Coda.fm

2000 Fold

by Styles of Beyond

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Disciples of the camp of Divine Styler, Los Angeles's Styles of Beyond lack the spiritual commitment of their mentor yet more than make up for it with deft rhyme construction, a hungry battle attitude, and a cosmic-comic understanding of the world around them. Their sound is a cross between that of Mobb Deep and Camp Lo, mixing casual storytelling with penetrating insult, and whether it's dealing with interdimensional transmissions, lyrical transgressions, or biological transformations, MCs Takbir and Ryu do it with class and finesse. The production, largely supplied by Vin Skully, is uniformly outstanding, abusing the sampler and the turntable to penetrating depths. As Takbir says on "Styles of Beyond," they'll continue to be "the number 3 letters on your flip phone: D-E-F till my death." --Jon Caramanica