YG’s 2016 sophomore record Still Brazy is celebrating its 10th anniversary with the release of a new format. The West Coast rap favorite will soon be available on a limited edition 2LP “molten lava” color vinyl.
Still Brazy features the singles “Twist My Fingaz,” “Why You Always Hatin’?,” and “FDT.” The album features production from Swish, P-Lo, Terrace Martin, Larrance Dopson, CT Beats, Ty Dolla Sign and Hit-Boy. Lil Wayne, Drake, Nipsey Hussle, Kamaiyah, and Slim 400 all make appearances. Still Brazy debuted at number six on the US Billboard 200.
In an interview around the release of Still Brazy, YG explained why he wanted to critique politics and police brutality. “Oh, man, it was just how I feel. It was just me knowing what’s going on in the culture and me being a human and really feeling some type of way,” he said. “Being in the rap game and the rap community, that’s where it started at.”
“Twist My Fingaz” references the Compton rapper’s then-recent experience of getting shot outside of a recording studio. “Was it hard to write about the situation? No, not at all. I mention it and talk about it on the record and let everyone know what and let everyone know whatever they going to know,” YG told Billboard. “I’ve been through real shit and I still go through real shit, and I made it in sticky situations and turned the negative into a positive.”
“Why You Always Hatin’?” was a collaboration between YG, Drake, and Kamaiyah. YG and Drake previously worked together on “Who Do You Love?” a standout track off YG’s 2014 debut, My Krazy Life.
“FDT,” a collaboration with Nipsey Hussle, is an expletive-driven rebuke of Donald Trump and his policies. “It got to a point where [Trump] was disrespectin‘, saying shit that makes no sense,” YG told Billboard in 2016. “Me and Nip always talk about doing real shit about these politics, stepping up and saying stuff other motherf—ers are not doing so we finally hit the studio and really did it.”
Buy the limited edition vinyl edition of YG’s Still Brazy here.
