It’s been over a year since Royce Da 5’9 and DJ Premier teamed up as PRhyme to release their self-titled debut album, and they’re still the topic of conversation amongst many Rap circles. In the digital age where fans are losing the ability to pay attention to albums for extensive periods, how are they managing it?

December 9th, 2014 saw PRhyme release after a very small amount of promotion. The official partnership was only announced in the middle of September with the album teased a couple of weeks before. At this point, very little was known about what was to come. Whether it was because of J. Cole’s 2014 Forest Hills Drive release on the same day, or the fact that media had already dropped their year-end lists, for some reason the LP was overlooked.

It had been a full year since the release of the standard edition when the deluxe edition was finally released a few days ago (December 11, 2015), which is not something we see in Hip-Hop too often. However, this method is actually an extremely underrated marketing technique and extends the life cycle of the LP. More time can be taken to acquire guest verses, artwork can be redone, more interviews can take place and songs can be remastered. Overall, it allows for more to be done to give a higher quality product which fans deserve, especially from such prestigious artists.

As if releasing a deluxe version of the album a year later wasn’t enough, the duo also liberated an instrumental version of the album, featuring mastered versions of all nine beats. Not only does this increase attention around their original project, but it adds to the value of production and gives rappers alike the chance to spit on their favorite songs.

The self-titled PRhyme album has a clear theme, with no two songs sounding similar yet conveying the same dark energy which Royce is so comfortable over. Part of the reason is his chemistry with Premier, but another essential reason is the stance they took with sampling. Every single song on the project samples a song from the catalogue of Adrian Younge, almost making PRhyme a deadly trio.

In addition to adding to the cohesiveness of the project, this gave some power back to the lost art of flipping a previous piece of music to make a new one. In a day and age where it is often so difficult to clear samples, Adrian Younge has helped progress the culture by showing the benefits of letting your creativity inspire.

Despite being OGs in the game, Royce and Preem did well adapting to their conditions. It would have been easy for them to sound out of touch and try to fight the new generation’s tendencies but instead they made the more skilled, veteran move of adjusting. The standard edition sits at 9 songs and less than 35 minutes long, likely a conscious decision taking into account the short attention spans of most listeners today. By the time you get to the end of the last track, you’re not hoping that there are no more songs but you’ve received just enough to digest and want to immediately repeat.

Rapper-producer duos are nothing new in Hip-Hop but Royce and Premo deserve the extra praise. Not only have they both been successful for decades between them, but they’ve been making a living whilst at the top tier of their respective crafts consistently too – an underappreciated skill which few have. That type of experience garners huge respect from peers.

The deluxe edition of the album features new verses from himself, Black Thought, Logic, MF Doom, Phonte and Joey Bada$$. Iron sharpens iron and Nickle clearly keeps his pen game strong by surrounding himself with great talent. As big as rappers can get, how many do you know that can get all the aforementioned names plus Jay Electronica, Killer Mike, Common and more onto one short CD?

By the way, a sequel might just be in the works. Royce took to social media to tease Eminem, Mos Def, The Game and Kendrick Lamar having guest appearances. “We’re promising blood,” Royce tweeted. We can’t wait for round 2.

– by Akaash Sharma