Slow V and Retrospect

Second-guessing the state of commercial hip-hop could become the next no-budget ESPN thing once Celebrity Poker buggers off. You'd need look no further than Slow V and Retrospect to find a couple of locals eager to expel some froth on cable or anyplace else.

"Today's clubs, to me, are like caves, and everyone in there is a caveman," complains Retro. "No one listens to anything, and these rappers are just saying any little thing and everyone loves it."

Slow V chimes in, "No one is focused on making a classic record. We don't just give you a catchy chorus and a hot beat; we hit you with concepts and written imagery that's capable for commercial uses." He's stumping for the crew's full-length, Radio, a self-financed joint selling on Amazon since August. You can take the term concepts literally; all of Radio's tunes and Clockers-inspired skittage revolve around the hard rites of passage a twelve-year-old orphaned boy undergoes, leading up to an M. Night Shyamalan-esque denouement.

Staunch DJ Kauze fans barely out of high school, the pair blew into Miami on Netherlands Antilles winds when they were in their single digits — Slow V from Haiti, Retrospect from Santo Domingo. Retrospect is the old-schooler, as his nym is meant to suggest, nowadays favoring the Roots and Biggie after weaning himself off Busta Rhymes. They're Club Oxygen kiddies, taking tentative steps into gigging's hard-knock life and learning to love the feel of bear traps sawing into their calves along the way. "There was this one time we were scheduled to perform at a local South Beach club," Retro shudders to remember. "Long story short, there were only ten people and no stage." The Shakespearean tragic injustice of it all gets him on a roll. "Our stage show is just like our music: sick. We put forth 110 percent in everything we do, and a stage show is something we always come correct on. We haven't had the chance to meet or perform with anybody big, but we look forward to performing with anybody that's bringing it."

Thus the gauntlet has been thrown. "We only done local shows so far," Slow adds. "But look out for us, because things are looking up." — Eric W. Saeger