutely. It's brilliant 00:10:48.799 --> 00:10:51.259 how he leverages that momentum, too. He doesn't 00:10:51.259 --> 00:10:53.139 just run off to Los Angeles and leave his crew 00:10:53.139 --> 00:10:55.259 behind. No, he keeps building. Right, he drops 00:10:55.259 --> 00:10:58.120 it. Be careful with his glizzy gang collective. 00:10:58.580 --> 00:11:00.820 Then he releases for Trappers Only, which is 00:11:00.820 --> 00:11:03.220 entirely produced by Zaytoven. And Zaytoven is 00:11:03.220 --> 00:11:05.480 basically the architect of the modern Atlanta 00:11:05.480 --> 00:11:07.779 trap sound. Exactly. So teaming up with him acts 00:11:07.779 --> 00:11:10.940 as this sonic bridge connecting his hyper local 00:11:10.940 --> 00:11:14.080 DMV style with the dominant southern rap sound 00:11:14.080 --> 00:11:16.600 that was already controlling the radio. And that 00:11:16.600 --> 00:11:19.159 strategic bridge building perfectly sets the 00:11:19.159 --> 00:11:22.139 stage for his absolute commercial peak in 2016 00:11:22.139 --> 00:11:25.460 and 2017. We should talk about Crew. Yes, he 00:11:25.460 --> 00:11:27.860 provides the standout feature on Goldlink's track 00:11:27.860 --> 00:11:31.360 crew alongside Brent Fiaz. Calling crew a hit 00:11:31.360 --> 00:11:34.179 feels like a massive understatement. It was a 00:11:34.179 --> 00:11:36.559 cultural omnipresence. It was everywhere. It 00:11:36.559 --> 00:11:38.720 peaks at number 45 on the Billboard Hot 100, 00:11:39.120 --> 00:11:41.100 eventually goes eight times platinum, and earns 00:11:41.100 --> 00:11:43.340 a Grammy nomination for best rap song performance. 00:11:43.440 --> 00:11:46.080 It's an incredible journey. Right. He started 00:11:46.080 --> 00:11:48.580 with conga drums and literature on a porch in 00:11:48.580 --> 00:11:50.840 southeast DC, and now he's holding a ticket to 00:11:50.840 --> 00:11:52.850 the Grammys. But arriving at that mountaintop 00:11:52.850 --> 00:11:55.330 fundamentally alters the physics of an artist's 00:11:55.330 --> 00:11:58.309 career. The pressure shifts. When you're dropping 00:11:58.309 --> 00:12:00.850 six mixtapes in two years, you're just fighting 00:12:00.850 --> 00:12:03.350 for survival and attention. But once you have 00:12:03.350 --> 00:12:05.429 the Grammy nod and the multi -platinum plaque, 00:12:06.009 --> 00:12:08.769 the industry expects you to evolve into an institution. 00:12:09.470 --> 00:12:12.570 And his attempt to evolve introduces a really 00:12:12.570 --> 00:12:16.230 turbulent era. Very turbulent. In January 2017, 00:12:16.649 --> 00:12:19.629 seemingly out of nowhere, he drops the shy, glizzy 00:12:19.629 --> 00:12:22.799 moniker entirely. He releases an EP called The 00:12:22.799 --> 00:12:25.179 World Is Yours under just the name Jeff A. I 00:12:25.179 --> 00:12:27.879 look at that name change. Right when his national 00:12:27.879 --> 00:12:29.919 awareness is absolutely peaking and it feels 00:12:29.919 --> 00:12:33.200 like self -sabotage, it gives me major prints 00:12:33.200 --> 00:12:35.259 changing his name to assemble vibes. That's a 00:12:35.259 --> 00:12:37.820 great comparison. Why take an established brand 00:12:37.820 --> 00:12:39.940 with mats of equity and just throw a wrench in 00:12:39.940 --> 00:12:43.100 it like that? It's a really bold psychological 00:12:43.100 --> 00:12:46.440 declaration. Shedding the word shy to become 00:12:46.440 --> 00:12:50.419 jefe, which translates to boss, is his way of 00:12:50.419 --> 00:12:52.940 telegraphing a shift in maturity. He wants to 00:12:52.940 --> 00:12:55.399 be seen differently. Exactly. He is trying to 00:12:55.399 --> 00:12:57.460 force the audience to see him differently. He's 00:12:57.460 --> 00:13:00.120 saying, I am no longer the hungry kid churning 00:13:00.120 --> 00:13:02.940 out dat -piff mix tapes. I am a label executive. 00:13:03.019 --> 00:13:06.399 I am calling the shots. But that's risky. Incredibly 00:13:06.399 --> 00:13:08.940 dangerous. Executing a rebrand like that while 00:13:08.940 --> 00:13:11.120 you're still solidifying your mainstream foothold 00:13:11.120 --> 00:13:13.600 is dangerous because the critics and the fans 00:13:13.600 --> 00:13:16.200 are deeply attached to the hungry kid they originally 00:13:16.200 --> 00:13:18.440 discovered. And the critical whiplash was severe. 