The artist currently known as Yea Yea (and formerly by Yamschild, Skrr, and many more) is a true enigma within the underground rap community. Possessing an unmatched workrate and drive to succeed, the steady growth of his popularity has been a wonder to behold. A master of building connections and forming lasting relationships, the New York-based rapper deserves immense praise for his contributions to the scene.
The most recent of Yea Yea (henceforth referred to just as Yea)’s drops is one of the most important when examining his growth as an artist. ‘Better Stop Me!!’ is not only one of his most savage, flagrant rapping displays yet, but it’s also one of his best produced, mixed and mastered songs ever. The dry menace in his voice throughout the first verse sets featured artist Ghosttholic up wonderfully, the latter artist a potent ball of energy over a classic cyber trap beat from Subjxct 5. If any one song could be described as exemplary of Yea’s sound, it would be this one.
Another vital point to go over when exploring the rapper’s discography is his growing relationship with UK-based producer Sixtythree666, whose music should by now be very familiar to readers of this blog. Alongside his collaborative efforts with acquaintance Cybernetic Snake, Sixty has also seen fit to bless Yea with some of his stronger beats and mixes. ‘ThatsF*ckdUp’ is an evil dark trap banger in which the rapper battles constantly with Sixty’s crushing drum patterns and evil church bell melodies (I’ve personally always been a sucker for those), while the epic ‘Yams Day Freestyle’ is the latest in a series of increasingly based freestyles alongside Snake. Clocking in at over 20 minutes, the collaboration sees the two rappers trading bars over a series of manipulated trap beats (they demolish the ‘Get Dripped’ and ‘RIP Fredo’ beats in particular). It’s a real odyssey of a track, highly recommended for Lil B fans.
Appropriately, Yea also has a song with The Based God himself. The remix of last year’s ‘Hoodbat’ features not only Lil B but also rapper-producer Muhkai (FKA Pies). All three artists lay great verses down: Yea’s verse is by far the most focused while Muhkai’s raspy bars conclude the song pleasantly. The fact that the NY rapper was able to put together this remix in the first place is impressive, and what’s even more interesting is that he has more than held his own when rapping alongside undisputed legends of the underground.
There’s an incredible amount of music to find from Yea, and only some of it is on his current SoundCloud. I will place links at the bottom of this article that you can follow to check out some of his older material, it’s all worth checking out. There’s also a fair amount of his music on the 108MICS SoundCloud. I’m very much looking forward to more from the NY artist, and even if he does eventually change his stage name again I don’t doubt that his music will always find those who need it the most.
Yea’s old SoundCloud can be found here.
– Chris (@108seraph)
108MICS 