by Dan Goldin (@post_trash_)
We’ve said it before and we will most definitely say it again, Meyhem Lauren is the very essence of New York hip-hop. Lay out a beat for him and he effortlessly crushes it, bar after bar detailing accounts of exquisite living and devious behavior. He’s got an iron clad flow, absolutely bodying beats, shining like diamonds glistening from the shadows. While he will forever carry Queens on his back, the magic of his latest album, Champagne For Breakfast, comes as a historical West Coast moment, the first collaborative project between Madlib and DJ Muggs. A meeting of undeniable giants, the legendary producers, responsible for some of hip-hop’s all-time greatest efforts, work in unison together to design the wavy elegance and the minimalist psych-laced blueprint of Meyhem Lauren’s latest. Their collaboration behind the boards offers trademarks from each of their respective catalogs, merged together to give glimpses of both. Lauren has always represented the lavish style and hard-nosed bravado of rap’s glory years, and who better to arrange the score than Muggs and Madlib. Matching his larger-than-life charisma, their beats set tone and character, pivoting between glorious funk-strewn boogie and menacing minimalism, each rattling out the speakers with dusty perfection.
For as much as every MC would kill to have a production team like Muggs and Madlib, it should be noted that every producer probably feels the same about working with an MC like Meyhem Lauren, someone with the ability to stick like superglue to any beat. Over a swirl of apocalyptic grooves and psychedelic noir boom-bap, Meyhem Lauren does his thing, a living monument to the “fly shit”. While his lyrics don’t offer anything profoundly poetic or pointedly political, Lauren spits it as he sees it, all in the pursuit of the finer things that come within the lap of luxury. He brings a supreme confidence, a big body energy to the proceedings, a manifesto of extravagant meals, designer clothes, and exclusive rides, acquired at any cost. It’s the dream of the come up. Rising from humble means to a life where humble isn’t even in the vocabulary (“I’m an icon, pardon my confidence, dress code dripping got ‘em slippin’ outta consciousness”).
With darts shifting between gangsterisms of counting money and duffle bags of elicit product and his flair for expensive tastes, Meyhem is example of the ends justifying the means.More often than not, however, he can be found in the kitchen or at the chef’s table, appreciating an endless list of elegant meals. Throughout Champagne For Breakfast, Lauren is eating good, dropping references to octopus carpaccio, crawfish étouffée, shaved truffles, grilled lamb, monkfish ossobuco, porcini pesto, Calabrian peppers, saki, scallops, orecchiette, swordfish, yuca, salmon over rice, chimichuri topped skirt steaks, flan, sushi, hand-gathered muscles, ribs, shrimp, and rosemary portobellos… and we’re just scratching the surface. The endless list of food that Meyhem Lauren peppers into his songs probably outweighs all references to fast whips and the street life combined. This is after all, a celebration, a chance for Meyhem Lauren to be in love with the life he’s built. He’s doing his thing, and at the moment, life is good. Over the slamming break-beat jubilation of “Dom Vs Cris” (a truly glorious beat), Meyhem is “out here winning,” welcoming the Spring with new cars and “drinking champagne in the sunshine.” The clouds have parted, there’s nothing ominous about it, Meyhem is living his best life.
It’s not all food and bubbly though, Meyhem Lauren pays homage to hip-hop’s past, both with references to the legends (Biggie, Mobb Deep, Nas, Cypress Hill) and with the indirect homage that comes embedded in his timeless delivery. Like a living breathing “jackin’ for beats,” many of the album’s tracks change direction midway through the song, shifting tempos and tension as Meyhem remains forever unfazed. He rides beats with a smoothness in his flow that goes hand-in-hand with the otherwise gruff nature of his booming voice. Songs like “OD Wilson” and “Big Money” offer short fused beats with a tremendous evil, the type fit for a “Super Villain,” and while Lauren doesn’t often go abstract in the way that MF DOOM would, he does put these beats in a stranglehold. At times he weaves his words without a sense of urgency, like he’s got all the time in the world, and he wants you to hang on every lyric. On the flipside of the coin, Meyhem Lauren still crafts brilliant bars with complex rhyme schemes when the gets the itch. He digs throughout the record between tough and punchy enunciation and tongue twister acrobatics, treating songs like “African Pompano” with its sparse snaps and pulsating bass, to a slew of dizzying bars and rhymes that triple back over the beat.
In the same way that Meyhem Lauren gets to shine, so do DJ Muggs and Madlib, working together to dazzle at each turn, gliding between twinkling pianos and steely organs. Champagne for Breakfast is an album with tremendous flow, not just in the vocal delivery, but conceptual flow in the music itself. The producers piece the work together with a pair of instrumentals, the looped soul heavy “Triple M Airlines” with dusty snares, urgent strings, and a fiery crackle and “Pop Clink Fizz,” a sample heavy, patchwork instrumental that could have fit on Madvillainy. The beats are well crafted, with just enough composition to serve their hypnotic design, chopped and resonant, there’s a constant head nod in place.
Everything comes to it’s celebratory conclusion on the retro summer time soul of “Wild Salmon,” a track that’s lifted with nothing but good vibes. From the breezy ease of the beat with it’s bent guitars, funky bass, and layered soul, to Meyhem’s detailed description of a backyard barbecue, he grills up jokes and braggadocious boasts side by side, setting the scene as he recounts “I told Alchemist to put his shirt on, he’s looking too pale, get some sunlight, you’re scaring the kids” and later reminding us all “the pitbull eats better than your mother.” It’s all good times in the sunshine. As the beat rolls on, Meyhem concludes the record with some words of hope, “Life is one big BBQ, man. Shit got its up and downs but you whenever we bounce back, the mother fucking grill’s gonna be hot and the wine’s gonna be pouring.”
Meyhem Lauren looms large in his lyrics and he’s building the myth and magic of his presence ever larger. Steadily talking shit, immersed in culinary excellence with one foot in and one foot out of the “crime-related” lifestyle, Lauren is having a great time, “looking like a blend of old money and new money”. - DG