Album Review // Roc Marciano // 656
4.5/5 stars
Roc Marciano has no interest in coasting. The East Coast rapper isn't just content spinning gritty and absurd yarns over dusty sample loops and fuzzy synthesizers – he's confident enough to do it almost entirely on his own. On 656, his 10th studio album and first fully self-produced project in over a decade, Marciano handles nearly every aspect of the record himself. The lone exception is Errol Holden, an equally hungry collaborator who appears twice and doesn't mince words, delivering two of the album's most electric and confrontational moments. 656 would be a startling debut from a younger rapper, but it's even more impressive coming from a veteran who helped define underground rap in the 2010s. The album feels like a flex and a victory lap wrapped into one, allowing the rapper/producer to thumb through vinyl crates for the kind of warped, menacing samples found on opener "Trick Bag" and the deceptively soulful "Hate Is Love," while "Childish Things" hinges on an unsettling synthetic bass tone. None of this should be surprising for an artist of Marciano's caliber, but 656 still feels vital rather than nostalgic. By eschewing trends and past highs in favor of continuing to refine his vision, 656 immediately positions itself as an early contender for one of the strongest hip-hop records of the year.
