“Pound Town” was the wildest rap hit of the year, according to Pitchfork’s review of Sexyy Red’s new mixtape, “Hood Hottest Princess.” The critic put it in the company of Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion’s “WAP,” Rio Da Yung OG’s “Legendary” and RXK Nephew’s ten-minute “American tterroistt,” songs whose lyrics still shock him on every listen.
The track runs over a Tay Keith beat that, the review says, would have had strip clubs on lock in 2008. Sexyy Red raps about her toes getting sucked and about wanting men who are wild in bed but could also be decent stepfathers to her son. She moans theatrically, as if in a Paul Verhoeven sex scene. It is funny and out of pocket, the critic wrote, and it makes pearl clutchers squirm, yet she never seems to be trying too hard to provoke.
A throwback sound
The mixtape carries that spirit forward. Pitchfork describes it as her bid for the nastiest, sweatiest summer since the smartphone arrived. The booming production recalls the years when beats by Shawty Redd and Zaytoven were the blueprint. The reviewer joked he would not be surprised to learn she had spent the time since 2012 in a cryo chamber.
He traced the old-school feel to her hometown of St. Louis, which she says is stuck in the 2000s. “We don’t listen to the new rap; we still listen to the old shit,” she said in a recent interview.
Her slurred delivery sounds like someone stranded with 2008 and 2009 Gucci Mane tapes such as “EA Sportscenter” and “The BurrPrint: The Movie 3D.” But she does not just rework old Gucci hits, the review argues. In an age of ready-made nostalgia, that would be the easy route. For her, the older music is a foundation, not the point.
