JPEGMAFIA and Danny Brown, playful on their own, make a mischievously wacky, outlandishly talented team

Written by ZACHARY HAYES

When Baltimore rapper and producer JPEGMAFIA released his last album, 2021’s LP!, the album notes on Bandcamp reveled in the fact that he was finally, and for forever more, free. Free from his label, free from creative restraints, and free to do just about whatever the hell he wanted. Make a collab album with his favorite rapper, underground legend Danny Brown? Why not? Produce the entire thing by himself on a Roland SP-404 sampler? How else could he do it? One thing’s for sure: freedom looks good on Peggy. Scaring the Hoes Vol.1 is a jarringly unapologetic triumph for the sonic oddballs, with Peggy and Brown flaunting their unhinged talents in top form and having a hell of a good time doing it.

From the start, the album makes a wholehearted commitment to the promise of its title. This is weirdo music, playfully glitchy and steeped in distortion as Brown’s signature yowl just barely cuts through the chaos. And yet somehow, it’s catchy. Songs like “Steppa Pig” and “Garbage Pale Kids” will confound you with eerily melodic samples of NSYNC and chanting Japanese schoolgirls before dissolving into a decadent cascade of synths and layered guitars, all while the rappers belt out tongue-in-cheek riffs on Twitch and televangelists. It shouldn’t work as well as it does. And yet, by seamlessly blending the mainstream with the absurd, the album accomplishes something rarely achieved in experimental music, dedicating itself to an unorthodox production style without falling into the pretentious pitfall of abstract noise that can only be appreciated by the most high-minded Lynchians. In other words, it’s really, really fun.

Take the title track: thick, meaty claps keep the pace high, a single lilting sax meandering in the background as Peggy plays a heckler telling himself to cut the weird shit out. “How the fuck we supposed to make money off this shit?” he asks as the sax screeches out of tune behind him. And just as you’re beginning to wonder what the hell is going on, the familiar comforts of heady rock drums and a sweltering bassline kick in, tying it all together as Brown slings satirical jabs at image-obsessed rappers. This is an album that will keep you on your toes, in one moment flooring you with the medieval WWE entrance fanfare of “Burfict!,” and bewildering you with a comically egregious “Milkshake” sample on “Fentanyl Tester” in the next. I’d think they were putting me on if it all didn’t feel so unapologetically joyful.

While the album takes a welcome breather heading into the second half, ratcheting down both the tempo and the general abrasiveness of the beats, the machine kicks back into gear with the brief, speedy flapper bop “Run the Jewels” before barreling towards its climactic finisher “Where Ya Get Ya Coke From?” – an anxious back and forth between grand, distorted horn explosions and the contemplative plinking of a woodblock and hand drums. It sounds more like an intro track, an entrance, and a build-up all rolled into one. And with this album being tentatively labeled Vol. 1, we can only hope this is just the beginning of Peggy and Brown’s lighting-in-a-bottle sideshow.