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The Burner Tape

Campana’s got talent in the bank and a year of successes that includes a high-energy performance at Prince’s Paisley Park mansion in Minnesota. On The Burner Tape, he steps into the role of a high-stakes dealer who’s “got that shit that can make you relax.” Earmilk says that “on Burner, he’s all about the hustle, delivering laissez-faire swag and humor over a bouncy backdrop.” Respect My Region praises this project too. Campana “picks up his stack of cash, and waves it in your face. Are you listening? Are you watching? Because you should. Dude is building an empire.”

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Moonshine

On the opening lines of Moonshine, Cosmos frontman Campana spits, “Just about a year ago, they didn’t know my name and now… I gotta hunch that we’re gonna be colossal.” In September, the group traveled to Paisley Park, MN—Prince’s former estate—to represent the hopes of all Seattle at the national Musicology competition. This was just the latest step on the ladder for a band that crushed the competition at 2016’s Sound Off! battle of the bands. This 2017 mixtape, Moonshine, pulls together a mosaic of influences. While listening, I wrote this perplexing scribble: “math-rock Northern Soul EDM dance jazz rap.” They knit together this wide range of influences into a unified, singular sound. There’s so much sonic goodness to savor here, from the Hendrix guitar axe crash on opener “North Star,” to the house club dub of “Mixed Signals,” or the gorgeously weird moments in “To The Moon” and “Silver Lining.” There’s also a smart choice of featured contributors, including Parisalexa and MistaDC, two talents whose star power has been rising all year. This is shake-your-booty music, channeling all the energy of a live five-piece band, while also engaging in advanced studio trickery. Cosmos’s live shows, such as the 4/20 launch party that kicked off this record, are a highly recommend experience. These guys are destined for big things. That opening hunch ain’t so far off.

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Eviction Notice

Pour yourself a tall glass of Hennessy, curl up on a comfortable couch, and digest this album like you would a theatrical production. With Eviction Notice, Campana brings forth a deeply personal and emotional, autobiographical full-length offering, underscored by the loss of a friend and musical homie Thee Ruin, whose name is featured on the cover, spelled out in stars above a dark desert road. For a record so much about the loss of direction, this music has such a grounded sense of place. Such physicality in the instruments. The knocks we face in life teach us lessons, and on tracks like “Look Around” with its pop chorus, Campana comes out swinging, and on “Organics” he’s shaking the dance floor.

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LGEP2: Day & Night

Each song on producer Luna God’s six-track Lgep2: Day & Night pairs his beats with a different Seattle vocalist, creating a whos-who of the latest and greatest that Seattle hip-hop has on offer. You will jump up and down to the sonic maximalism/eardrum massage of “Booty Bounce,” featuring ZELLi, and that’s reason enough to check this one out. But it’s the small moments that are the most sublime: The closing bridge of “Managing,” featuring Taylar Elizza Beth catches me by surprise each time as it deconstructs, or the ringing phone at the end of the first track, featuring Campana, that always has me pulling my phone out of my pocket thinking it’s ringing. The closing track “Don’t You Search For Nobody Else” could be a lost bonus track off Beyoncé’s Lemonade. It’s no surprise that KEXP recently included this one in their best-of-the-year list.

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