Denzel Curry’s newest collaboration with Kenny Beats is a necessary heat check for the Florida rapper
Denzel Curry wants to scare the hell out of you in as little time as possible. His 2019 banger-fest of an album, ZUU, was a brisk battlefield of tracks that would have parents question your sanity if played at full volume. UNLOCKED, the newest collaborative effort from Curry and the ever-popular Kenny Beats is even shorter, even wilder, and just as exciting as ZUU.
Running under 20 minutes, UNLOCKED leaves little room for failure. In fact, there’s not that much rapping either. A lot of the project sees Beats having a field day behind the boards, creating the most imaginative retro-futuristic instrumentals that bring the best out of Curry’s aggressive, bulletproof rapping style.
“DIET_” and “Lay_Up.m4a” are the two tracks that stand out the most but really there are so few, if any, missteps in this project that any two songs could be standouts—though maybe not the intro since there’s not much going on.
If rap is a basketball game, then UNLOCKED is Curry’s heat check. His last two projects have been incredibly well-received and this new effort should do nothing but add more weight to the argument that Curry is a top tier rapper today.
Rating: 8/10
Trial Track: “Lay_Up.m4a”
