Kid Millions

KID MILLIONS STIMULATES WORLD ECONOMY WITH RECESSION-PROOF RAP Milwaukee MC Kid Millions, known for his uplifting, often hilarious storytelling rhymes and unstoppable battling style, has generously dedicated his brain and body to the public welfare with the release of his new album, Recession Proof Rap, now available on Ski School/Uni-Fi LPs and CDs. On his first album, Words Get Around (2001), Kid Millions blew heads with funky, eclectic beats and outrageous braggadocio. With the all-star band Minus After, he dropped imaginative science on the single “Yellow Corvettes” and LP Examine My Face (2003). In 2006 Kid Millions unleashed the party-rocking Catch the Fever and a bumpin’ collaborative single with Milwaukee rhyme comrades the Rusty Ps. In 2008 the Kid toured the Midwest all the way down south with KingHellBastard. Now times are tougher, so Kid Millions has gone economy-size with the multi-format Recession Proof Rap. With nine huge-sounding tracks that take you from snooze alarm to pavement in seconds each, Kid Millions does not waste time or money. He has provided gainful employment to producers Eltronix, S. Watson, Sage Schwarm, LMNtylyst, and J. Todd, with whom he splits the album’s first single, “Victim to the Beat.” “Victim to the Beat” is a radio hit in Milwaukee, where WMSE-FM and WYMS-FM have rocked the bass-heavy roller-boogie joint steadily for months. Video montagemongers the Almost Twins employed the song for their Bite and Chew Montage on Will Ferrell’s funnyordie.com website. Recession Proof Rap begins with a dense, industrial-strength electro-stomp, Kid Millions slicing through the sonic mayhem with confidence and rhythmic precision. On “I Won’t Help You Up,” the Kid rides Eltronix’s futuristic dancehall rhythm in his now universally hip Milwaukee dialect. The raw, fast funk of “Trouble” slams like the Who, S. Watson viciously cutting in a Big Daddy Kane quote and Kid Millions singing the chorus and showing a little wrath on the verses, augmented by hip baritone sax toasts. The second single from the album, “I Made a Mixtape,” is the most joyous, exuberant hip-hop song in years, an upbeat story of romantic regret featuring another great Kid Millions rhyme story and the Kid’s pleasant singing vocals. Another driving, catchy number, “Running Out of Time” features Kid Millions inventing new cadences with long, freestyle-like verses, proclaiming his bad self “way too fly to stay on ground.” On the sentimental side, “Burn the House Down” is a refreshing statement of humility with a sublime anti-drug message – “Your way of living might burn the house down/My way of living ain’t all that classy” – over a soul-based beat that carries the same emotional wallop as Jackie Wilson’s “Higher and Higher.” Plug cuts: “Victim to the Beat”: big-beat roller-skate disco with swaggering vocals and comical Halloween vocal effects “I Made a Mixtape”: driving, infectious dancefloor pop reminiscent of the classic quoted by the Kid therein, De La Soul’s “A Roller Skating Jam Named Saturdays” “Running Out of Time”: appealing Fender Rhodes chord progression over a conga/handclap synth-disco beat, freestyle-like lyrical flow