R4PC4MP is an amorphous group from Portland, Oregon, built around the core of Claud Six, Blake Ambrose, and Kurn’t Cobain. They released their first album, Somebody Gotta Hold the Balloons, in 2018. In 2021, they reached all the way to Columbus, Ohio to team up with Dug & Happy Tooth to make an album called Just Outside America’s Test Market. As we wait for the next proper album, we get an interesting collection of new material and remixes called Sales Pitch.

The nice thing about a project like Sales Pitch is that the expectations are such that this just gives everyone permission to be their best weirdest self. What this means in practical terms is that nobody is trying to make a big single or anything like that, we’re just getting experimental beats and rhymes where everyone feels free to go off in any direction they want, whether it be political, philosophical, or abstract. On the production side of things, we get beats from Evaridea, i like animals, Claud Six, Bloodmoney Perez, and Dreams95. The general vibe here is underground cypher, and these laid back experimental boom bap beats are just what the doctor ordered. On the mic, the aforementioned five artists were clearly not enough to get this posse project in full effect, so we’re also getting appearances from Alex Toast, Pete Benda, Evaridae, neumy, C.K.P.I.T.S., and Ghost Mimosa. In lesser hands, this would turn into a giant mess, but no one here is trying to steal the show as much as they are just joining in on the fun and adding to the ongoing discussion across these nine songs. When you put it all together, you get a project that has the vibe of a good party where the conversation keeps flowing and you get some really great discussions going and everybody gets along. In that sense, it’s a very comforting listen.

Sales Pitch might seem like a place holder on paper, maybe something to tide people over before the next “big” release. In practice, it’s a really solid underground hip hop project that heads who go for the more experimental side of hip hop will really appreciate. The beats are inventive, the rhymes are clever, and it just feels like a good time from start to finish.