Four albums land this Friday spanning boom-bap, UK dance-R&B, and underground rap, plus a previously unreleased Mac Miller vault cut and a 25th-anniversary Mariah Carey remix. Here's the full slate, each with the Apple Music player and a Spotify link.
Listen to the full Uristocrat New Music Friday tape →
Rapsody — God Gotta Afro & Gold Hoops
God Gotta Afro & Gold Hoops is Rapsody's fifth studio album and her first for Roc Nation Records since 2022's Please Don't Cry. The 16-track set is led by the title single featuring South African rapper Karabo Ya Morena, and continues the boom-bap-rooted, lyrics-first lane that's defined her catalog since 2017's Laila's Wisdom.
Denzel Curry & Kenneth Blume — ii
ii reunites Denzel Curry with producer Kenneth Blume (formerly known as Kenny Beats) six years after their acclaimed 2020 collaboration UNLOCKED, out via Loma Vista. The nine-track, 24-minute record was built with nothing but an SP-404 and a cheap microphone after the pair worked through creative disagreements during sessions. Closing track "DIFFERENCE" features Yebba, alongside additional guest turns from JPEGMAFIA and Westside Gunn across the record.
Jorja Smith — What Are The Odds
What Are The Odds is Jorja Smith's third studio album, released via FAMM and produced entirely by her longtime collaborator P2J. The 12-track record trades her usual soul-ballad lane for a dance-floor pivot through UK garage, grime, 2-step, UK funky, soulful house, and Afro house. Lead single "Alive," featuring Wizkid, sets the tone; grime MC Devlin also appears, on "This City."
Thirteendegrees — GHETTO HIPSTER
GHETTO HIPSTER is produced entirely by Gyant and marks a deliberate return to the rapper's earlier, rawer 2023 style after last year's more polished Young World. In interviews around the release, Thirteendegrees pointed to Nas and Westside Gunn as reference points, framing the record as music "for literally everybody" rather than a single scene.
Singles & tracks worth pulling
- Mac Miller — "Butterflies": a previously unreleased track from the 2016 Divine Feminine sessions, produced by Taylor Graves with Thundercat on bass, out ahead of the album's October 2 10th-anniversary reissue.
- Mariah Carey & Rochelle Jordan — "Didn't Mean to Turn You On" (Rochelle Jordan Remix): a KLSH-produced reimagining previewing the October 30 25th-anniversary reissue of Glitter, pairing Carey's original R&B-funk foundation with Jordan's UK garage-leaning production.
The week in context
Four albums land the same Friday from four different label homes — Roc Nation, Loma Vista, FAMM, and an independent release for Thirteendegrees — with no single genre or scene dominating: boom-bap, UK dance-R&B, and rap all sit side by side. It also follows directly behind last week's Starr Girl-led roundup, which means Ayra Starr's album is still fresh off the same six-way pileup — for more from that stretch, browse the full Hip-Hop archive.
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