Avatar Young Blaze "Russian Revolution"

Seattle artists don’t hustle. We got some cats that work hard, rock shows, kill it and stay promoting themselves but you don’t see dudes in the lab dropping multiple projects a year. Not even tracks daily. Not to say the scene isn’t fruitful. Avatar Young Blaze has taken a page out of the book of trappers turned rappers and stayed making music at a higher volume than anyone else in his town.

With his latest project Russian Revolution hitting twitter earlier this week I’ve been sitting with it pretty much on repeat trying to get a feel for where the young man is taking us. Having listened to a couple other projects, watched the videos and talked with him in the last month I feel like I’ve started to see behind the mask.

To be honest this tape shows more depth than anything else he has done to date. Sure he still has the street shit. He rocks “BMF” and does a pretty good job with it, I’d love to hear what some national critics think of his rendition. He seems to take the same route talking in code about a bunch of shit most of us probably aren’t privy too. But his flow is rocks and you can’t deny his presence.

Elsewhere we see him do the weed song over some beautiful piano and guitar chords that certainly have you forgetting about that “Zone Out” video. “Wishing On A Dream” features Isabella Du Graf doing her thing over a beautiful beat with knocking drums, some ill strings and horns - a composition perfect for Av to talk about life of today and tomorrow.

At times in the past I have thought Avatar’s voice and flow were a bit awkward, gone is any of the clunkyness to his spit here. He is 100 percent on point throughout the tape, carrying it pretty much all by himself with only his homie Ackrite the Butcher and Eighty4 Fly making guest verse appearances. Ackrite and Avatar work really well together, we’ve already heard their chemistry and I’m anxious to hear a full project from the Butcher.

“Extraterrestrial” is another turn for Young Blaze, featuring a spacey beat with sparkling synths it sounds much more up the alley of it’s guest Eighty4 Fly. They do their thing, and I guess I’m gonna have to stop doubting Fly, he always holds his own.

The production throughout this tape is great. I don’t have an actual list of creidts but he shouts out Jake One on “The Quattroporte” and it sounds pretty trademark White Van Music with awesome drums, a hard bassline, and that crispness Seattle needs to be known for. Elsewhere Avatar selects records to suit his needs. He gets the synthed out club records, the hard gangsta shit and he even takes it back flipping the 808 for “Posse on Jackson.” It’s a bold move that no one should be mad at.

Listening to Russian Revolution you shouldn’t find much to be mad at. While Avatar projects of the past have shown us a young kid from the streets ready to spit venom at those just like he was still out on the block scoping a chain to snatch, this one shows a more mature Avatar. He is rounding himself out. And it makes for a listening experience that does not tire.

Download Russian Revolution here!