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Curren$y  

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• Upcoming 2024 concerts: none

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Warehouse Live Midtown ( Formerly Rise Rooftop)

Fillmore New Orleans

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Shante Scott Frankin, better know by his stage name, Curren$y, is an American hip-hop rap artist from New Orleans, Louisiana.

Born on 4 April 1981, Curren$y signed with Master P’s No Limit Records in 2002. He was also a member of 504 Boyz and made multiple appearances on Master P’s “Good Side, Bad Side” record in 2004. Later that same year, he signed with Cash Money Records and Lil Wayne’s Young Money Entertainment and released a mix tape entitled “Welcome Back.” Additionally, Curren$y started Fly Society, first as just a clothing company, then as a company that also released music. Led off by the single “Where Da Cash At” he released his mix tape album with Young Money Records “Music To Fly To” in 2006.

In 2009 Curren$y signed with Amalgam Digital to released his album “This Ain’t No Mixtape,” which was followed shortly by the release of “Jet Files.” A year later he released “Pilot Talk” which featured guests such as Snoop Dogg, Mos Def and Big K.R.I.T. A mere four months later he followed up with his fourth album, “Pilot Talk II” which featured Fiend and Raekwon. On 11 February 2011 signed with Jet Life Recordings, an imprint of Warner Brothers Records. He released a ten-track album for free entitled “The Alchemist” followed by a mix tape “Weekend At Burnie’s.” Early the next year, Curren$y released his next album, “Muscle Car Chronicles,” followed by a consistent release of albums and EPs, and in 2014 he released “The Drive In Theater.”

Live reviews

Shante Scott Franklin better known by his stage name Curren$y is an American rapper from New Orleans who is quickly becoming one of the most likeable performers on the hip hop circuit. Away from the music, he is known to be one of the most personable artists currently touring as he attempts to build rapport with every member of the audience.

There are stories of him looking after dehydrated patrons, calling fans who couldn't make it from the stage and serenading individual audience members. He also has a fantastic ability to entertain the masses with his likeable and enthusiastic personality. Add into the equation his high quality music and you have a star assured for international domination.

Having a discography that stands at four official albums and two independent releases, the young rapper performs sets of over twenty tracks in length yet the energy and pace never dips. The audience is dancing and singing along to the unpredictable star's entire show and when the final beats of 'Jet Life' fade the whole crowd is yearning for more.

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I had only seen a few videos of Curren$y's performances, so I was going into this without knowing what his energy would be like. After arriving and waiting for what seemed like forever to see Curren$y perform, when he came out to do his set, the crowd immediately got excited. He came out and was suprised to see the energy throughout the building. The whole time, he was making eye contact, between songs he would talk to the people out in the crowd (not just the front) and make jokes, he even held someone's phone and spoke with someone on FaceTime that was unable to make it out. He's extremely personable. And song, in and out, the songs sounded very good, live and all. No doubt when he comes back out, I'll be in attendance.

Curren$y was Awsome. He is a true stage preformer. As soon as he walked out he energized and took complete control over the crowd. Majority of the concert was a cappella, which brought that true feel of hip hop and recognition for his music. Most artists couldn't rock it a cappella, their fans wouldn't have followed along; the fans at this show damn near out rapped Curren$y through how loud and how knowledgeable of the lyrics we were. Overall Curren$y's performance was Awsome. Absolutely no shine taken away from any of these performers; I have seen the likes of: Kendrick Lamar, Kanye West, Toro Y Moi, Devin the Dude, and Curren$y has the best live performance. The best show I have seen so far.

This was literally the best concert I've ever been to. Hes an artist you can reach out and touch he is not Hollywood at all one of the coolest ppl I've ever met. he played every single song you expected and wanted him to play. The most energetic show I've ever been to. Definetly worth the money you spend. My head is buzzing from how much fun I had.

TY, Corner Boy P and Curren$y had us LIT!!! I enjoyed the show from beginning to end! We were given a show. Didn't leave venue until 1:30am. Well worth being at work exhausted this morning. Thinking I may go see him in Milwaukee again tonight. Only an hour away!!! #JetLife!

Guess there wasn't that many day 1 Curren$y fans in the building. We had to wait 3 hrs and listen to 4-5 opening acts. Security guy kept taking people joints. He performed a short set and seemed like the vibe wasn't so good. Oh and he brought Cornerboy P.

Yooo...concert was lit!!! Curren$y and Wiz have the best chemistry! I was really close to the front so I had a great view of everything. It was almost surreal seeing Spitta that close up (getting to see all of his facial expressions was priceless)!!!

One of the greatest nights of this year it was fun and great experience to always see curren$y and wiz khalifa together. NEVER will I miss another show I love when they come to our city and make us feel very happy

The show in Omaha was lit. Cornerboy P is a cool brotha. My wife and I have been to each curren$y concert in Omaha and they keep getting better. Can't wait till he come back or fuck it I would travel to see him.

Amazing show! The crowd was ok. Mixed crowd that didn’t know shit about the true currensy and wiz but it was still a good vibe. Currensy was hittin those flows like we know him to do. I loved seeing wiz.

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• New Orleans (63)
• Los Angeles (LA) (44)
• New York (NYC) (32)
• SF Bay Area (30)
• Dallas - Fort Worth (21)

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• Corner Boy P (93)
• Smoke DZA (76)
• BIG K.R.I.T. (69)
• Young Roddy (51)

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• Hip-Hop 50 @ The Tiny Desk
• Tiny Desk Home Concerts
• Tiny Desk Contest

Curren$y: Tiny Desk (Home) Concert

Bobby Carter

Credit: Courtesy of the artist

The Tiny Desk is working from home for the foreseeable future. Introducing NPR Music's Tiny Desk (home) concerts, bringing you performances from across the country and the world. It's the same spirit — stripped-down sets, an intimate setting — just a different space.

Curren$y 's Tiny Desk (home) concert features three key elements that make him who he is: cars, weed and, of course, music. One of the prominent champions of cannabis plays from the confines of a garage on this 4/20, a day deemed a worldwide celebration of marijuana. In front of a purple candy-coated 1965 Chevy Impala sitting on three wheel motion, the New Orleans native plays a smidgen from a catalog that spans over seventy projects to date.

His name would hold a place in the hip-hop rafters due to sheer volume alone, yet his consistency in the independent space pre-dates just about all of your favorite indie emcees. His formative years as an artist on two of the most successful independent hip-hop labels in the world (No Limit and Cash Money Records) helped develop the homegrown formula for his business. He's helped lay the groundwork for distributing projects online, selling tickets and merch without the middleman or radio play, for over 15 years. This set is mainly composed of fan favorites from his rise in the 2010s. Each song starts with the recorded track before the band takes complete control; however, they let the vocal sample from the opening number, 2018's "Sixty Seven Turbo Jet" ride throughout. Spitta expressed his desire to play the Tiny Desk a few years back. There's no better time than now.

• "Sixty-Seven Turbo Jet"
• "Breakfast"
• "Airborne Aquarium"
• Curren$y: vocals
• Prime: guitar
• Jean Laphare: bass
• Groovy Murphy: drums
• Director and Editor: Adam Vo
• Director of Photography: Allen Esmail
• Mixed and Mastered by FluWop
• Producer: Kayla "Rose" Magee
• Production House: Channel Vivid
• Production Assistants: Joey Park, Keijuan Jacobs, John Battle, Garrett Brumfield
• Executive Producer: Mousa

TINY DESK TEAM

• Producer: Bobby Carter
• Video Producer: Joshua Bryant
• Audio Mastering: Josh Rogosin
• Tiny Production Team: Bob Boilen, Kara Frame, Michael Zamora, Maia Stern, Ashley Pointer
• Executive Producer: Keith Jenkins
• Senior VP, Programming: Anya Grundmann

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Curren$y Is Forever Living the High Life

A survivor of the mixtape era, the blog era, and the streaming era. One of the only artists who was signed to both No Limit and Cash Money. One of hip-hop’s great weed aficionados. Curren$y is not only one of the most prolific rappers of his time—he’s also one of its most influential.

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Curren$y’s set begins in three hours, but he has a more pressing, if not unsurprising, concern in the interim. “You got a lighter?” he asks, flashing a toothy grin and offering a handshake in the lobby of the Hotel Monaco in Washington, D.C.

Fresh off a flight from his native New Orleans, the famed weed enthusiast doesn’t want to smoke out the hotel before his performance at Karma DC, so he’s in search of a light and a comfortable place to indulge. We were supposed to meet in New York back in April, but that plan fell through—after I’d arrived at his hotel. (“It be a lot of moving parts, bro,” the 42-year-old later tells me with a chuckle.) Now, after reconvening in the nation’s capital in late June, I—a nonsmoker—have joined the hunt. Curren$y is convinced someone has a lighter on them, so he ventures outside to find one. Ultimately, he’s correct: His manager, Mousa, and I locate him in front of the hotel, where he’s posing for pictures with a couple who blessed him with the device. This man-of-the-people quality has been integral to Curren$y’s success in a volatile hip-hop landscape that’s seen many artists come and go since he broke through during the late 2000s.

“I remember seeing him at Irving Plaza—this must’ve been 2010 or 2011,” says Jeff Rosenthal, who created the hip-hop sketch comedy blog ItsTheReal along with his brother, Eric. “He left the stage, in a packed venue, and didn’t go backstage after the show was over. He went through the crowd and led it, on some Pied Piper shit, through the streets of New York.”

