{"id":941018,"date":"2026-10-21T07:10:09","date_gmt":"2026-10-21T07:10:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/941018\/"},"modified":"2026-10-21T07:10:09","modified_gmt":"2026-10-21T07:10:09","slug":"zukenee-blunts-blades-album-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/941018\/","title":{"rendered":"Zukenee: BLUNTS & BLADES Album Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

The 24-year-old Atlantan eccentric Zukenee<\/a> claims he\u2019s bringing \u201cauthenticity\u201d back to the rap game\u2014except his whole thing is cosplaying as a medieval knight. BLUNTS & BLADES, his fourth full-length album of 2026, is the newest entry in his ongoing project of reimaging himself as a disillusioned paladin wandering the gothic wasteland of modern-day Atlanta\u2014post-T.I.<\/a>, Gucci Mane<\/a>, and Jeezy<\/a>, post-Whole Lotta Red<\/a>, post-YSL RICO trial\u2014trying to piece it all back together almost singlehandedly. It\u2019s his best work to date, a jolt of inspiration that deprioritizes the sword-and-shield shtick and redirects focus to his songwriting and raw rapping ability.<\/p>\n

The new record reveals a deep reverence for an acutely lyrical branch of Atlanta rap. Zukenee matches the verbal acrobatics of the incarcerated Peewee Longway with the larger-than-life stylings of the late Young Scooter, sometimes dropping his voice and employing a measured, singsong cadence reminiscent of another late Atlanta legend, Trouble<\/a>. Like Trouble, Zukenee can lull you into a groove, then puncture that false sense of security with an abrupt shift in tone. (I\u2019d like to think of the presence of Ear Drummers producer Truebeatzz on this otherwise close-knit roster of producers as further homage to Mike WiLL Made-It<\/a>\u2019s work with Trouble.) More explicit is the Bankroll Fresh<\/a> flip \u201cWalked Out,\u201d where Zukenee fires off stream-of-conscious taunts over a glitchy rendition of the familiar Mr. 2-17 melody. On \u201cQuestion Mark,\u201d he lets slip a rare autobiographical bar: \u201cFourth grade I was playin\u2019 Future, thinkin\u2019 \u2019bout my future.\u201d<\/p>\n

No score yet, be the first to add.<\/p>\n

Production-wise, a bulk of the beats are handled by Cade, desmos, and Willem.kr, three of Zukenee\u2019s closest collaborators. Though generally more jittery, the best ones shoot for the disarming quirkiness of Pi\u2019erre Bourne<\/a>\u2019s work with Young Nudy<\/a>, filtering Pi\u2019erre\u2019s ear for digital sounds through the blown-out tastes of a post-Flex Music underground scene and Zukenee\u2019s own flair for carnival sounds and fat synths. \u201cFace in Pillow\u201d is particularly thrilling, coupling face-melting double bass with Zu\u2019s matter-of-fact shit-talking. It all feels intentional, as if Zukenee is trying to prove that it\u2019s possible to rap well over beats that sound like they might also be on a OsamaSon<\/a> or Yeat<\/a> hard drive somewhere.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The 24-year-old Atlantan eccentric Zukenee claims he\u2019s bringing \u201cauthenticity\u201d back to the rap game\u2014except his whole thing is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":941019,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[342,49,48,75,341,343],"class_list":["post-941018","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-albums","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-entertainment","tag-music","tag-web"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/941018","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=941018"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/941018\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/941019"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=941018"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=941018"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=941018"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}