Andy Cooper is the Long Beach emcee/producer formerly of the group Ugly Duckling. In recent years, he’s re-emerged as a solo artist, with albums like Room to Breathe and Action! He’s also been collaborating with British producers such as The Allergies and DJ Format. His most recent full-length came in 2018 when he released The Layered Effect. He now comes back with a new full-length, L.I.S.T.E.N. (Lyrical Innovation Supplying The Ear’s Need).

St. Panther is a young producer/emcee/vocalist/multi-instrumentalist from Irvine, California. She just released her debut EP, These Days, an exciting opening statement that brings together a wide variety of influences, from hip hop to synth pop to R&B. The EP was released as a joint venture between Ricky Reed’s Nice Life Recording Company and Nate Mercereau’s How So Records. She recently took the time to talk to us about her background in music, making the EP, and adjusting to COVID times.

Blacknerdninja is an emcee from Athens, Georgia that has been releasing music at a steady pace for the last five years. Most recently, he dropped an EP called The Bride just this past April. Now he’s back with a new project, R.H.H.L.W.P. R.H.H.L.W.P. stands for “Respect + Humanity + Honor + Loyalty + Warriors + Proudly.” Working with producers RicandThadeus, BeneBeats, Freekvanworkum, Jay B Beats, Psycho Beatz, and DaBeatMan, Blacknerdninja set out to make an album dealing with the everyday life of the Black man living in America, the balance between staying optimistic and not self-destructing while dealing with all of the macro and micro aggressions that are baked into society.

Waldo From Cincinnati is a producer from – that’s right! – Cincinnati, who has been working as part of the Fort Ancient collective. While he’s been part of several collaborative projects in recent years, whether it be a full length album with Homage CVG or the full Fort Ancient crew, it’s actually been five years since he last proper solo release, Yonder Works (And Then Some). Now he breaks that streak with a beat tape, Yellow Brick.

Doseone is an emcee/producer from Oakland, and whose resume includes being a founding member of anticon., as well as being a member of groups like Them, cloudDEAD, Subtle, 13 + God, Nevermen, and Deep Puddle Dynamics, just to name a few. Basically, he’s been an underground hip hop legend for the past two decades. Two years ago, he delivered an incredible album called Less is Orchestra which also turned out to be a painful farewell to producer Alias, who died suddenly before the album was released.

Javier Santiago is a pianist/producer originally from the Twin Cities but now based in New York. He’s been steady gigging since he graduated from New School back in 2011, but it’s really been in the past couple of years that he’s established himself as a solo artist with a couple of releases, starting with Phoenix in 2018. His most recent effort came just this past April, when he released an EP called Are You There?

Just this past June, we were treated to the debut album from a new collective from the UK called Sault, when they dropped Untitled (Black Is). Purposely keeping almost all information from the press and public, they relied on a few key marketing decisions, but mostly word of mouth to spread the music far and wide. While I wouldn’t recommend this path for everyone, when you make music as ambitious and unique as Sault did with that album, word is going to travel fast, and it did, creating a lot of buzz about this group that we knew nothing about.

Steve Arrington is a musician from Dayton who has had a long and winding career. Back in 1975, he moved out to San Francisco, where he played Latin percussion and drums with Coke Escovedo and Sheila E. From there, he joined up with funk group Slave, first as a drummer, but then also took on vocal duties for singles like “Just a Touch of Love.” After leaving Slave in 1982, he formed his own group, Steve Arrington’s Hall of Fame.

Takuya Kuroda is a trumpet player born in Japan, but long established in New York, where he first moved to study music at New School. Since that time, he spent time in Akoya Afrobeat, DJ Premier’s BADDER band, and Jose James’s band before striking out on his own. As a solo artist, he’s worked with labels such as Blue Note and Concord. Now he makes his debut on First Word Records with Fly Moon Die Soon.

Lex Amor is a relatively new artist out of North London who had released a handful of scattered singles in the past year or so, collaborating with artists like Wu-Lu along the way. Now she’s ready to drop her debut album, Government Tropicana. Lex Amor is handling some of the production on this album, but she’s also getting assists from Melo Zed, Rei Sky, T3, Josette Joseph, and Seinna. Together, they’ve crafted a sound that blends together neo-soul, downtempo, and some grimy boom bap.