Over the course of his winding career, Curren$y has grown into a charismatic cult figure. After stints on two legendary hometown record labels, No Limit Records and Cash Money Records, he struck out on his own in 2007 and never looked back. Across dozens of projects, he’s entrenched listeners in his purple-tinted world of weed, vintage cars, and carefully considered pop culture references. On 2010’s “Roasted,” he brags of “Olympic swimming in bitches, Michael-slash-Leon Phelps,” a hat tip to the 23-time gold medalist and the Lothario at the center of The Ladies Man . (I’ve seen him perform this live, mimicking an exaggerated yet fluid swimming stroke for comedic effect.) On 2010’s “Life Under the Scope,” he weaves a nod to an infamous Real World moment into a rumination on operating beneath the ever-scrutinous public eye. His vast catalog includes mixtapes named for Fast Times at Ridgemont High , songs named after Days of Thunder , and albums titled in homage to Weekend at Bernie’s .

To coincide with the NFL’s return last week, Curren$y released the compilation album Season Opener , which features artists from his Jet Life Recordings roster, some of his favorite producers, and Pen & Pixel cover art referencing the 1998 compilation Big Ballers . Back in June, he released Vices , another collaboration between him and producer Harry Fraud. Inspired by a rewatch of Michael Mann’s Miami Vice series, it’s packed with clips from the show and samples of music featured prominently throughout the show. The opening song, “The Great McCarthy,” borrows its title from a first-season episode and is driven by a sample of the Lindsey Buckingham song soundtracking one of its key scenes . Although Curren$y adheres to the project’s theme (the neon skylines, pastel-colored suits, and rampant illicit activity of 1980s Miami), the song’s chorus is a perfect snapshot of his attitude: “So many cars, so many broads, so many walls / I’m livin’ large, my backyard a hundred yards / So many scars, but no awards and no applause / That ain’t what I’m in it for—where my money, dog?”

Curren$y has thrived mostly outside the major label system thanks to a loyal following built on the strength of his charm and consistency. The people who get it get it because Curren$y’s stoned musings feel like those of a friend who’s effortlessly cool without a hint of pretentiousness. In his own words, he “became a millionaire just from being chill.” This pathway to success, virtually nonexistent when Curren$y first declared his independence, is the result of a seismic industrial shift.

The blog era, a revered period from roughly 2007 through 2012, saw a group of influential websites knock a punch-drunk music industry further off-balance by siphoning power away from the usual gatekeepers—mainly record labels. It helped propel artists like Drake, Kendrick Lamar, J. Cole, and Nicki Minaj to superstardom, but it also opened doors for misfits like Curren$y. To that end, Curren$y epitomizes what the blog era accomplished: niche artists succeeding on their own terms without the conventional support systems or traditional measures of success. “He was ahead of his time and on time, at the same time,” says Eric Rosenthal, who also created the sprawling podcast The Blog Era with his brother, Jeff.

Curren$y can tour for as long as he wants to and add any car to an already impressive collection. Naturally, he has his own handpicked strain of weed and grow house . He’s evolved Jet Life from an ethos to a brand that’s collaborated with NASCAR and the New Orleans Pelicans. He’s developed a relationship with Pelicans star Zion Williamson by being a regular at home games. Earlier this year, he released For Motivational Use Only, Vol.1 in tandem with Jermaine Dupri—after a viewing of the producer and rapper’s MTV Cribs episode prompted him to make “Jermaine Dupri.” On Instagram Live, you’ll find him exchanging praise with Yasiin Bey , cleaning his lowriders while blasting Aurra’s “Are You Single?” or Tha Dogg Pound’s “I Don’t Like to Dream About Gettin Paid,” and break-dancing with his 4-year-old son, Cruz . He does it all while living in a residential neighborhood in New Orleans. Over the last 15 years, Curren$y has helped broaden the idea of what a successful rapper is, simply by being himself.

“I never put a label on it or what I thought I was trying to achieve, I just knew what I didn’t want to do,” he says while smoking on the front steps of the National Portrait Gallery. “I never wanted to have a rap voice. I never wanted a mode I had to shift into to be whatever the fuck I had to be. I just wanted to be myself so that when it clicked, it would last long because it’s not really any work to be me.”

Curren$y’s music offers vivid glimpses of his broad interests, specific tastes, and penchant for detail. You can see the cigarette boats zip across Biscayne Bay . You can smell the sour diesel as he rolls joints with assembly-line precision. You can feel the tan leather of his car seats. It’s not just a Mercedes-Benz, it’s a 560 SL . It’s not just a Corvette, it’s a Stingray . The common areas in the downtown high-rises are adorned with marble columns . He’s just as particular in conversation, right down to the pop culture he absorbed back when he went by Shante Franklin.

His parents introduced him to movies that influenced his worldview and music, from Super Fly to the Godfather trilogy. “‘Michael Corleone, presidential Rollie on / Closet full of Jordans, Foams, Penny Ones—that’s because of my mom,” he says, quoting “Motion,” from his 2012 mixtape Priest Andretti . His love of cars stems from the Hot Wheels she bought him for behaving during grocery store excursions. He grew up in a card-game house in East New Orleans, where the Commodores, Rufus, and Grover Washington Jr. records that his mother played jelled with the N.W.A and Slick Rick he gravitated toward, creating his musical palate. He was ecstatic during the G-Funk era because he recognized various samples from the funk records he heard at home. At a young age, he also displayed a willingness to zig where others zagged: He favored Kool Moe Dee during his battle with LL Cool J , mostly because his sister preferred the latter.

Although Curren$y hails from the East, his bones were made Uptown in the city’s Third Ward. As a youth, he formed bonds with C-Murder, a younger brother of Master P, who was convicted of second-degree murder in 2003 and sentenced to life in prison following a 2002 nightclub shooting that left a teenager dead (the rapper has maintained his innocence throughout); Soulja Slim, who was killed in 2003; and Mr. Marcelo, whom he refers to as his brother. “The Eastside had no rap guy,” he explains. “When [Lil] Wayne started to embrace the Squad Up movement, all of those homies are from the East. That’s when mufuckas knew we could rap, but my actual alley-oops all came from the Magnolia and Calliope Projects. That’s why I’m so closely associated and that’s why I make sure to say ‘Eastside’ so much: so that mufuckas from my hood don’t ever think I thought I needed to claim another for success. It’s just that they have a lot of love for me, too.” That love is an early example of how people (especially the elders whose respect he’d earned) gravitated toward Curren$y. “When you’re not a buster, mufuckas like you, bruh,” he says with a laugh and shrug. “What can you do?”

An unexpected encounter with C-Murder brought Curren$y deeper into the No Limit fold. After dabbling in rap as a teen, he fell back from music following a friend’s murder, opting for a job at Toys “R” Us because it felt safer. One day, C-Murder, who used to give him rides to school, showed up to buy the latest edition of Madden . Surprised to find Curren$y working retail and interested in seeing him reach his potential, C-Murder extended an opportunity. “He was like, ‘Man, you missin’ out, bruh. Come to my house tomorrow,’’’ Curren$y remembers. “So I went, and what was crazy was that I went back to Toys ‘R’ Us after three days—no call, no show. Just like: ‘My fault. Shit’s crazy, I was hangin’ out at C-Murder’s. Maybe I’m gonna be a rapper.’”

Curren$y officially joined No Limit in 2002 as a last-minute addition to the 504 Boyz. (You can catch him delivering the opening verse on “Get Back” and riding shotgun in a Gucci-monogram-wrapped Ferrari in the “Tight Whips” video .) He was supposed to be part of a new era for the label, but soon realized that Master P’s ever-growing list of responsibilities prevented him from focusing on Curren$y’s individual needs. He recalls seeing a lineup of albums slated as “Coming Soon” following the release of Choppa’s Choppa Style in 2003. Reality set in for Curren$y when he saw an unofficial photo taken outside his house next to his name. “I was like, ‘Man … I don’t think my album’s coming soon,’” he says, chuckling. “We never took a trip to Pen & Pixel. We never discussed what my single was. So I was like, ‘This is more for me to chill.’ And that’s a good thing, because P was saving lives by just giving mufuckas something to believe in. But I was like, ‘Nah, I wanna do this for real.’”

Though Curren$y released his first mixtape, Sports Center, Vol.1 , via No Limit in 2004, his ambition guided him to Cash Money the same year. He signed to Lil Wayne’s Young Money Entertainment, delivering strong verses on Wayne’s “Grown Man,” from 2005’s Tha Carter ll , and 2006’s “Where Da Cash At?” —which became Curren$y’s single after first appearing on Wayne’s Dedication 2 mixtape. But even on a new label, Curren$y ran into a familiar issue: His career was less of a priority than Wayne’s relentless pursuit of the best-rapper-alive designation . He also noticed that, similar to Master P, Wayne and Birdman weren’t really enjoying the fruits of their labor. “I still like to have a good time, so Wayne and I would butt heads because I’d be like, ‘Yo … let’s leave out this bitch,’” he says, thinking back on their studio sessions. “‘Birdman just bought y’all fuckin’ matching Maseratis or Bugattis, let’s run these bitches up and down the street.’”

The bigger issue, however, was the slight resistance Curren$y experienced for wanting to deviate from contemporary hip-hop at the time. On a deeper level, Curren$y simply understood who he was. “I wasn’t gonna say in a rap that I smoked four niggas, because I didn’t,” he says. “We’re from a spot where that shit is like that, but we have other shit going on, too. So I wanted to talk about that, and there was a bit of pushback, but I respected it.” Rather than cause problems or risk not being true to himself, Curren$y walked away once again, announcing his departure from Young Money in a December 2007 Myspace post . “If that loses me friends r fans thats just something i will live with but i will get my just due in this rap game b4 its all said and done,” he wrote.