00:13:19.039 --> 00:13:22.879 Pitchfork gave the Chef AEP a 6 .9, and the way 00:13:22.879 --> 00:13:24.679 they described it is super telling. What did 00:13:24.679 --> 00:13:27.200 they say? They said he mostly seems content to 00:13:27.200 --> 00:13:30.360 roll leisurely with no sense of urgency. And 00:13:30.360 --> 00:13:33.370 Hip Hop DX was even harsher. They handed down 00:13:33.370 --> 00:13:37.070 a brutal 2 .7 rating, calling it an energetic 00:13:37.070 --> 00:13:40.210 but hollow offering. It is the definitive curse 00:13:40.210 --> 00:13:42.950 of the established artist. Right. The very frenetic 00:13:42.950 --> 00:13:45.190 energy that the Washington City paper praised 00:13:45.190 --> 00:13:48.149 years earlier is exactly what Pitchfork and Hip 00:13:48.149 --> 00:13:50.690 Hop DX felt was missing now. You lost the edge. 00:13:50.950 --> 00:13:52.529 Yeah, when you try to sound like a boss, you 00:13:52.529 --> 00:13:54.730 often lose the frantic desperation that made 00:13:54.730 --> 00:13:56.769 your music thrilling in the first place. You 00:13:56.769 --> 00:13:59.570 slow your cadence down. You pick more polished, 00:13:59.909 --> 00:14:02.970 expensive sounding beats. but the edge gets smoothed 00:14:02.970 --> 00:14:05.230 out. But, you know, all of that critical debate 00:14:05.230 --> 00:14:08.450 over his artistic evolution suddenly feels incredibly 00:14:08.450 --> 00:14:11.789 trivial later in 2017. Yeah, real life happens. 00:14:12.090 --> 00:14:14.690 A core member of his collective, 30 Glizzy, is 00:14:14.690 --> 00:14:18.149 found dead. It's a devastating real -world tragedy 00:14:18.149 --> 00:14:20.269 that just fractures his entire foundation. It 00:14:20.269 --> 00:14:22.750 was a huge blow. He releases an emotional tribute 00:14:22.750 --> 00:14:25.250 single called Take Me Away, and you can literally 00:14:25.250 --> 00:14:27.730 hear the grief altering his approach to music. 00:14:27.879 --> 00:14:31.120 The music stops being a strategic tool for industry 00:14:31.120 --> 00:14:33.620 dominance at that point, and it transforms into 00:14:33.620 --> 00:14:36.740 a mechanism for survival. And the contrast between 00:14:36.740 --> 00:14:39.360 his next two projects highlights this perfectly. 00:14:40.179 --> 00:14:43.899 In 2018, he drops his debut studio album, Fully 00:14:43.899 --> 00:14:46.940 Loaded. It peaked at number 35 on the Billboard 00:14:46.940 --> 00:14:50.080 200, and it's a highly calculated feature -heavy 00:14:50.080 --> 00:14:53.039 project. Lots of big names. Right, you have Young 00:14:53.039 --> 00:14:56.929 Boy Never Broke, again, Lil' Z -Vert, Gunna, 00:14:57.049 --> 00:14:59.190 Young Thug. It's designed to perform well in 00:14:59.190 --> 00:15:01.269 the streaming era. But then you look at his follow 00:15:01.269 --> 00:15:04.309 -up in 2019, Covered in Blood. It charts way 00:15:04.309 --> 00:15:07.210 down at 156 on the Billboard 200. Yeah. But when 00:15:07.210 --> 00:15:09.470 you actually listen to it, you realize charting 00:15:09.470 --> 00:15:12.330 wasn't the goal. Not at all. He described the 00:15:12.330 --> 00:15:16.110 album in an interview as a diary. documenting 00:15:16.110 --> 00:15:17.830 what he had been going through over the previous 00:15:17.830 --> 00:15:20.649 months. The polish is gone. The massive guest 00:15:20.649 --> 00:15:23.769 features are largely gone. It is just raw vulnerability 00:15:23.769 --> 00:15:26.289 and trauma. And that transition is absolutely 00:15:26.289 --> 00:15:28.009 crucial for his longevity. Because he couldn't 00:15:28.009 --> 00:15:30.309 keep faking it. Exactly. If he had just kept 00:15:30.309 --> 00:15:32.730 trying to replicate the commercial formula of 00:15:32.730 --> 00:15:34.490 fully loaded, he might have completely burned 00:15:34.490 --> 00:15:37.889 out. By using covered in blood to actively process 00:15:37.889 --> 00:15:40.370 his trauma on the microphone, he grounds himself. 