When a new Drake/Kanye or Jay Z song drops everyone checks the hell outta that song ASAPISH. Every blog would feature it and no reader would skip. Then you get them artist that may get a feature on some blogs but still get overlooked for whatever reason by the masses. In our #Overlooked Series, we take a look at some of those artists that actually deserve to be checked out. First on our radar is CyHi The Prynce.
I first heard CyHi the Prynce during Kanye’s popular ‘G.O.O.D Friday’ series back in 2010. Good bars, word play and flowed pretty tight but nothing from the Atlanta rapper really stood out to me. His verse on the ‘My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy’ cut ‘So Appalled’, was tough, but it didn’t scream ‘let me go and download every mixtape this guy has ever released’. Maybe because at the time I had no care for new rappers and was only ever checking for some new Kanye or Pusha or maybe he just wasn’t good enough. Anyways, In the four years since the release of ‘G.O.O.D Friday’, the “spotlight” was never on CyHi the Prynce, as it was on his peers like Big Sean, J.Cole or Big K.R.I.T. Mixtapes like Royal Flush II and Ivy League: Kick Back from Cy Hi did alright but nothing made waves.
On the ‘Cruel Winter’ singles, CyHi was very absent (You may or may not have noticed) where as new GOOD Music recruit 2Chains was all over that b*ch. I, myself don’t even know how I notice these things, but on a few of Cy’s own leaks and releases during this period, G.O.O.D Music’s logo was missing from Cy’s artwork and received very minimal support if any. At this point I had just assumed that he had embodied the role of ‘Pill’ of Maybach Music Group (remember him? No? Oh).
Then came 2014, and with it came ‘Hystori: The Black History Project‘, with Kanye West as Executive Producer. CyHi starts this project off with an intro, saying: “He had to do it… It’s so necessary” and necessary it was.
Admittedly, here is exactly where we began paying attention at SpotlightFirst, because Good music is exactly what ‘Hystori’ is – a mixtape that displays the best of CyHi and gives us exactly what he was missing 4 years ago. The concept of ‘Hystori’ was different and executed near perfect. He definitely woke up a lot of people with this, including myself, and we was warned.
“Kanye told me to stop being humble so all you MCs and rappers out there get your bars up cause I’m ready!!! Seriously” Feb.2014 – CYHI THE PRYNCE (@CyhiThePrynce)
With that tweet followed ‘Napoleon’ which had Cy straight beasting for over 3 minutes on the m16 produced banger.
“Flowing so ethical plus I’m cold and poetical.
It’s my time according to this gold Oyster Perpetual
Ghetto activist, I’m not a Devil’s advocate
As humble as a dove but I run with some savages
Catch my goons laying on a nigga, mattresses
You ain’t from the streets if you thought that was some faggot shit.”
CyHi , drops some knowledge as well as display awesome pen skills. With conviction, CyHi likens himself to great historic names such as Jean-Michel Basquiat, Huey P. Newton and Nelson Mandela, in a way that can’t be ignored.
After this tape I began paying more attention to the dude and in doing so also discovered that CyHi is credited for contributing to nearly all of Kanye’s songs on his critically acclaimed album ‘Yeezus’. Meaning there is a lot more to the man than first thought and would no longer be an artist i over look.
Check out a few of our favourites from the tape (Download here) and let us know what you think below.