Existential pondering led Curren$y to the conclusion that no one else could create the right scenario for him. “I always ask people this: ‘What are you gonna do to live forever?’” he says. “Because physically, we can’t. But it’s gonna be something you do where a mufucka will always have to talk about you, so what would you do? And that was my point. I’d just be one of the , unless I stood up, branched off, and did it the right way.” Where numerous artists would be content to orbit Master P or simply stand next to the supernova that was Lil Wayne in the lead-up to Tha Carter lll , Curren$y had the foresight to walk away from two situations he knew didn’t suit him. There’s no guarantee that what worked for Drake and Nicki Minaj would have ever worked for him.

“Gudda Gudda didn’t have the same trajectory,” Rob Markman, a former music journalist who’s currently the vice president of content strategy for Genius, says of Drake and Minaj. “Lil Twist didn’t have the same trajectory. It could work a variety of different ways. But to have the courage to say, ‘Hey, this isn’t me. I’d rather try it on my own and live and die by what I believe in’ is great. You have to applaud that.”

Moreover, Curren$y left without acrimony. Any static was smoothed over long ago, so both Wayne and Birdman have made appearances at the Jet Lounge parties Curren$y has hosted at the House of Blues in New Orleans over the years. Wayne also appeared on Curren$y’s 2015 single “Bottom of the Bottle,” although Curren$y is reluctant to play the I can get a Wayne verse if I really want it hand. “Honestly, I think when I get ready to get out of this shit, I’ll do one more joint with bruh,” he says, hinting at his eventual retirement. “Because I don’t even like to do that.”

The door is always open because of how Curren$y handled his exit. “They always told me the same thing: ‘I just like how you did your shit. You ain’t have nothin’ fucked up to say,’” he says. “And I could never have nothin’ fucked up to say. Even if I did realize it wasn’t the situation for me and I had to dip, it was beneficial.”

The blog era didn’t immediately render the established benchmarks for success obsolete, but it made it clear they were no longer requirements. Artists didn’t need high-charting singles, videos on 106 & Park , or even strong record sales to get attention. Pirates were going to pirate, but a lot of the music was available for free download, making it more accessible. A co-sign from the New Music Cartel went a long way, but the key to sustainability was building an audience and keeping it satisfied. If there’s one thing Curren$y learned from his time on No Limit and Cash Money, it’s the value of releasing music regularly and keeping listeners engaged.

The seven mixtapes Curren$y released in 2008, beginning with Independence Day , created a much-needed revenue stream: show money. The new music generated enough interest that fans who didn’t pay for it were willing to pay to see him live to get the full Curren$y experience. It also earned him a spot on the cover of XXL ’s December 2008 issue alongside fellow blog-era darlings Kid Cudi, Wale, and Charles Hamilton as part of the magazine’s second Freshman Class. For Curren$y, this was validation that he was on the right track and more reason to dismiss everyone who treated him “like he had shit on [his] shoes” after he left Cash Money. “I figured they’d see that it was all right to fuck with me—and now I get to not fuck with them,” he says. “That was the best part: ‘I don’t wanna do nothing, nigga. I’m good.’” Healthy skepticism is a necessary survival skill, especially in an industry as nefarious as entertainment. But Curren$y soon found a kindred spirit in another blog era success story: Wiz Khalifa.

The origin of How Fly , the duo’s 2009 Cheech & Chong–inspired mixtape, goes as follows: Khalifa, whom Warner Records discarded in 2009, was in the midst of his own independent run when he reached out to Curren$y on Myspace about collaborating. Curren$y missed the message, but once Khalifa’s ardent fan base voiced its disappointment, he suggested they do an entire project together. In addition to genuinely liking each other, they complement one another perfectly: Khalifa’s cloud of mellow harmony plus Curren$y’s nonchalant darts, with an endearing pothead common denominator.

How Fly offered vignettes of bong rips, post-club drunk-dials, and finessing women away from their boyfriends before catching the next flight. “Car Service,” however, is the enduring gem. From the sped-up Smokey Robinson & the Miracles sample to Khalifa’s exuberant opening verse and chorus, it captures the excitement of life in transit, chasing money from state to state. “Car Service” feels triumphant, and Curren$y, who calls it “the blog-era national anthem,” sums up the spirit of the time in his verse: “Ain’t tryna be a hog, dawgy, all I want is what I’m worth.” His and Khalifa’s 2019 album, 2009 , was a victory lap celebrating the period in which they first linked and how far they’d come in the years since. “We fucked the game up by mistake and had mufuckas smoking different, looking different, and they had to call us to do shit,” Curren$y says. “ 2009 was us just saying we did all of that and mufuckas who make bread fall out, but we never did.” Even with Khalifa reaching superstar status, he and Curren$y are bound by the fact that they’ve done exactly what they wanted to do with their careers.

As the aughts drew to a close, Curren$y’s elevated profile helped him grow his legion of fans clad in Diamond Supply crewnecks, camo shorts, and a seemingly endless rotation of sneakers just like him. His rise coincided with that of Twitter, which allowed him to share his personality with fans in real time. (“Damnnnn this bitch called X now?” he tweeted in August , aghast at the site’s haphazard rebrand like countless other users.) The blog era marked the first time millennials encountered a range of artists who were of the same generation, influenced by the same art and pop culture. Curren$y, part of the first batch of millennials, connected with listeners who grew up on the same things he did, shared the same experiences and sensibilities, and felt seen by every mention of them in his music.

Curren$y’s non-regional sound also helped him stand out, even with a smaller footprint. “A lot of the sound is sort of universal because it’s like this gumbo: He grabbed it from all these different places in his travels,” says David Dennis Jr., a senior writer for Andscape. But Dennis, who lived in New Orleans and wrote for The Smoking Section during the blog era, also points out that Curren$y’s thick New Orleans drawl marks his music as Southern despite its non-regional qualities: “That man makes New Orleans music just by how he uses his voice as an instrument, and based off the slant rhymes of the accent.”

All of this crystallized into something special with the Pilot Talk series. Pilot Talk and Pilot Talk ll , released in 2010, were crafted while Curren$y shuttled back and forth between New Orleans and New York, where he worked under the guidance of Roc-A-Fella Records co-founder Damon Dash and his DD172 label. Through Dash, Curren$y met Ski Beatz, best known for his work on Jay-Z’s Reasonable Doubt and Camp Lo’s Uptown Saturday Night . Ski, who hails from North Carolina, believes he and Curren$y found common ground thanks to Southern upbringings which shaped their musical tastes. “It just made sense: I love music music, he loves music music,” says Ski, who produced most of the Pilot Talk tetralogy. “He likes that smooth vibe, so let’s make this music smooth, real musical, and lazy—but at the same time, hittin’.”

The Pilot Talk sound—hazy, lush, progressive—set the backdrop for the universe in Curren$y’s mind. The artwork is part of that vision. David Barnett, who did the art for the first three Pilot Talk albums, reimagined New Orleans and New York with a psychedelic yet futuristic feel. “Then, Spitta’s flying over, dropping weed bombs on the city and the whole thing is overgrown,” he says. But it’s Curren$y’s off-kilter rhyme scheme that animates each entry in the series. His flow shifts from lackadaisical, to staggered, to laser-focused at the drop of a hat. He uses intonation for emphasis and to keep listeners on their toes. If you aren’t paying attention, you risk missing his wit. “He leaves those gems that hit you later,” Ski says. Take Pilot Talk ’s “Breakfast,” a sub-three-minute, hookless work of abstract art. Over Bey and Ski’s woozy, horn-powered production, Curren$y roves from “rolled Bambú’s in the Bahamas,” to playing NBA 2K in a condo full of snacks, to The Karate Kid while utilizing wordplay that warrants multiple listens.

Fly in the hive, buzzing, them bugs can’t be him Illegible letters in my ledger, they can’t read ’em Smiling, money piling, I’m cheesin’ Odometer broken, I ain’t know that I was speedin’

“That just happened,” Curren$y explains. “Any time I write a story rap, I don’t know that it’s a story until well into the first verse.”

The Pilot Talk series took Curren$y and his unorthodox approach to new heights. Bey, Snoop Dogg, Devin the Dude, and fellow New Orleans resident Jay Electronica appeared on the first installation. The second features a guest verse from Raekwon, whom Curren$y remembers as the first northern legend to show their appreciation. (“I was pretty much gonna throw up about it,” he says.) He found himself at Fashion Week, then hanging out with the likes of Vashtie Kola and producer Danger Mouse. During his appearance on Andscape’s Rap Stories podcast, he told Dennis about the time Dash brought actress Sienna Miller to the studio. “Dame Dash was buying this company that made watches, so Sienna Miller came to check out a watch and fuckin’ bam, I’m there, just dancing to ‘Rock Creek Park,’ rolling joints and shit,” he tells me. “She’s like, ‘What the fuck is this guy doing?!’ and you stay in people’s hearts that way.”

Although Curren$y and Dash’s professional relationship soured, resulting in a 2012 lawsuit alleging that Dash’s DD172 label released Curren$y’s music without a formal agreement, he still speaks highly of his former mentor. “Dame Dash is incredible,” he says. What’s more, Curren$y says the experience taught him to trust his instincts. “Roll the dice, then fix whatever didn’t work, keep what did, and come back again.”

After years on the independent grind, Curren$y signed a deal with Warner Records in 2011. The blog era gave artists more leverage, empowering them to tell the labels who would’ve otherwise ignored them “no” until it made sense to say “yes.” Curren$y also inked a deal for his Jet Life Recordings imprint, but says he’s since dissolved the partnership.

“I bought that whole thing back,” he says. “We’re just our own thing, we could put your album out right now.”

For all of the fine points and effort that Curren$y puts into his music, he’s adamant that things feel natural. It’s clear that thought goes into his work, but he’s vehemently opposed to thinking too hard about it. “What makes me leave a studio session, not do a feature, tell somebody I have to go get my son, or just come up with something else to do is when mufuckas are like, ‘So what’s the concept?’” he says. “If nothing pops into your mind when the beat comes on, don’t even say it. I don’t want to conceptualize and shit.”

