Detroit’s Elzhi is one of Hip-Hop’s championed heros of lyricism. First capturing the music world’s attention with the track “Come and Get It”, which was featured on J Dilla’s “Welcome to Detroit”, Elzhi began to already be compared to some of the heavyweights of Hip-Hop with the use of clever metaphors and a precise delivery that would make any purest put aside any dose of skepticism. In 2002, the Detroit native joined Slum Village which solidified his imprint in Hip-Hop.
Keeping the spirit of Hip-Hop alive, Elzhi recentely released the “Elmatic” mixtape, a tribute to the classic Nas album “Illmatic”. While this may seem to be a large shoe size to place one’s foot in, what better emcee to handle the job as Elzhi’s vocal tone even slightly resembles Mr. Jones. However, this is surely no gimmicky, one-off mixtape of El rapping on Illmatic instrumentals. The Motor City emcee teamed up with the band Will Sessions to recreate those magical moments. Elzhi rhymes, “Who can touch me?/F**k who you read about/Haters I’m weeding out the same way I do my dutchie” on “Life’s A B***h featuring Royce Da 5’9.
Elzhi proves that there is still a place for skilled emcees who refuses to dumb down content just for the sake of pleasing.
Download the mixtape here.