Last year, L.A. underground hip hop legend 2Mex released his first album in seven years when he dropped Lospital, capping off a comeback from a serious health scare that saw him lose his leg to diabetes. Now, as the dust settles on that album and 2Mex gets back to thinking about what comes next, he drops The Gentrification EP.

There’s nothing wrong with a filler EP when it’s done right, and it’s done right with The Gentrification EP. What you have here is a five-song EP, with three remixes and two new songs. The songs from Lospital in question are “Get Away From Me,” “Lostpital,” and “I Love You, I’m Sorry.” Each one is remixed well, and by that I mean you get to hear each song in a new light, with a significantly different take than the original recording. This is easier said than done sometimes, so it’s worth acknowledging when it’s done right, especially since that would make or break the EP. My personal favorite among the remixes is “Lostpital,” which slows things down and spaces things out, with a simple piano line and vocal sample setting this melancholic tone that lets the lyrics come to the forefront. In this case, it’s a pretty dark song dealing with some serious depression but told in such a way that 2Mex isn’t asking for sympathy, just understanding. It’s not an easy song to listen to, or one to throw on at a party, but it’s a really good and necessary song to help us have a conversation about coming back from the darkness. On top of the remixes, we’ve got two really solid songs in “Shadowhand” and “I Think You Were Right.” They’re both introspective songs that keep this melancholic tone to the EP, and both are incredibly honest and vulnerable songs from a veteran emcee.

This isn’t the most fun release in 2Mex’s catalogue, but it’s a really good EP to follow up his comeback album, Lospital. It’s a little bit dark and introspective, but it’s never too self-indulgent or self-pitying. It lays bare some raw emotion and the struggle with depression that can come with a health scare and the long road back.