Some of Curren$y’s trusted collaborators confirm this. According to Ski, he figures things out on the fly. Fraud says he straight-up doesn’t waste time. “Once the beat captures him, his pen just fuckin’ moves across the notebook,” he says. Jean Lephare, half of the New Orleans production team Monsta Beatz, is succinct in his description of Curren$y in the studio: “He’ll write that shit and then he’ll be right in the booth, bruh.”

On his 2012 album The Stoned Immaculate , Curren$y worked with a variety of producers, including Pharrell, J.U.S.T.I.C.E. League, Bink!, and Daz Dillinger, but he returned to his comfort zone of familiarity. He’s adaptable, but values the rhythm he has with certain people. At this point in his career, he’s mastered the collaborative album where he works closely—often exclusively—with one producer. Hence why his catalog consists of entire franchises. There are four Pilot Talk albums to date, with the most recent installment arriving in 2021. He’s made six “Audio Dope” songs so far. And he says Continuance , his 2022 album with the Alchemist, is essentially the sequel to their 2011 project, Covert Coup . For Curren$y to add to a series, the ingredients have to be the same.

“The same personnel is important, right down to whoever was hanging,” he says. “The same homies and homegirls have to be around, so we do it again. It also has to sound and feel that way. I go to the studio with just my engineer, we go through beats, and I record. If I do two or three from the same producer in a night, I’m like, ‘All right, call him tomorrow and let’s lock in and do it for real.’”

Each of Curren$y’s producers of choice taps into something different, but he pulls something distinct out of them as well. “He has that air of a boss, because he is one in his world,” Fraud says. “But he also has that air of a kingpin-type figure, and I think I give him the leeway to lean all the way into that—and he gives me the leeway to produce.” Markman believes you can hear the difference in the music the producers create with Curren$y versus other artists they work with. “The stuff Harry Fraud’s made for Curren$y doesn’t sound like the stuff he makes for French Montana,” he says. And regardless of whether it’s Ski Beatz, the Alchemist, or la musica de Harry Fraud , it always sounds like Curren$y.

That said, Curren$y has learned from different producers along the way. For example, Dupri extolled the virtues of quality control. “Sometimes, you gotta take your time, let shit get mixed down, and not drop it the same night you do it,” Curren$y says of what he took from their sessions. “Because you can hear the difference. But it’s JD—the shit’s gonna sound that much different.”

It’s likely there are Curren$y fans who haven’t kept up with his output this decade, and it’s certainly possible to miss new releases with the rate at which he releases music. Although he’s the model for consistency, sticking to a blueprint that’s worked for over a decade, he’s shown a willingness to adjust his subject matter when it strikes him. The self-described “big-ass kid” has touched on fatherhood since that became his reality. On “Gold and Chrome,” from 2020’s The OutRunners , he reflects on losing friends to COVID-19, how the pandemic altered life at the most basic levels (“You gotta watch who you smoke with, who you go home with / Being smart’s synonymous with germophobics”), and envisioning his son as an adult, sliding in a Chevy just like his old man. On “The Final Board,” from Continuance , he speaks on the hurt of feeling burned by a friend he loaned money to and considers how life in the pandemic has affected his son.

Whether it’s meditating on interpersonal conflicts or the game behind the game of the music business , Curren$y’s music is rooted in experiences, after all.

To little surprise, Curren$y is indifferent about receiving credit for anything he’s done. “I don’t know how much money I could get from that credit, so I don’t care about it,” he says. “If I can’t trade it for fuckin’ Daytons, then I’m cool.” There’s a palpable cynicism, based on his experiences, that’s left him reluctant to accept praise because he’s never sure of where it’s coming from.

“I’ve been around people in such high-up positions, and I see the people around them never keep it a hundred,” he explains. “Tell them everything is great even if they really don’t think so because they want to stay in the good graces. If big dog is pulling up to the jewelry store, he’s gonna get you something because you’re always the one who’s telling him, ‘This is dope’ and blasé blah. So I don’t want none of it.”

At the same time, Curren$y is aware of the power in what he’s done and has expressed as much in his music. “I am an example of what can happen when you quit being afraid to gamble,” he says in “Example,” the very first song on Pilot Talk . Seeing what Curren$y has accomplished, by his own design, has inspired artists who have come after him. San Francisco rapper Larry June , another frequent collaborator who’s also hit his stride independently, felt empowered by it. “I call him my big brother because we’re on the same shit and he took it to the world and made a crazy impact,” June says. And while Curren$y doesn’t necessarily see himself as anyone’s OG, he will give advice to people like June whom he believes will apply it. Frankly, he’s encouraged June to keep operating in the laid-back everyman pocket on which he’s hung his San Francisco Giants hat. “Just stay in that lifestyle vein and mufuckas are gonna relate,” he remembers telling June. “Because it’s more regular niggas than jump-out shooters in the world.”

Curren$y has left his mark on the world, but all roads lead back to New Orleans for him. You can find him at his Jet Life retail store on Canal Street. You can spot him driving his cars all over the city. And in a city with a musical history as rich as New Orleans—from the origins of jazz, to the second lines and frenetic bounce music, to the respective apexes of No Limit and Cash Money—Curren$y is a legend in his own right with a mural commemorating his achievements.

Through it all, Curren$y has maintained a youthful energy about him. He’s just as happy showing off his 1992 Mercedes-Benz 600SEL as he was when he bought his first Ferrari . He’s at his happiest with his family, particularly his son, whether he’s rewarding him with an assortment of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles action figures or just playing with Hot Wheels. “My son, he loves to make crashes and I’m like, ‘You are chipping collectibles , bro!’” he says with a laugh. “He don’t give a shit right now.”

Curren$y values his privacy, but also understands that his willingness to meet his fans where they are has been integral to his success. As a result, he’s cultivated a devoted fan base that’s willing to support everything he does. And even without songs on terrestrial radio or absurd streaming numbers, people still stop dead in their tracks at the sight of him. At two different points during our conversation, fans approach the steps and ask for photos. Another sits down, rolls a joint while smoking his own, and offers it to Curren$y, who politely declines because he has to go over his setlist with his DJ. It’s a level of notoriety Curren$y is comfortable with: He can still go to Walmart or Target and buy Hot Wheels in peace.

“I don’t want to be famous,” he says. “This the dope game, so honestly, all the plug really wants to do is be unknown, supply everybody with work, and fuckin’ live on some ranch somewhere with his shit. And that’s basically what I’m doing.”

A previous version of this article said Wiz Khalifa left Warner Records in 2008. He left in 2009.

Julian Kimble has written for The New York Times , The Los Angeles Times , The Washington Post , GQ , and many more. He’s currently working on a book about the 1996 NBA draft class’s impact on basketball and popular culture around the world.

Confederacy Month, the New Drake Diss, and Stephen A.’s Apology

Rick ross is the dark horse in hip-hop’s war against drake, drake vs. the world with wos.

Reps: New Orleans, LA

Website: https://www.currensyspitta.com/.

The rise to success was slow and steady for New Orleans rapper Curren$y, who started out as a member of No Limit Records signees 504 Boyz in the early 2000s and made it through struggles with various labels before starting his own. Over the years, his smart lyrics would catch the attention of fans and other artists alike, and along with prolific output in the form of solo mixtapes, Curren$y had high-profile collaborations with Lil Wayne, Wiz Khalifa, Freddie Gibbs, and many others. With six studio albums and many other releases in an impressive discography, his 2012 Warner Bros.-released album, The Stoned Immaculate was one of his most well-received and highest-charting albums. Born Shante Anthony Franklin and raised in New Orleans, Curren$y was originally signed to Master P’s No Limit label, but in 2005 he made the move to Lil Wayne and Birdman’s Cash Money imprint, Young Money. He appeared on Wayne’s Tha Carter II album that same year, and in 2006, Curren$y’s “Where da Cash At” single was released — both on its own and as part of Wayne’s Dedication 2 mixtape — but a promised album never materialized. Not one to sit idle, Curren$y started Fly Society with professional skateboarder Terry Kennedy. in 2007. The brand was originally planned as a line of apparel, but evolved into a music label as the rapper’s relationship with Young Money soured. After leaving the label at the end of 2007 with Fly Society in tow, Curren$y released a series of underground mixtapes, including 2009’s How Fly, a much buzzed-about collaboration with then-newcomer Wiz Khalifa. Other mixtapes appeared before Curren$y hooked up with the digital-only Amalgam Digital for the early-2009 release This Ain’t No Mixtape. The relationship continued that October with the download-only Jet Files, but in early 2010 he joined the Def Jam family via Damon Dash’s DD172 imprint. With the label’s in-house producer Ski Beatz handling most of the production, Curren$y’s Pilot Talk album appeared in July of that year, with Pilot Talk II landing in 2010. The stopgap release Weekend at Burnie’s followed in 2011, with the retro backing tracks coming from producer Monsta Beatz. Beatz, along with the J.U.S.T.I.C.E. League and Pharrell, was back for the rapper’s 2012 street release, The Stoned Immaculate. In 2015, the album Pilot Talk III was released on a $100.00 USB key made available from the rapper’s Jet Life website, while the EP Even More Saturday Night Car Tunes landed through more traditional distribution channels. That same year, the “Bottom of the Bottle” single featuring Lil Wayne and August Alsina appeared right before the release of Canal Street Confidential, an album that the MC road-tested on tour before deciding on the final track list. In 2016, the rapper issued over a dozen mixtapes, including collaborative efforts with the Alchemist (The Carrollton Heist), Purps (Bourbon Street Secrets), and Sledgren (Revolver). The self-releases continued into 2017, with the Jetlanta EP and The Fo20 Massacre, followed by The Marina (Jet Life) EP in 2018. February of 2019 saw the release of 2009, a collaboration with Wiz Khalifa that revisited the creative chemistry of the duo’s decade-old How Fly project. Not long after, Curren$y teamed up with DJ.Fresh to release, The Tonite Show with Curren$y.

