A Look at Hip-Hop’s Freshest New Voices

Hip-hop is changing again. Over time both its sound and its voices have grown more diverse. Like it or not, a bevy of young talent is flooding the scene, saturating a genre rooted in social change with college songs and party music. With so many new artists these days, it can be hard to pick out the good ones – I know – and I’m here to help. Don’t be fooled by the hype, here are the underground’s best and brightest new voices:

Kinetics & One Love:

I’ve talked about these guys before, and I’ll talk about them again, because it doesn’t get much better than this. These Cornell grads have been making some of the best mp3s that the blogosphere has to offer since we entered college. The group’s vocalist is the NYC-born Kinetics, famous for his battle-rap background and socially conscious lyrics. While at Cornell, he majored in international relations. Add to this the productions of the Maryland-based One Love, who majored in music at Cornell and studied classical and jazz theory for years before making the transition to hip-hop.

What you get is the intelligent, innovative and catchy music this group has become known for, scoring a songwriting deal with Atlantic Records after writing the chorus and music for B.o.B’s hit “Airplanes” last year. Now they are turning back to their own music again, and recent releases like “Halley’s Comet,” and especially “Sign Language,” featuring Wynter Gordon (of Flo-Rida’s “Sugar” fame) are the cream of the crop, blending One Love’s signature productions with Kinetics’ smooth flow, storytelling ability, and one-liners. Be sure to check out all their new music as well as last year’s release Fading Back to Normal.

Chiddy Bang:

After the breakout success of “Opposite of Adults” (sampling MGMT’s “Kids), these Drexel students have blown up, performing across the country and earning a feature from Pharrell on their pre-album EP Chiddy Bang: The Preview, which dropped last month. Their signature sound features rapper Chiddy (born Chidera Anamege) rapping over Xaphoon’s beats made from chopped up indie and pop samples and drums. Some of my favorites include the Pharrell-laced “The Good Life”, “Fuck You” – a mash of the hit Cee-Lo track, and “Truth”, which samples Passion Pit’s “Better Things”. Look out for their official debut The Swelly Life next spring.

e-dubble:

With sharp instrumentals and cognitive lyrics, this Philly-born and Baltimore-based producer/rapper is one of the most progressive new artists I’ve heard. After a brief gig in the music industry (which ended when the label he was with went under), e-dubble planted himself in Baltimore where he and his friends are now fixing up an old warehouse into a recording studio and working on their debut as the group Young English. With all this going on, e-dub still drops a Freestyle Friday on his Facebook page every week. If you haven’t heard his debut hip-hop is good yet, then you have some kind of a treat waiting for you.

Hoodie Allen:

This is a name that’s going to start coming up a lot more over the next couple years. Hoodie Allen (born Steven Witz) is a Long Island-based rapper and self-defined “college-educated music nerd”. First popping out in 2009 with his debut Bagels and Beats EP, this indie-hopper returned to the spotlight last month with the release of his newest mixtape, Pep Rally. Backed by the production of Obey City, whose samples include everyone from Marina & The Diamonds to Death Cab for Cutie, these genre-benders have injected hip-hop with yet another splash of alternative sounds and indie pop. Pep Rally is chock full of smooth flows and witty punchlines, especially evident in the blog smash “You Are Not a Robot”. Other notables include “Swimming With Sharks”, sampling VV Brown, and “January Jones.”