AG Club

One Liner: Rapper collective that reminds me of Brockhampton

Wikipedia Genre: No Wikipedia but hip hop, rap
Home:  San Francisco

Poster Position: 14
Both Weekends.

Saturday at 3:20 on the Miller Lite Stage.

Thoughts:  Yes!  This may be the top five rap on the bill, even down here at line #14 on the poster.  I'm so damn glad to hear rap that actually sounds good and isn't some skinny white model whining about his feelings!  Has that Brockhampton feel because it won't just be a straight-forward rap with one guy taking the reins for the entire track - it'll have a tempo switch or a new rapper or a R&B interlude or whatever that pops up in the midst of the track.  One article I read said they sound like Odd Future, but I never really could figure out how to get into Odd Future.

The name may stand for Avant Garde Club, but it's sometimes hard to tell with groups like this who are trying to play around during their interviews.  The dudes look like a big group of freshmen in college started a skate club or something.  The main guy is named Jody Fontaine - in the videos below he is the main rapper.

Three albums - 2020's Halfway Off the Porch, 2021's Fuck Your Expectations, and 2021's Fuck Your Expectations PT. 2.  The first album has their top streamer - the one that got them noticed by a record label and then involved in a remix with A$AP Ferg.  "Memphis" has 9.5 million streams.

Love the backwards videos.  Shoutout Pharcyde.  Fun story of how a bunch of kids from the Bay Area ended up with a song called "Memphis."   The producer and the main rapper were just up too late in the studio, and the producer was looping a sample that said "north Memphis n*****s" over and over.  It wasn't working and he was about to trash the idea, when Fontaine came up with the "let these n*****s know!" loop, they recorded it real quick, and off they went.  When it came time to name the song, they were just like, screw it, call it "Memphis," no one is ever even going to hear it.  And now that it's their hit, people are all mad that they don't really have any reason to rep Memphis.  "JF: Now we got people in our YouTube comments talking about, “Y’all not even from Memphis, y’all can’t come to Memphis — blah, blah, blah.  BB: Why do they all have nose rings?”  That is funny.

And just for comparison, here is the remix with NLE Chopper and A$AP Ferg.  Their second-most streamed track at 7.1 million.

That beat is a good time - tough and bouncy and great for a good time.  So, after they caught a little hype from that track, they had a call with someone from the record label Columbia.  The resulting track was "Columbia," all about the odd experience of being offered big money for doing their art, which they used to make a weird alien video.

I've said this before, but I am always a sucker for a good horn sample in a rap song.  Love that.  The first one that always comes to mind is Trick Daddy's "Shut Up," because the horns on that one are so perfectly angry.  Jay-Z has a couple good ones, Kanye has "Touch the Sky" and likely others.  But a good horn lick instantly improves anything.

That song is their most streamed from the newer albums, but "NOHO" is currently more popular on Spotify and has a fun groove to it.  Definitely makes me want to shake the shoulders a little bit.  Overall, I like the true rap tracks better than the R&B-ish ones.  "TRUTH" is pretty solid too.  But for the most part, I don't see the PT. 2 album as good as either of the earlier two.  "QUESO" is kind of fun, but other than the "Memphis" redux, its about the best thing on here.

I'd go watch this.  Seems like they would put on a show and have fun with it.