The Tonite Show With Curren$y

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The 25 Best Curren$y Songs

By  Ben Niespodziany

Since 2004, New Orleans rapper Curren$y has released 45 projects. Tomorrow marks the release of #46: Canal Street Confidential  (buy here ), his first studio album through Atlantic Records. With such a massive discography and history, we felt it right to highlight the prolific rapper's career, selecting our 25 favorite songs by Spitta.

Although we only stuck to Curren$y-released projects when selecting this list (meaning we didn't include/consider any of his features on other people's tracks), it's worth mentioning he has  a song with Kendrick Lamar and Talib Kweli  that you need to listen to. The same goes for " Grooveline Pt. 1 " with ScHoolBoy Q and Dom Kennedy and “ So High ” with French Montana. We also dismissed his early work as a 504 Boyz member for No Limit Records. Shouts to his legendary rap on Lil Wayne's version of “Dis is How We Do,” back when they were both within Cash Money Records, too.

All this is to say, the man has made a lot of music. Thousands of Curren$y songs exist. I have 616 just in my iTunes library. We tried to make this list of 25 as eclectic as possible, while taking account of career highs like the  Pilot Talk albums, which figure heavily but don't dominate this chronological, unranked list.

Note: I respect the hell out of Spitta and the massive underground following of “Lifers” and I welcome any and all hate in the comment section for songs I most assuredly missed. Praise to Spitta. Life.

UPDATE:  Curren$y just dropped a new video, the fourth from  Canal Street Confidential.  Watch "Superstar," featuring Ty Dolla $ign, below.

2. Curren$y – "Scared of Monstas"

Year released: 2009

Album: This Ain't No Mixtape

Producer: Monsta Beats

One of the very first solo songs by Curren$y that grabbed my attention, “Scared of Monsters” is a quaking track with production from Monsta Beatz that oozes menace. This is a New Orleans track through and through, released on Curren$y's first album. After having released so many mixtapes (seven in eight months), he had to clarify for his listeners that This Ain't No Mixtape . The artwork still goes.

Honorable mention from this album: “ Elevator Muzik. ”

3. Curren$y x Wiz Khalifa - “Car Service”

Album: How Fly

Producer: Sledgren

2009: when Curren$y was bigger than Wiz Khalifa. The same year that Wiz and Spitta released How Fly , with “Car Service” acting as one hell of an opener, Curren$y was on the cover of XXL as one of the Freshman selections. The next year, Wiz would make that same cover. It's crazy to see where these two have come in six years.

Ever since this song dropped, I've been wanting to have my “pockets on Schwarzenegger.”

4. Curren$y - “The Pledge (In and Out)”

Album: Jet Files

Producer: Big Chop

One of Curren$y's more reflective and emotional numbers, this piece is smack in the middle of his second studio album, Jet Files . Released through Amalgram Digital, just like This Ain't No Mixtape , this song became a manifesto for the jet lifestyle.

“Bitches see they reflections when they look in my wheel but they never get to do it 'cause I can't keep still.”

5. Curren$y ft. Chip Tha Ripper & Big Sean - “Fat Raps”

Year released: 2010

Album: Smokee Robinson

Producer: Chuck Inglish

Chuck Inglish has produced some of the best posse cuts in hip-hop. Here, Sir Chuck provides the backdrop for King Chip (then known as Chip Tha Ripper) and a young Big Sean. This song was so hot that it made it also made its way on Chip's mixtape, The Cleveland Show , as well as Big Sean's Finally Famous Vol. 3: BIG , which included a remix with additional verses from Chuck Inglish, Chip, Dom Kennedy, Asher Roth, and Boldy James.

Curren$y's Smokee Robinson , which houses this track, might be Curren$y's strongest mixtape over recycled beats, as tracks like “Reset” and “Lemon Kush” take it to the next level. This was released two months before Pilot Talk . Spitta had one hell of a year in 2010.

6. Curren$y - “King Kong”

Album: Pilot Talk

Producer: Ski Beatz

Can we cut the bullshit and include all of Pilot Talk on this list? “King Kong” is a personal favorite, as that Ski Beatz instrumental is a thing of beauty. This one's been bumping in the whip ever since 2010. The video is a simple black-and-white car ride in the rain, but the crisp HD and cool flows is a testament to the many quality videos made by Spitta and Creative Control.

7. Curren$y - “Breakfast”

Producer:  Ski Beatz & Mos Def

Whenever I hear this song, wherever I may be, I instantly think of Curren$y getting out of bed and rolling up in a hotel somewhere tropical. Complete with a sung outro from Mos Def, this song is a healthy breakfast, indeed.

Note: the music video version of “Breakfast” and what we actually hear on Pilot Talk are two very different songs. Listen closely.

8. Curren$y ft. Jay Electronica & Mos Def – “The Day”

Dame Dash's studio in 2009-2010 was iconic. From Blakroc sessions to Jay Electronica and Mos Def stopping by multiple days a week, we heard so much great music that was created in this small amount of time. Pilot Talk battles at the top for the greatest project to come out of that era, with this posse cut (of sorts) being one of the most legendary creations. RIP to Blakroc 2 .

9. Curren$y ft. Young Roddy & Trademark Da Skydiver - “Hold On”

Album: Pilot Talk 2

Producer: Nesby Phips

Jonah Schwartz was holding down a great deal of the video work for Creative Control in 2010, and the talented director continues to shoot for artists like Freddie Gibbs and A$AP Mob. Here, he highlights three lifestyles: Curren$y, who plays video games and plays with his dogs, Young Roddy, who gets his kid dressed and ready, and Trademark Da Skydiver, who plays poker in a dimly lit basement.

Pilot Talk 2 might just be as good as the first edition, and the sedated posse cut “Hold On” is one reason why.

10. Curren$y ft. Raekwon - “Michael Knight (Remix)”

Producer: Ski Beatz & The Senseis

Released as a bonus track on Pilot Talk 2 , Curren$y's remix with Raekwon makes “Michael Knight” a track that would stand out on any album. Ski Beatz went wild on this instrumental and The Senseis provided stellar live instrumentation. That being said, it's a shame that Curren$y didn't give us a new verse for the remix version.

11. Curren$y ft. Killa Kyleon - “4 Hours & 20 Minutes”

Producer: Young Los

Released strictly as a music video and never appearing on a proper project, the collaborative single between New Orleans rapper Curren$y and Houston rapper Killa Kyleon is a bass-heavy country tune that speeds through traffic and makes it home in time for the front yard kickback. The title is obviously alluding to Smoke Time, but it's also (almost) the driving time it takes to make it from NOLA to H-Town.

According to Google Maps, the two cities are five hours and twelve minutes apart. But if you drive real fast...

12. Curren$y - “BBS”

Year released: 2011

Album: Covert Coup

Producer: The Alchemist

What a stellar opening to a free 4/20 release from Curren$y and producer Alchemist. The two gave us ten heaters and the collaborative effort remains a highlight in both their discographies. This song is in my personal Curren$y top ten. Straight flames, beats and bars fully on point.

13. Curren$y ft. Prodigy - “The Type”

Directly following the opener “BBS,” Alchemist brings Prodigy from Mobb Deep into the studio so he and Curren$y can go back and forth with brag-heavy lines and plenty of smoke. Paying homage to Outakst's "Skew It On The Bar-B," with the hook, "We bust raps like D boys bust Gats," is just another reason to love this track.

The whole of  Covert Coup  knocks.

14. Curren$y ft. Freddie Gibbs - “Scottie Pippen”

Year Released: 2011

Producer: Covert Coup

My last selection from Covert Coup (I wish I could pick another three tracks) is “Scottie Pippen” with Gary, IN rapper Freddie Gibbs alongside Spitta. The two do damage over the sleepy guitar beat courtesy of Alan the Chemist. This is a song best enjoyed with a RapGenius page up .

15. Curren$y ft. Lil Wayne - “Smoke Sumthin'”

Album: Verde Terrace

Producer: Organized Noise

A much appreciated collaboration, “Smoke Sumthin” showcases Lil' Wayne and Curren$y vibing over Outkast's classic “Elevators (Me & You).” Since Curren$y left Cash Money back in 2007, we weren't sure of the relationship between the two, but they kept crafting songs together (including brand new single “Bottom of the Bottle”).

More proof that everybody loves Spitta.

16. Curren$y - “Chasin' Papers”

Year released: 2012

Album: The Stoned Immaculate

Producer: The Neptunes

It's necessary to pick something from Curren$y's debut major label album. Released through Warner Bros., this album featured some big names, including one of the biggest of them all:  Pharrell . With production from The Neptunes and a hook from Mr. Williams, “Chasin' Papers” had to be included; very few things sound better than Curren$y and Pharrell together.

17. Curren$y - “Biscayne Bay”

Album: Cigarette Boats

Producer: Harry Fraud

Curren$y's Cigarette Boats EP might have been my favorite project of 2012. Only four songs long, the EP finds Curren$y flowing over the hazy (and nautical) production from Harry Fraud, one hell of a formula for success. “ Mirrors ” with Smoke DZA is another must-hear from the project, but solo piece “Biscayne Bay” takes the cake for having the strongest music video.

