If you didn’t know who A$AP was before, you surely do after the release of his newest album, Long.Live.A$AP., on January 15th. Although this album has found him great success and placed him on the top of the Billboard charts according to Neilsen SoundScan, A$AP used to be a struggling artist starting out just as everybody else had. His release of “Peso” back in 2011 drew major interest from YouTube listeners, generating 17 million views. His career was launched before A$AP even knew it. Within the past two years he’s had anywhere from 200 – 300 shows and headlined plenty of music festivals with major artists such as Drake and Rihanna.

His newest album takes a number of different musical styles and mixes them together to create a unique blend of music. “Wild for the Night” features Skrillex who created an amazing beat that would be great to just hear alone. On top of that, A$AP goes in lyrically with a perfect and organic blend of hip-hop with electronica music. “PMW (All I Really Need)” is another favorite of mine of this album. Featuring Schoolboy Q, an uprising star in the hip-hop community, Rocky and him bring a nice flow of lyrics. They provide a nice style that goes from rapping to singsong melodies towards the end of their verses.

A$AP Rocky has managed to create his own lane in music with an original sound and has stuck to it. Although a few of the tracks didn’t reel me in fully, “Long.Live.A$AP.” is a mix of elements of hip-hop from East Coast to Southern chopped and screwed. This album may not be perfect, but it almost is in my eyes.

A$AP