00:15:40.600 --> 00:15:43.799 Surviving that profound personal loss, combined 00:15:43.799 --> 00:15:46.259 with navigating the turbulent critical reception 00:15:46.259 --> 00:15:49.419 of his experimental phases, ushers in his current 00:15:49.419 --> 00:15:52.759 era. He truly steps into the role of the elder 00:15:52.759 --> 00:15:55.139 statesman of the DMV. You can even see him changing 00:15:55.139 --> 00:15:57.200 his physical environment to reflect this new 00:15:57.200 --> 00:16:00.500 mindset. At the end of 2019, he flies out to 00:16:00.500 --> 00:16:03.200 the island of Hawaii to record the Aloha EP. 00:16:03.320 --> 00:16:05.980 A total change of scenery. Yeah, he is actively 00:16:05.980 --> 00:16:09.379 removing himself from the intense, hyper -local, 00:16:09.519 --> 00:16:11.899 and often dangerous environment of DC to find 00:16:11.899 --> 00:16:14.379 a completely new creative headspace. And when 00:16:14.379 --> 00:16:16.879 he returns to his roots with Young Cafe 3 in 00:16:16.879 --> 00:16:19.830 2020, his posture has completely changed. He 00:16:19.830 --> 00:16:21.809 isn't just the star player anymore, he's the 00:16:21.809 --> 00:16:24.470 coach. Right. Take the video for the lead single 00:16:24.470 --> 00:16:27.710 Forever Tray 7. It heavily features No Savage, 00:16:28.110 --> 00:16:30.450 who is a brand new Sammini to Glizzy Gang Records, 00:16:30.730 --> 00:16:33.009 operating as an imprint under 300 Entertainment. 00:16:33.090 --> 00:16:35.490 Leading back to the community. Exactly. He is 00:16:35.490 --> 00:16:37.590 taking the massive label infrastructure he gained 00:16:37.590 --> 00:16:40.029 access to and building a pipeline directly back 00:16:40.029 --> 00:16:42.250 to his neighborhood. He's handing down the blueprint 00:16:42.250 --> 00:16:44.389 that he had to basically invent from scratch. 00:16:45.110 --> 00:16:47.490 And he really hasn't stopped working. He dropped 00:16:47.490 --> 00:16:50.690 flowers in 2023, and his most recent project 00:16:50.690 --> 00:16:56.820 was released on December 12th. 2025. Which is 00:16:56.820 --> 00:16:59.299 a very significant date. Yeah, what's really 00:16:59.299 --> 00:17:01.580 poetic about that release date is that it falls 00:17:01.580 --> 00:17:05.039 exactly on his 33rd birthday. Right. When you 00:17:05.039 --> 00:17:07.380 step back and look at his massive discography, 00:17:08.099 --> 00:17:11.119 like dozens of mixtapes, EPs, and albums over 00:17:11.119 --> 00:17:14.039 the span of roughly 15 years, it brings us right 00:17:14.039 --> 00:17:15.900 back to the beginning. Full circle. He started 00:17:15.900 --> 00:17:19.009 out as a teenager wanting to write a book. And 00:17:19.009 --> 00:17:21.130 through all of these audio projects, he essentially 00:17:21.130 --> 00:17:25.049 did. He just serialized a massive, unedited autobiography 00:17:25.049 --> 00:17:27.329 over a decade and a half of music. It's brilliant. 00:17:27.450 --> 00:17:29.710 The through line of his career is just unparalleled 00:17:29.710 --> 00:17:31.890 resilience. Yeah, resilience is the perfect word. 00:17:32.089 --> 00:17:34.109 He took a city that the music industry was largely 00:17:34.109 --> 00:17:37.170 ignoring, infused the DNA of its native go -go 00:17:37.170 --> 00:17:39.849 rhythms into a completely unorthodox rap style, 00:17:40.089 --> 00:17:42.509 and just refused to take no for an answer. He 00:17:42.509 --> 00:17:45.349 forced it. He bypassed the traditional influences, 00:17:46.029 --> 00:17:48.170 flooded the market with a sheer volume of mixed 00:17:48.170 --> 00:17:50.690 tapes, navigated the crushing weight of grief 00:17:50.690 --> 00:17:53.690 and the fickle nature of music critics, and emerged 00:17:53.690 --> 00:17:56.769 as a Grammy -nominated label executive. Just 00:17:56.769 --> 00:17:58.950 an unbelievable arc. And for you, the listener, 00:17:59.390 --> 00:18:01.150 it leaves you with something really fascinating 00:18:01.150 --> 00:18:03.910 to chew on as we wrap up today's deep dive. Oh, 00:18:03.910 --> 00:18:06.410 absolutely. We know exactly how Shy Glizzy built 00:18:06.410 --> 00:18:09.829 his sound by absorbing the live percussive energy 00:18:09.829 --> 00:18:12.650 of DC's go -go music instead of traditional hip 00:18:12.650 --> 00:18:14.839 hop. It makes you wonder, you know, how many 00:18:14.839 --> 00:18:18.420 other highly localized hyper niche regional genres 00:18:18.420 --> 00:18:21.660 are quietly serving as the uncredited DNA for 00:18:21.660 --> 00:18:23.680 the biggest mainstream hits on the radio right 00:18:23.680 --> 00:18:26.119 now. It's a great question. What hyper local 00:18:26.119 --> 00:18:28.299 sounds bouncing around your own city might be 00:18:28.299 --> 00:18:30.380 just one visionary kid away from taking over 00:18:30.380 --> 00:18:30.740 the world.