18. Curren$y - “Money Machine Pt. 2”

Album: Priest Andretti

Producer: DJ Toomp

Yes, I believe that Priest Andretti is Curren$y's most slept-on mixtape. Produced by DJ Toomp, “Money Machine Pt. 2” is cinematic and boss; it's a song that should play at every bank around the country when the tellers start to count money at the end of the day.

Note: this is actually a “sequel” to “Money Machine,” which can be found on Spitta's Weekend at Burnie's mixtape.

19. Curren$y ft. Young Roddy - “Can't Get Out”

Album: 3 Piece Set

Producer: Thelonius Martin

Another oft-overlooked Curren$y release is 3 Piece Set . In 2012, Spitta paid a visit to Closed Sessions in Chicago alongside Young Roddy. The two hopped on three instrumentals from Thelonious Martin (allegedly the first three he played for them), and the rest is history. Thelo has continued producing for Curren$y, but this was the first taste, and boy, is it smooth.

“Can't Get Out” sounds like a Brazilian dream.

20. Curren$y x Wiz Khalifa - “Toast”

Year released: 2013

Album: Live In Concert

Producer: Bobbi Humphrey

Remember when Curren$y and Wiz delayed their sophomore project because of sample clearance? Then they dropped a six-song retail EP, full of samples, complete with flute solos and lounge bar bass lines? 2013 was interesting. The song “Toast” is about as classy as Curren$y will ever be. Spitta and Wiz should have worn suits in the music video, but they went with standard baggy cargo shorts instead.

21. Curren$y - “Showroom 2”

Album: Red Eye

Producer: Cardo

Before Monsta Beatz, Cornerboy P, and Young Roddy went on tour (with Sir Michael Rocks joining them for a few shows), they released the Jet Life compilation mixtape Red Eye . Although unfortunately not on the tour, Curren$y delivered on the mixtape an the unreleased solo track “Showroom 2”, produced by Cardo.

Reminder: the first “Showroom” was on The Stoned Immaculate  and also produced by Cardo.

22. Curren$y x Young Roddy - “Walkie Talkies”

Album: Bales

The third Thelonious Martin-produced track to make this list, “Walkie Talkies” has the same sample as Kid Cudi's “The One.” The song is a simple loop meant for infinite bars, and Spitta and Young Roddy are only too happy to comply. Bales is a great album from these two Jet Life cohorts, and well worth revisiting.

23. Curren$y x Smoke DZA Ft. French Montana & Big K.R.I.T. - “10 Bricks”

Album: The Stage EP

Curren$y's Cigarette Boats EP and Smoke DZA's Rugby Thompson (both fully produced by Harry Fraud) are nearly flawless, but Curren$y and Smoke's collaborative The Stage EP (again, fully produced by Harry Fraud) wasn't what it could have been. The four-song EP is unfortunately forgettable, but thankfully the track “10 Bricks” with French Montana and Big K.R.I.T acts as a nice closing posse cut for the short project.

24. Curren$y - “Hi Top Whites”

Year released: 2014

Album: The Drive-In Theatre

Acting damn near as a follow-up to Priest Andretti (although, like, six projects were scattered between), The Drive-In Theatre is a Godfather -esque mafioso tape, covered in production from Thelonious Martin. It's hard to top the Action Bronson-featuring “ Godfather Four, ” but the relaxing horn-filled haze on “Hi Top Whites” is the winner.

25. Curren$y - “Cargo Planes”

Year released: 2015

Album: Pilot Talk III

Producer: Joey Fatts

Closing out the trilogy five years after it started, Curren$y dropped another strong addition to the Pilot Talk series. It wasn't as strong as the first two, but the third installment shows a more mature and wizened Curren$y.

Five years and hundreds of songs later, Pilot Talk III is a new Spitta. Still smoking heavy, still smiling, but new nonetheless. Acting as the second single on the album, “Cargo Planes” came produced by Joey Fatts and showed a more mob-friendly Curren$y, letting us know that we wouldn't be getting a cookie-cutter version of the original Pilot Talk .

Evolution is key.

26. Curren$y - “Like Five Deuce Four Trey”

Album: Cathedral

Producer: Chase N Cashe

This project went under most radars, but back in June, Curren$y linked with producer Chase N Cashe and released the seven-song EP Cathedral . A great deal of these tracks are strong, and I might even like this better than Pilot Talk III , if only for the instrumental cohesion.

“Like Five Deuce Four Trey” is signature Curren$y—you can tell that much as soon as he starts muttering “la da da” adlibs at the beginning of a soulful, smooth sample. It's riding music, it's Jet Life music, it's a 2015 product from one of the most consistent rappers in the game.

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Curren$y and Harry Fraud Reunite for New Album ‘VICES’ Feat. Jim Jones, Benny The Butcher & More

When Curren$y and Harry Fraud connect, you know what it will sound like. The rapper-producer duo is back with a new album, VICES , bringing the synergy back from Regatta , Cigarette Boats , and more.

Curren$y and Harry Fraud’s new album is produced in its entirety by Harry Fraud and features Benny The Butcher, Larry June, Jim Jones, Rome Streetz & G.T.

“’VICES’ is a musical ‘tip of the hat’ to all of the coolest bad guys from one of the best examples of 80’s television,” Spitta remarks. “Let this serve as a time capsule from the times that shaped the Miami skyline and sparked an entire sub-culture that revolves around automobiles and fashion.”

“Sonically, it was important on ‘VICES’ to tap into the nostalgia of the 80s; while maintaining the forward-thinking sound Spitta and I are known for. From our mutual tastes in cars to television of that era, it’s always a very organic undertaking,” Harry Fraud reveals. “’VICES’ is the next chapter in the catalog of moments we began capturing over a decade ago.”

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The Drive In Theatre

By Jonah Bromwich

March 14, 2014

In 2010, the New Orleans rapper Curren$y scored the two biggest hits of his career. The rapper, born Shante Franklin, had once been a gangster rapper, one of the semi-anonymous weed carriers that populated Lil Wayne’s Young Money Entertainment imprint. Like so many of his fellows, Curren$y, who frequently refers to himself as Spitta, wasn’t promoted properly while on YME, but he also was an ill fit for the label’s gangster-lite subject matter at the time.

After leaving Young Money, he hit upon a formula that worked better: rapping about his smoked-out lifestyle, an aspirational, unpretentious, working man’s fantasy of fast cars, fast women and copious amounts of THC. Curren$y found his trademark style, discussing that subject matter with a flow which didn’t so much find a beats’ pockets as create creases of its own. Pairing those raps with the lush boom-bap of the producer Ski Beats on the Pilot Talk records yielded two near-perfect albums of stoner fantasia.

He has not made a project with the same kind of impact since. That has a lot to with artistic inertia—like many prolific musicians, Curren$y can seem more interested in the present, cranking out song after song, than he does in making specific creative statements. The closest he gets is warmed-over concepts like the one that powers his new mixtape The Drive In Theatre, a tired tribute to the Godfather that’s ostensibly supposed to double as a paean to movies in general.

But the Pilot Talks weren’t great because they provided an insider’s look into the aviating life—Curren$y’s concepts have traditionally been smoked-out deviations more than anything else.  Instead, they functioned as mood albums, the lush beats creating a perfect atmosphere for Spitta’s offbeat flow to come in and make itself at home.  And the new mixtape is the first since that 2010 duo to create a similar atmosphere, making it the rapper’s strongest project in nearly four years.

A lot of that has to do with the guiding hand of Thelonius Martin, who produced just under half the songs here and who keeps it orchestral, with brass-happy, atmospheric boom bap that provides the perfect backdrop to Curren$y’s diaristic scribbling.  “Vintage Vinyard” is a great example of the intimacy on display. It’s a jazzy, off-the-cuff tale of the successful man’s life, opulent, but also filled with paranoia, reflections on one’s place in the artistic hierarchy and quiet moments with the wife. “Hi-Top Whites” keys in on a single detail about a woman, but in the course of getting to the shoe-talk, gives an absorbing account of a day in the life. Curren$y is smoothest over beats like these, where his leaping from one topic to another feels less unfocused and more in sync with the improvisational jazz providing a foundation below him.

Even when Martin is not in charge, the album’s producers do a good job at keeping the vibe consistent. The production team of Cardo and Young Exclusive contribute a blown out bass to “$ Sign Migraine” buts it’s the floating mid-tempo tones that help the song to vibe with the rest of the album. Cooking Soul, who fans will recall from their late-aughts remix albums, come through with the first truly absorbing beat on the project, the mellow backdrop of “Stove Top".

If there is a uniting theme on The Drive In Theatre, it’s that Curren$y seems more reflective than usual, a rap veteran reconciling himself with his place in the music business. The posse cut “Grew Up In This” includes a hook that could be interpreted as an assertion of gangster authenticity (“I grew up in this shit”) but it seems to double as a contemplation of being a working man’s rapper, tirelessly grinding out songs and navigating a perilous industry with finesse. “Grew Up In This” also features excellent verses from both Young Roddy and Freddie Gibbs, the former a Curren$y protege who seems to finally have found his own voice, the latter a rapper with a career path similar to and a record of making great songs with Curren$y.

Curren$y has always had good taste in collaborators and the other features on the album are equally effective. Fiend and Smoke DZA both sound great over the handclaps and sax that power “The Usual Suspects.” And Action Bronson saves what might otherwise be a weak opening track, “Godfather Four.” (The beat loops The Godfather’s theme music, which sounds great, but is awfully gimmicky*.)*

That beat is just one of the many ways in which The Drive In Theatre is studded with the trappings of a much weaker concept album—there are also plenty of unnecessary snippets of dialogue from Coppola’s movies. But just as Pilot Talk became a euphemism for the kind of lifestyle rap that Curren$y excels at, the movie theater signifiers mostly evaporate to reveal a reflective rapper with a keen eye for detail and a true gift for beat selection: the atmosphere is cinematic, in scope if nothing else. Curren$y puts out a lot of music, and fans could be forgiven for missing a mixtape here and there. But The Drive In Theatre, premiered on Datpiff with next-to-no promotion, proves once again, that Curren$y is one of a certain group of artists that it pays to keep your eye on.

