Look who’s back! It’s the main guys! The guys who I have been covering since late 2024 and, unless I’m mistaken, have reviewed every single album they’ve dropped, and they have yet to stop surprising me with their consistency, quality, and performances! Now it’s time to cover their brand-new album and see what it brings to the table!
This is the brand-new record by the underground’s highest lyricism authority, THE PEN LORDZ! The trio:
– Fam Ross
– Audio Messiah
– Arsinel
These three men have changed the way the culture sees consistency, conscious bars, and overall style of what I consider to be the underground scene. Whether that be spiritual and preaching in their bars, to a more mean and sadistic streak (as of late), they have no ceiling to worry about and keep providing their brand of no-nonsense, lyrical mastery to the culture for diehards (like me) to consume!
Across this eight-track project, they seem to be making an album that is equal parts savage and gritty and spiritually engaging! I love it because it seems they have become hip-hop’s health and well-being advocates!
For example, on this album, they make a line upset about the fact that people are still eating McDonald’s! And on an earlier EP, they literally made a project dedicated to just health awareness!
I don’t see anyone else in the game doing important bars like that, and to fit that into a solid record without sounding tacky is quite impressive! They are the enlightened leaders of the game, and I love hearing them stand on their morals and principles and try to encourage and support the audience of theirs!
Of course, as it should come as no surprise to anyone who is even slightly familiar with them, that they come in loaded with advanced vocabulary, precise flow, spiritual energy, and enough charisma to give away! These three have become one unit and, to me, share one mind to the point where I find it hard to distinguish between the three because of their solid unity!
Each verse is done with finesse, maturity, and years of knowledge and experience that puts them above the rest! I haven’t heard a wake verse from them yet, and I doubt I ever will!
This time around, the production is done by Fiqqouw, and he’s no stranger to the crew and has done tracks before. On this one, it feels like he’s just continuing where he left off with his trademark brand of deep, heavy minimalist vibes with a cinematic flair to them!
Although he’s only utilising a few key elements, he’s doing them in such a way that it feels less bare and more immersive and atmospheric due to his mastery on the beats!
He doesn’t waste a single second of the 24 minutes provided to him, and he is a producer who is able to sync perfectly with the vibes and notions of Penlordz to create the ideal score for the trio!
It’s really a magical moment when you see a producer take the job seriously and actually focus and grow with the artists themselves. It’s a given that artists are going to have beats; you don’t hear many a cappella records, but how many actually sync and become ONE with the artist in question?
Have you ever heard an album and have a nagging feeling that the beat doesn’t match the tone of the rapper or vice versa? That means ASS chemistry or just a quick payday without any passion or care to the project getting paid for.
It’s the equivalent of a casual teenage worker on the hour making you the worst fast food you’ve ever had in your life instead of taking the time to make it enjoyable or properly!
When it comes to these guys, there’s never a shortage of passion and conviction on both sides— beats and lyricism— and that’s why this album POPS! Doubt me? Go listen for yourself now!
https://open.spotify.com/album/57KxvJ5TGyYeCnasoquDGN?si=mSZ7dWRERwOCA567OdJhiQ
The Serpent Tongue Reviews 