Is JPEGMafia the greatest hip hop artist right now?

 

By Manuel Gemperli

If I had to pick just one current hip hop artist as my favorite it would be JPEGMafia. To me, hip hop is as much a producer’s as it is a rapper’s game. Producing in hip hop is a different role than in most other genres. It involves building the canvas including the first layers of paint. The best ones create collages that could even stand on their own. Very few operate at the top level in rapping and producing. JPEG does. Hell, he smokes most of them in both disciplines. And it seems that only he would be able to control the obviously frenetic pace of his artistic mind. “50 beat-switches a minute, they gonna put me in a Guinness”, he raps on “I scream this into the mirror before i interact with anyone”. That sums it up pretty nicely. While many hip hop songs are built around very few beats, he switches things around seemingly by the second. His music is often wild, even frantic, but there’s tender moments too. He constantly keeps you on your toes, because there’s no way you could guess what he chooses to do next. His song structures are way different than in most contemporary hip hop, possibly more comparable to progressive rock (I know that sounds crazy, but think about it), just at a much higher coolness level (and the songs aren’t as ridiculously long). It gives the music a completely different feel. It’s challenging, it’s entertaining and often just straight up fun. And now I haven’t even talked about his way with words and the musicality of his rhymes. A singular artist who doesn’t compromise.