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YOUNG MONEY RAPPER

Hip hop artist euro has an extraordinary way of painting lyrical imagery within the minds eye of the listener. But let's start at the beginning. Euro was born in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. At the age of 5, his family moved to the United States and they made Providence, RI their home. From early on he was passionate about sharing his love of rap. At the age of 6 euro's uncle entered him in a talent show where he had to memorize his bars on the way to the venue and walked away with a first place win. At the age of 11 euro performed at halftime at a basketball event at the Dunkin Donuts Center - a 12,000+ capacity arena in Providence.

He kept honing his rhyme skills throughout his teenage years, but it was while playing baseball in college that he was introduced to the Young Money head honcho himself Lil Wayne. Wayne

immediately realized the sheer talent euro possessed and aligned him with the YM imprint.

He has since appeared on "Young Money: Rise Of An Empire", specifically on the lead single "We Alright" featuring Lil Wayne and Birdman, countless legendary Lil Wayne mixtapes and recently on Afro beats artist, FireBoy DML, Playboy album. Euro's lyrically strong style evokes the spirit of some of his biggest influences including Jay-Z and of course Lil Wayne. Euro has rocked the stage at Lil Weezyana Fest, at NBA All-Star weekend, The A3C Festival, and blessed the mic many times before sold out arenas with Lil Wayne on tour.

Euro has a reverence for the all time greats of rap while keeping his gaze fixated on the future of the genre. His ultimate goal is to one day be considered amongst the all time greats. 

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Nicki Minaj conquers the United Center in long-awaited return to Chicago

Minaj had some good company for her united center kickoff, bringing out two of chicago’s own for special guest spots: rapper g herbo and singer-producer jeremih..

Nicki Minaj performs March 30 during her Pink Friday 2 World Tour at Madison Square Garden in New York City. The artist played the first of two shows in Chicago on Wednesday night at the United Center.

Kevin Mazur/WireImage for Live Nation

Queen Sleeze has been ruling Chicago this week. After bringing her family to hang with penguins at the Shedd Aquarium and waxing about Chicago pizza on socials, Nicki Minaj finally got down to business of music Wednesday night at the United Center, where the chart-topping rapper arrived with her Pink Friday 2 World Tour in tow. It offered a two-and-half-hour, 34-song super trip through the conceptual cyberspace village known as Gag City, that made you want to move there and claim residency.

The United Center spectacle — full of costume and wig changes, a backup dancer army, high-def video displays and fire towers — was the first of two very sold-out shows (in fact, her record-breaking 28 th and 29 th consecutive sell-outs). It was also the first time the Trinidadian-born rapper-singer has had a proper show in Chicago in about a decade (most recently bowing out of 103.5 KISS FM’s Jingle Ball last December).

Nicki Minaj is joined by special guest Jeremih on “Favorite” during her show Wednesday night at the United Center in Chicago.

Selena Fragassi/For the Sun-Times

The wait was worth it, as the long incubation period has served its purpose, allowing Minaj to morph into the dominating force she is today, a larger-than-life performer and savvy rhyme slinger who is considered the modern-era Queen of Hip-Hop with the most No. 1 hits on the Billboard 200 by any female rapper.

The latest, a remix of the “Pink Friday 2” track “FTCU” (featuring Travis Scott, Chris Brown and Sexxy Red), is only a week old but has been delivered like a veteran classic on tour. Its catchy backbeat — aided by a fantastic live duo on drums and synths — was a highlight of the night that stood up to time-tested power singles “Super Bass,” “Anaconda” and “Starships” that were delivered in rapid-fire succession at the end of the set.

Minaj had some good company for her United Center kickoff as well, bringing out two of Chicago’s own for special guest spots. Rapper G Herbo joined for a blitzkrieg version of “Chi-Raq,” while Jeremih tagged in for “Favorite” and “Want Some More,” with Minaj asserting it was the first time she had ever performed the songs live with the latter.

Monica performs onstage during Nicki Minaj’s Madison Square Garden concert in New York in March, part of the Pink Friday 2 World Tour.

Kevin Mazur/Getty Images for Live Nation

For someone who’s often swimming in headlines for her beefs with fellow rappers, Minaj has showcased her alliances on this tour, also getting Tyga, Big Sean and Sada Baby for previous dates. Monica has also been a special guest for multiple nights on the trek, though in a very ill-timed placement within the evening’s lineup. The “Angel of Mine” singer appears some 30 songs into Minaj’s own set, abruptly delivering a five-song break that disrupted the flow of the Gag City escape and added unnecessarily to a very long night (Wednesday’s concert let out at midnight).

Regardless, Minaj posted on her social accounts that it was, “Perfect. Absolutely. Positively. Perfect. From start to finish. Complete perfection.” And there’s no doubt her Barbz (as her diehard cult of fans are known) would agree. The epitome of “we wear pink” on this Wednesday, they came dressed head to toe in a cotton candy explosion of fabrics, rhinestones and Western wear, the perfect visual blend of Minaj’s “Barbie World”/”Barbie Dangerous” cartoonishness and her pre-“Cowboy Carter” curveball track “Cowgirl.”

Minaj showed her gratitude to the denizens, throwing out a few branded Pink Friday 2 T-shirts while offering “blessings” and thanking the fans for “f- - - - -g with me all these years,” adding, “you either love me or f- - - - -g hate me, right?” She then handed over her microphone to a few of them situated in the SRO pit area around the thrust stage, baiting them to do their best vocal take on “The Night Is Still Young,” though quickly, thankfully, cutting off the less-than-successful karaoke. Minaj’s excellent backup singer Keisha Renee then showed the crowd how it was done.

Nicki Minaj performs onstage during her Pink Friday 2 World Tour at New York’s Madison Square Garden in March.

The life journey Minaj has been on since she started flipping mixtapes in 2007 has not been lost on her in her latest arena tour. The rapper pays homage to her origin story on the set list opener, “I’m The Best,” and she also adds in a cover of Ye’s (formerly Kanye West) 2010 hit “Monster,” which was her gateway into the scene. (The latter connection happened after being discovered by Lil Wayne, whose Young Money imprint released her debut album “Pink Friday” that same year.)

No doubt the Barbz and everyone else are hoping it’s not another 10 years before we see Minaj on a local stage again.

• I’m The Best
• Barbie Dangerous
• Chi-Raq (with G Herbo)
• Big Difference/Beez in the Trap
• Pink Birthday

Nicki Minaj performs at the United Center on Wednesday, April 24, 2024.

• Favorite (with Jeremih)
• Want Some More (with Jeremih)
• High School
• Red Ruby Da Sleeze
• Barbie World (Aqua cover)
• Roman’s Revenge
• Monster (Ye cover)
• Right Through Me
• Let Me Calm Down
• Super Freaky Girl
• The Night Is Still Young
• Moment 4 Life

Rapper Chris King, friend of Justin Bieber and Trippie Redd, killed in Nashville

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The rapper Chris King, who was close friends with Justin Bieber and collaborated with Trippie Redd, was killed early Saturday morning in Nashville, according to police reports . He was 32.

The artist, born Christopher Cheeks, was in an alleyway between Hayes and Church streets in Nashville at 2:30 a.m. with a 29-year-old man (who was not named), when according to Nashville police, three men attempted to rob them. Both King and the 29-year-old man were shot in the altercation, though the 29-year-old survived.

King was found in the parking garage of the nearby Hayes Street Hotel, and was transported to Vanderbilt University Medical Center, where he died.

Bieber, a former roommate of King’s, reposted a photo of the two to Instagram, writing “Love you bro. This one hurts. Please keep his family in your prayers. See you in paradise brother.”

Trippie Redd also mourned the loss of his friend, writing “I am so hurt rn I can’t even think I love you bro come back!!!!! I can’t catch a break.”

“I would not be where I am today without @whoischrisking,” he continued. “He had the best energy always he had so many friends and it shows I love you guys for supporting one of my best friends ever my brother.”

Over a decade-long career, King releases scores of mixtapes and LPs, including the long-running “Luck of the Snotty” series. King released a new single, “Seeing Double Seeing Double,” on April 8.

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Bad Bunny brought a live horse, an orchestra and Puerto Rican pride to Austin concert

There was a live horse.

Friday night at the Moody Center, reggaetón idol and fashion trendsetter Bad Bunny switched sides and costumes. Earlier he donned a suit and wig under an L.A. Dodgers cap, then he rocked a tan jacket with frills. In between, a soliloquy about taking the road less traveled via pre-recorded video.

In it, Bunny crossed the dessert on a horse with the self-serious swagger of a cologne ad.

“No one else dares to take this path,” he narrated on-screen in Spanish.

Then, for about 15 seconds, he walked into the arena on a brown horse, gave it a pat, and we never saw it again. For one of the world’s mightiest rock stars, it was the most over-the-top flourish in a night filled with them.

A full orchestra; 20 back-up dancers; a rotating cat walk; 10 to 15 minutes of just posing on said cat walk to breathe in the idol worship while giving back brooding stares; barroom singalongs of sweeping breakup ballads like “un x100to” performed while lounging on top of a grand piano; the audacity to not book an opener; the bravado to leave out song of the summer 2022, “Callaita,” which was in a beer commercial, from the set list. And like Leo Messi, the rock star born Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio never bothered to address his adoring English-speaking public in anything other than his native Spanish.

More from the Statesman: Valentina’s Tex Mex BBQ in Buda temporarily closes, says shifting to new management

He’d ask where all the Latinas in Austin, Texas were at to get screams, sure, but also offer affirmations about identity and self-actualization.

