Bag of Tricks Cat is an emcee from Phoenix who has been releasing music for about a decade now, best known for his collaborative albums with Mega Ran and his solo album, Felix Shevrolet. Just this past July he gave us The Bad Luck EP. Now he has returned with a year-end EP, Milk and Vodka. The title of this EP comes from the collaboration between Cat and Los Angeles producer Vodka Gravas.

Ever since North Carolina emcee SkyBlew made his recording debut over ten years ago, he’s been working at a prolific pace and collaborating with all sorts of different people. In recent years, he has made albums with Scottie Royal, DJ Reimi, and Sublime Cloud. Now he’s back with a new album with Durham producer Navo the Maestro to give us Keys of Light. A lot of SkyBlew’s music over the years has revealed his production wheelhouse to be that jazzy early ‘90s style of boom bap.

Day Tripper is an Atlanta-based producer best known for his work in groups like Clan Destined and The Difference Machine. Just last year, he teamed up with Full Plate to release an instrumental solo album called Langford Landscapes. Now he’s back with a different sort of project with I Found The End: A Dedication To Broadcast. I always love it when producers tip their hands to genres and groups not obviously associated with hip hop.

G’emma is a young artist from Berlin who released her first single in 2019. While the jazz and vocals student at Osnabrück University was in Freiburg, she met Quintin Copper and Dowakee, who not only started working with her as producers and musicians, but also got her hooked up with Sonar Kollektiv. Now, G’emma is ready to present her debut project, Types of Water EP. The first thing that hit me in listening to Types of Water was how seasoned G’emma sounds as a vocalist.

Daedelus is an artist who came up in the Los Angeles beat scene in the late ‘90s/early ‘00s. Since that time, he has given us a plethora of different projects that range from the grandest conceptual projects to the fun and (somewhat) straight ahead and everything in between. Most recently, he gave us the beat-focused project, What Wands Won’t Break, back in May of 2020. Now he is back with a completely different type of project, teaming up with Nigerian British poet Joahua Idehen to release an EP called Holy Water Over Sons.

Jack Vaul is an artist from Adelaide, Australia who has been releasing music for a while, but he’s really been ramping things up in the past couple of years. He’s done collaborative projects with people like Thorts or as part of Lowlight Plains alongside Wakemare. He’s also been active as a solo artist, with his last EP, StarHeartSkull, coming out in August of 2020. Now he’s returned with a new solo EP, A Long Where Away.

Kill Bill is an artist who used to be based in Austin but is now calling Charleston home. Over the last seven years, he’s been releasing music as part of the Exosociety collective. In the past two years, we’ve gotten collaborative projects from him with Rav and Scuare, but now he’s back with new solo album, Snowglobe Theory. In case you don’t know the reference, the snowglobe theory is a reference to the TV show St.

Just a few years ago, producer Dixon Hill was living out of his van, traveling the country, digging for records and producing beats. After releasing a couple of beat tapes, he was able to connect with Guilty Simpson and work with him on the 2019 album, Actus Reus. Now he’s teamed up with Clear Soul Forces emcee Noveliss for the album Book of Changes. Listening to Book of Changes, you can get a sense for what attracted Noveliss to Dixon Hill’s style of production.

Dr. Dundiff is a producer from Louisville who has been releasing music for the better part of a decade. Over the years he has worked with numerous artists such as Touch A.C. and LoFidel, but most recently he’s become known for his releases on Jakarta alongside Otis Junior. He’s also maintained a steady solo career, and in 2019 he released a project called SGJAZZ. As you can surmise, this was a jazz project, with the “SG” portion of the title standing for “super group.

dubldragon. is the San Francisco duo of emcee Skeptik and producer Danny G, formed back in 2014. Most recently, they dropped an EP called Funcoland, in June of 2020. Now they are back with a full-length album, Synthesthesia. As you might infer from the title of the album, a play on the word for when people visualize music when they hear it, this is a largely philosophical album. Danny G is laying down some beats built off of 8-bit production and synth pop, creating this dreamy soundscape that feels like there’s a hazy sense of wonder to the whole album.