Danny Brown – Quaranta

Detroit spitter Danny Brown is a fan favourite for a reason. Few MCs have taken true-blue lyrical ferocity and draped it in a persona as arresting as Danny’s.

Recognized in his early days as much for his streak of permed hair, toothy grin, and boggling fashion sense as he was for his rhymes and beats, Brown could always tell when to ratchet up the dramatics. But his ability to trojan-horse in bars about street-level Detroit and his surreal day to day life within it has truly produced his longevity and etched his legacy. In an era where hip-hop was fractioning in countless directions, Brown seemed to have it all down to a science–by the time he released his breakout album XXX, he was spearheading a movement of avant-garde internet hip-hop that we still live in the shadow of today.

Since then, Brown has whipped ravers into frenzies across European festival circuits and donned XXL’s coveted Freshman cover. He’s bridged old and new-school rap royalty (collabs from Earl Sweatshirt to Q-Tip) and linked with the most grailed underground electronic record labels. And most remarkably, he has done all this while remaining inexplicably himself; never veering too far one way or another, or bothering to explain how he maintains balance. Quaranta finally begins to peel back the curtain, unveiling the inner monologues of an artist who’s mystified fans for over a decade. Brown’s sixth studio album, written during the pandemic lockdowns of 2021, is autobiographical and personal in a way seldom heard from the MC before. “There wasn’t too much to do, so it was the best thing for me to do,” he says, “to put everything I was going through into the music.”