“What we can’t control is what people will say about us,” he’d say, later shouting out how special it was to see Puerto Rican flags from fans. (I counted more than 10 large ones stretched out by patrons, including a giant flag draped over the mezzanine wall like a soccer match.) In his pep talk, Bad Bunny was alluding to being a tabloid regular—he split with Kendall Jenner in December—but also seemingly shouting out what it’s like to be a Latinx person in the U.S.

And the Spanish-first community was proudly about town. Selling $10 cowboy hats; enjoying hot dogs with a million toppings, fresh off a street griddle; even third- and fourth-generation Texans seemed excited to tap into the fashion and swagger of Mexican uncles at a child’s birthday party on Bad Bunny night.

You forget that Bad Bunny is an idea and lifestyle, too. Locally, dance clubs like Mala Vida are molded in his neon image. In South Austin, the same operating group’s Gabrielas restaurant has a permanent Bad Bunny throne that diners can snap photos on. He’s emboldened the community with a zest for gender-neutral brightness so undeniably appealing that Mark Zuckerberg is now wearing gold chains and letting his curls flex.

Between bangers at the Moody, he told us to seek out “people who love you and support you.” The dude projects a lot, defiantly adding banter like “people tell me things every day, but I’m sure of who I am.”

More from the Statesman: In Montopolis, a constant battle to preserve Austin's historic Mexican cemeteries

Were his gradient lights hypnotic? Was the cowboy boot necklace we all got at the door, that synced to the lightshow Coldplay and Taylor Swift-style, a lovely souvenir? Were his vocals muffled and mixed to overpowering degrees so that at times you heard him echo twice as loud as the accompanying beat? Absolutely and of course.

Structurally, this Most Wanted Tour is a celebration of October’s “Nadie Sabe Lo Que Va Pasar Mañana” record, a more somber and rap-centric offering relative to 2022’s relentlessly romantic party masterpiece “Un Verano Sin Ti.” The former is almost a Rick Ross album, rich with thumping beats and strings—mood music for the bosses that makes you want to put a bib on and eat crab.

And so the show began with 10 uncompromising new songs, then revved into a string of party barge standards post-horse: “Yo Perreo Sola,” “La Santa,” “Me Porto Bonito.” Illuminate your reality and proudly let the dog out—he couldn’t be any clearer.

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‘It was only a matter of time for Slim’: Eminem to kill off Slim Shady alter ego on new album

Rapper trails summer release of The Death of Slim Shady (Coup de Grâce) with a fictional crime report suggesting that the antic character will meet a violent end

One of the great alter egos in pop could be meeting a grisly end, as Eminem announces his first album since 2020: The Death of Slim Shady (Coup de Grâce).

Set for release on an unspecified date this summer, the album was announced with a trailer that frames the demise of the antic character, with a crime reporter saying to camera: “Through his complex and oft-criticised tongue-twisting rhymes, the anti-hero known as Slim Shady has had no shortage of enemies … rude lyrics and controversial antics may have ultimately led to his demise.”

50 Cent appears, describing Slim Shady – with mock fear – as a psychopath, and Eminem himself concludes: “I knew it was only a matter of time for Slim.” An image, possibly the album artwork, features a figure with a knife wound to the chest.

THE DEATH OF SLIM SHADY (COUP DE GRÂCE). Summer 2024. https://t.co/J3F45PQDLx pic.twitter.com/tdJ4d4PzV0 — Marshall Mathers (@Eminem) April 26, 2024

Eminem created the character in 1997 to help energise him after the failure of his debut album Infinite the previous year. Beginning with a horror-movie intro where Slim Shady takes over Eminem’s body, The Slim Shady EP made its way to mogul Jimmy Iovine and then Dr Dre, who began a partnership that resulted in Eminem’s mainstream breakthrough, The Slim Shady LP (1999).

Slim Shady was a foul-mouthed, horny, cartoonishly disgusting provocateur who was introduced to the wider world with the single My Name Is, and its opening couplet: “Hi, kids, do you like violence? / Wanna see me stick nine-inch nails through each one of my eyelids?”

Eminem used the character to rabble-rouse pop culture, with crass lines about stars including Christina Aguilera, and delivering “horrorcore” storytelling full of violence and gross-out humour. Singles including Without Me, The Real Slim Shady and Just Lose It featured the character and became major commercial hits.

With his nasal delivery, Slim Shady also became part of a multi-voice split personality, with Eminem also using his real name Marshall Mathers to express more sober material such as his classic story of fan obsession Stan, and “Eminem” a kind of bridge between the two. There was drama in the way the rapper seemed torn between the different sides of his personality, but by 2008 Eminem wrote in his memoir: “Slim, Em, and Marshall are always in the mix when I’m writing now. I’ve found a way to morph the styles so that it’s sort of all me.”

Eminem then leaned more towards the downbeat side of his craft for a number of years, particularly in the wake of drug addiction on albums such as Relapse (2009) and Recovery (2010).

But on recent LPs – Kamikaze (2018) and Music to Be Murdered By (2020), each of them surprise-released – he has played again with the more provocative side of his artistry. He caused controversy with the Music to Be Murdered By track Unaccommodating by – very Slim Shady-ishly – comparing himself to the terrorist who bombed an Ariana Grande concert at Manchester Arena in 2017, killing 22.

The Guardian’s Alexis Petridis said of Kamikaze: “Hip-hop’s former enfant terrible, a man who made a career out of saying things that even his most nihilistic peers would consider beyond the pale … reinvented himself as rap’s grumpy dad, baffled and horrified at what the genre had become.”

Petridis said that on that album and its successor, Eminem was “going through the motions” with his Slim Shady provocations, but acknowledged that Music to Be Murdered By “offers one virtuoso performance after another: delivery that’s both warp-speed and perfectly enunciated, constant shifts in tempo and emphasis”.

Including his greatest hits collection Curtain Call – which has spent 614 weeks on the chart and is still currently inside the Top 20 – the new album will very probably become Eminem’s 11th UK No 1 in a row. That would put him on an equal footing with Taylor Swift, U2, and David Bowie who also have 11 chart-toppers each (though Swift will surely add a 12th later today), while the Beatles remain top with 15.

Alongside the album announcement, Eminem appeared at an event announcing this year’s NFL draft picks, held in the rapper’s home city of Detroit.

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Judge declines to dismiss lawsuits filed against rapper Travis Scott over deadly Astroworld concert

FILE - Travis Scott performs at Astroworld Festival at NRG park on Friday, Nov. 5, 2021, in Houston. A judge has declined to dismiss hundreds of lawsuits filed against rap star Scott over his role in the deadly 2021 Astroworld festival in which 10 people were killed in a crowd surge. State District Judge Kristen Hawkins issued a one-page order made public Wednesday, April 24, 2024, denying Scott’s request to be dropped from the case. (Jamaal Ellis/Houston Chronicle via AP, File)

FILE - The crowd watches as Travis Scott performs at Astroworld Festival at NRG park on Friday, Nov. 5, 2021, in Houston. A judge has declined to dismiss hundreds of lawsuits filed against rap star Scott over his role in the deadly 2021 Astroworld festival in which 10 people were killed in a crowd surge. State District Judge Kristen Hawkins issued a one-page order made public Wednesday, April 24, 2024, denying Scott’s request to be dropped from the case. (Jamaal Ellis//Houston Chronicle via AP, File)

FILE - Two people who knew an unidentified victim of a fatal incident at the Houston Astroworld concert embrace at a memorial on Nov. 7, 2021, in Houston. A judge has declined to dismiss hundreds of lawsuits filed against rap star Travis Scott over his role in the deadly 2021 Astroworld festival in which 10 people were killed in a crowd surge. State District Judge Kristen Hawkins issued a one-page order made public Wednesday, April 24, 2024, denying Scott’s request to be dropped from the case. (AP Photo/Robert Bumsted, File)

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HOUSTON (AP) — A judge has declined to dismiss hundreds of lawsuits filed against rap star Travis Scott over his role in the deadly 2021 Astroworld festival in which 10 people were killed in a crowd surge.

State District Judge Kristen Hawkins issued a one-page order denying Scott’s request that he and his touring and production company, XX Global, should be dropped from the case. The order was signed on Tuesday but made public on Wednesday.

Scott’s attorneys had argued during an April 15 hearing that he was not responsible for safety planning and watching for possible dangers at the concert on Nov. 5, 2021.

They argued Scott’s duties and responsibilities related to the festival only dealt with creative aspects, including performing and marketing.

However, Noah Wexler, an attorney for the family of Madison Dubiski , 23, one of the 10 people killed, said Scott, whose real name is Jacques Bermon Webster II, had a “conscious disregard for safety” at the sold-out festival. Wexler argued Scott encouraged people who didn’t have tickets to break in and ignored orders from festival organizers to stop the concert when told to do so as people in the crowd were hurt or dying.

Earlier this month, Hawkins dismissed lawsuits against Drake and several other individuals and companies involved in the show.

The lawsuit filed by Dubiski’s family is set to be the first one to go to trial on May 6.

The families of the 10 people who died, plus hundreds who were injured, sued Scott and Live Nation — the festival’s promoter — as well as dozens of other individuals and entities.

After an investigation by Houston police, no charges were filed against Scott, and a grand jury declined to indict him and five other people on any criminal counts related to the deadly concert.

Those killed, who ranged in age from 9 to 27, died from compression asphyxia , which an expert likened to being crushed by a car.

Some of the lawsuits filed by the families of the dead and the hundreds who were injured have been settled , including those filed by the families of four of the dead.

Follow Juan A. Lozano: https://twitter.com/juanlozano70