The Cool Kids

The Bake Sale EP

[4.5/5]

While Rick Rubin may have left the rap world for Johnny Cash and Neil Diamond, his spirit lives on in the sound of the Cool Kids. The Illinois duo rock rhymes over sparse 808 beats that are never complicated, always dope. Delayed a number of times, The Bake Sale is every bit worth the wait: Hip-hop fans may have found new saviors to orchestrate the second coming of rap’s golden age. They are the antithesis of mainstream rap; a stale assembly line of carbon copies. The Kids address that very subject on “A Little Bit Cooler,” a song that praises individuality with lines like, “You judging me, dawg? Please, you shop at the mall/I shop at boutiques, limited quantities.” Balancing a DIY mentality with a good ear for catchy hooks (“Black Mags” and “88," especially), the Cool Kids have the ability to please both sides of the fence-which is exactly what the hip-hop world needs. (CHOCOLATE INDUSTRIES) Eddie Fleisher