Going in, everybody understood that, regarding underground rap in Houston, 2011 was going to be all sorts of reckless. There were just too many people doing interesting things for it not to be mayhem. And thus far, it's mostly lived up to the billing.
So rather than wait until the end of the year to hand out awards - which, at that point, would end up being a 37,000-word column - we're breaking the awards into fourths this year. This is the first installment. Have at it. The "This Is The Best Mixtape of the Year Thus Far" Award: Delo's Hood Politics Vol. 2 And just like that, everybody is pissed.
When hasHBrown released his remarkable Relationsh*t in February, we were just about certain that it would hold onto this spot for several months. But then Delo, who had shown bits of wonderment on his impressive but not entirely fluid debut Hood Politics Vol. 1, released HP2 and that was that.
Where HP1 seemed to wander around some at times, HP2 was (mostly) focused and (mostly) driven. And what's more, it featured a new version of Delo: Angry Delo, a highly effective variation of himself that he didn't exercise on the original tape (see: "AAAGGGHHH" and "One Shot"). HP2 will no doubt rate among Houston's best come December. Runners-Up Not Named Hash: Tawn-P's The Wake Up Kiss*; Yung Quis's 16 oz; UZOY's The [DEF]inition. *Tawn-P's tape is the most relentless mixtape ANY female has released this year.
The "Has Anybody Noticed How Good Of A Year This Guy Has Been Having?" Award: Cy Fyre (producer) You need little more than a list of a few of the songs he's recently produced: Travis Barker and Killa Kyleon, "Drum Roll Please"; Delo, "Go Crazy"; Killa Kyleon, "Get Rich or Die Tryin'"; Blaze Burna, "Hold Up." High-five, sir.