Bring Back the Soundtrack #4: Riff Raff In the Atmosphere

As promised, I'm following up Mashup Issue #2 with a new Soundtrack. If you read (and hopefully viewed) Mashup Issue #2, you'll recall the two rappers up for review today are Riff Raff and Atmosphere.

I first heard Riff Raff's single, "Kokayne" (off of his new album, Neon Icon) where I hear most new music that grabs my attention these days: on Skratch 'n' Sniff. Living in the middle of nowhere (home to two classic rock stations, four country stations--at least--and one teeny-bopper pop station that barely comes in at all), iHeartRadio and Skratch 'n' Sniff have been a blessing to me.
Titled "Video Games" for radio play purposes, the white rapper's white powder anthem sports a sped-up baseline that sounds like it came straight out of Fugazzi's "Waiting Room," what might be bagpipes or a squeezebox put to non-annoying use, slightly creative rapid-fire name-dropping (Chris Rock, Carson Daly, Dolly Parton, Usain Bolt, Taco Bell), and a nod to Super Mario's turtle shell weapon that makes the title of song's clean version make sense. It's fun, I don't mind playing it to death, and I'm always willing to suck it into my eardrums whenever I need a "Kokayne" fix or a reason to party.
The rest of the album is uninspired, though. No mention of the baby with whom he appears on Neon Icon's cover, and nothing personal at all, for that matter. Though he does prove on a couple of songs that he is capable of moving from rap to actual, decent, un-auto-tuned singing, every song basically goes like this:
#1: Say how awesome your life is.
#2: Mention rice (apparently a slang word for coke--sorry, Koke) and/or champagne and/or vodka.
#3: Say "Oh, shit, look who it is, a white [insert name of B-list black celebrity here]" at some point in every song.
#4: Use a generic Hip-Hop/R&B melody to rap over.
#5: Name-drop incessantly.
#6: Basically end the song having said nothing of importance.
The skits that usually appear in the body of any rap album are annoying as hell, and there are maybe only two or three decent songs (besides "Kokayne") on the 20-track Neon Icon, one of which is a remix of one of the other decent songs ("How to Be the Man").
"Kokayne": 2 Lines Up
Neon Icon: D-

Next comes Atmosphere. I first heard about this rap duo from a guy who used to be my boss at WalMart (and when I say I heard about them, I mean that as I carpooled with him 40 miles each way to work, he played their 2008 CD nonstop until I got sick of it and made him listen to a bootleg CD of Sons Of Anarchy music for the next three days). I didn't even know yet that the title of their over-played album was When Life Gives You Lemons (You Paint That Shit Gold), which is a fucking awesome title by itself. Nor did I know that the voice of Atmosphere was a rapper named Slug (whom you may or may not know from the X-Ecutioners' Rob Zombie remix, "(Even) More Human Than Human," which was featured on the Hellboy soundtrack). That was a pleasant surprise as well.
But when I revisited Lemons years later and really listened to the words, I realized Slug and his instrumentalist partner, Ant, could actually write decent rhymes. Unlike Riff Raff's generic glam-rap, nearly every song on Lemons (and the more recent Southsiders) has a story behind it that feels personal and worth reading, and paints a vivid picture using the listener's imagination to the fullest.
A-

Stay tuned for more Mashuppery and characters from my cranium. But before I go, here's a list of other songs I've been introduced to through Skratch 'n' Sniff:

Avenged Sevenfold - "Shepherd of Fire"
Chevelle - "Take Out the Gunman"
Pop Evil - "Torn to Pieces," "Deal With the Devil," and "Trenches."
Linkin Park - "A Light that Never Comes" and "Guilty All the Same"
The Pretty Reckless - "Heaven Knows"
Tame Impala - "Elephant"
Arctic Monkeys - "Crawling Back to You"
All That Remains - "What If I Was Nothing"
The Kongos - "Come With Me Now"
The Dirty Heads - "My Sweet Summer"

The Only Ticketmaster Who Remixes Your Listening Device,
out.