After making a name for himself as one of the key members of Local Muzik Group, being featured on the immortal Lake$ide Locals and dropping various EP & singles, on “I’m Young, Let Me Live” Mari So Dope crafts the next evolution of the St.Pete Hip Hop sound.
No one is able to capture that swaggy pimp tyte vibe like Mari does, which is what makes him stand out from the rest. His beats are always mad futuristic as well, shout out to Goodie on “Gameboy”. On this project though Mari was able to bring all his sounds together and push them to the next level.
The album starts off with the usual Mari phone convo snippets fans should be accustomed to on the intro “Servin”. Mari’s flow on this one is really brazy going at a rapid pace. That “booneys” line was really clever, you don’t hear that word used much.
“Cupid” has been growing on me over the listens. With the accompanying video shot by the Rob Gallardo, the song gains a different life, now it’s one of my favorite tracks on the album. The sort of mellow tone of the track is very different than the rest of the tracks Mari usually makes but that’s what makes for me.
Anytime you add in some $lugged out production I am all for it. This track was born to be played on a hot St.Pete afternoon. This track has so many lines, the part about chilling on Clearwater Beach is spit so vividly by Mari, that bird bath line was cold.
So “BMW” featuring fellow Local Muzik member Ameen Spade is my favorite Mari track to date, no lie in preparation for this review I’ve listened to it non stop back to back, something I haven’t done since J Goodie’s “Ancient Barbarian” also featuring Spade. This shit is just the ultimate St.Pete vibe man. If someone ever asks me what St.Pete Hip Hop sounds like, I’m playing them this joint.
The next track has the most fitting title “Cooked Crack”. This is one of the hardest Mari songs, once he hits the “ring on all fingers line” it’s game over. I don’t think I’ve ever heard him spazz this hard on a track before. The video by Rob is also on some other shit like always. Mari always has some of the best videos in the game.
“No,No,No” featuring Ameen Spade was a nice change of pace at this point in the album. I loved the strong structure of this one, with the melodic vocals from Spade in the beginning and end, with Mari doing what he does best in the middle portion.
Hands down one of the most creative tracks I’ve heard in years is “Jugg” featuring Mother Mary Gold who adds some Neo Soul vocals to the track. Like I said anytime some $lugg shit is involved you got me, this time the “Lock Jaw” sampled beat is slowed down. This creates a trippy soundscape for Mari and Mother Mary Gold to float in.
The album ends strong with “Ralph Duffel”. The chill synth production ends the album on a liter note which is needed at times, especially when the bulk of the project is filled with bangers.
While only being 8 tracks there is no room for error, but that’s not a problem for Mari cause you can jam this straight through. His new project “It’s Not You, It’s Me” is already an evolution of this project, but it’s still to soon to call that one a classic. Trust me over at Jit Camp we are running back “BMW” all summer 2021.