Welcome to Week 12 of our Book (Album) Club! This weeks album is Sincerely, Detroit by Apollo Brown
This is not an album that was super well known so if you haven’t heard it please give it a listen and let us know what you think! If you heard it before then give it a fresh listen and give us your thoughts, opinions and possibly hot takes!
Doesn’t matter if this is your 100th time listening to the album or you listen to the album the first time right before posting!
December 12th: Unstoppable by The Reminders
December 19th: Gift Rap by The Cross Movement
December 26th: The Falling Season by Masta Ace
January 2nd: The Marshall Mathers LP by Eminem
Links for Sincerely, Detroit
I don’t know if anybody pulled up his Spotify, but Apollo Brown is one of those artists who releases a ton of music. Producing albums, he always works with different artists. I think of him as a Michigan focused version of Madlib. I have family in Michigan who turned me on to him back in ~2013, with his album Dice Game. I haven’t listened to everything he has ever released, but this is my favorite album of everything I’ve heard.
I wish this album had proper annotations on Genius, as there is a lot going on lyrically in some places and from doing a lot of research there are a lot of references that went over my head as somebody from outside of Michigan. This album is also loaded with Michigan artists. The best known are maybe Trick Trick, Black Milk and Royce Da 5’9". But also included are Ketchphraze, Boldy James, Clear Soul Forces, Slum Village and about a million more. It really is a who’s who of Detroit/Michigan Hip Hop.
Personal favorite tracks are God Help Me and Break the Code . Ketchphraze’s verse on God Help Me is fantastic and the beat on Break the Code is fantastic. I don’t know what he sampled for that beat but he killed it.