Rating: 8.5/10
For the past several years, stickers, slogans, and advertisements sporting the phrase, "We buy diabetic test strips," have become an overabundant and often overlooked stitch in the tapestries of cities like New York. Despite being plastered on sleazy internet ads and piss-stained street corners alike, it's the sort of thing that the majority of Americans probably tend to ignore. In actuality, the service being provided is merely the latest development in the never-ending slew of hustles necessitated by the lack of affordable healthcare, wherein insured diabetics suddenly become suppliers for third parties who resell their diabetic equipment to un-insured buyers. For most Americans — including myself — it's an occurrence that goes completely under the radar, but for rap duo Armand Hammer, it's the exact sort of capitalistic death roll that tends to inspire the best in their work.
Comprised of rappers billy woods and ELUCID, Armand Hammer is a name that bears a considerable amount of weight in the world of underground hip-hop. Alongside a litany of acclaimed solo releases, the duo's approach to music has spearheaded a new era of avant garde rap, emphasizing evocative vocals, labyrinthine lyricism, and mind-melting production. While it's certainly an overused adage, both woods and ELUCID really embody the idea of "your favorite rapper's favorite rapper." It's a level of prestige they don gracefully; effortlessly balancing the roles of hands-on creative and cultural leader. Their projects have continually proven to be springboards for lesser known artists, and woods' own record label, Backwoodz Studios, is a close-knit collection of performers, producers, and artists; many of whom feature on this particular record.
We Buy Diabetic Test Strips is easily the group's biggest album to date, boasting a hefty 53 minute runtime and housing a slew of collaborators, both old and new. Names like Pink Siifu, Curly Castro, and Moor Mother should be familiar to longtime fans, and relative newcomers like Junglepussy and Cavalier perfectly round out the rest of the list. Behind the boards — alongside a house band of Backwoodz musicians — the production list includes such hard-hitting names as August Fanon, DJ Preservation, Black Noi$e, El-P, DJ Haram, and most notably, JPEGMAFIA. The Baltimore rapper/producer's cybernetic tastes are a match made in heaven for the duo's avant garde style (he also produced a track for their 2017 album Rome), but his inclusion here is especially eye-catching due to the fact that he and ELUCID were exchanging subliminal disses barely 2 years ago. Thankfully, the dust seems to have settled, and Peggy's name being credited to 4 different songs on this record is a definitive white flag that fans can wholeheartedly rejoice.
While woods and ELUCID's music has always been boundary-pushing, We Buy Diabetic Test Strips is a whole other level of experimentation. On first listen, there's barely any sort of traditional structure to cling onto, and the album can feel downright confrontational at times. In a statement accompanying the album's release, Armand Hammer described the project by writing, "This album is a Midsummer's Night in Brooklyn... Memories, true and false, tangle like wires... The cracked mirror in your pocket is past warranty, but not to worry, they have already mailed you a replacement." This is merely a taste of the conceptual density on display on this record, and it truly is the sort of thing that cannot be understood in a single sitting. For many listeners, this album might be too difficult to come back to — or possibly even finish — but as someone who was initially unsure of its sheer unfamiliarity, I can promise that We Buy Diabetic Test Strips is absolutely worth the time and energy it demands of its listeners.
For an example of the album's insanity, look no further than lead single "Trauma Mic," featuring Pink Siifu. Produced by DJ Haram — one half of the experimental dance duo 700 Bliss — the track is an unbridled assault to the conventions of hip-hop. The soundscape is a collage of clanging metal, screeching guitars, and bubbling bass, where Pink Siifu howls with the punk chops he's showcased in the past: "Metal is my weapon! Credit all my blessings!" Despite its harshness, the track is by no means unintelligible. It's messy, yes, but the clutter of its production isn't just a meaningless hodge-podge; it's a Pollock-esque portrait of unbounded creative passion. Amongst the cacaphony, woods and ELUCID's performances are steady and stalwart, lithely weaving their way through the madness like rats in a junkyard. Their verses are perfect snapshots of the type of genius they usually concoct: dystopian imagery, unforgettable black humor, and little to no adherence to rhyme schemes or rhythm. woods spits one of my favorite verses on the entire album, painting a portrait of storefront loiterers with the bleak honesty and genuine empathy that only his pen could produce: "Hot lunch, folded chairs, couple space heaters/Any one of you bums could be Jesus."
The actual album kicks off with two JPEGMAFIA-produced cuts, "Landlines" and "Woke Up and Asked Siri How I'm Going to Die." Both feature Peggy's signature penchant for tech-savvy sample flips, with dial tones and mouse clicks perforating into the mix. "Landlines" centers around a reversed vocal chop, creating a hypnotic sense of uneasy bliss that Aphex Twin would be proud of. On it, several of the album's major themes are first introduced, including the disparity of technology, the morbid beauty of New York's darkest corners, and the ways in which both mans' lives are a cyclical conversation between their past and their present. "Woke Up and Asked Siri How I'm Going to Die" hammers these points home even harder, pairing the MCs with a gorgeously spacious instrumental that borders on ambience. Through the tapping snares and scrambled synth notes, ELUCID's vocals are almost Gregorian, chanting and humming amidst an ocean of reverb. Both rappers drop some of their most quotable performances on this cut, with woods' "Tinnitus like a chainsaw" being a personal favorite. It's a beautiful collaboration between three of the most important figures in modern rap, and captures the scintillating intangibility that only comes from true innovation.
While billy woods and ELUCID are masters of their craft who tear up every single track they appear on, the features on this album are definitely nothing to scoff at. Take Cavalier for example, a Brooklyn-born MC commonly affiliated with Quelle Chris, who absolutely decimates his verse on the standout "I Keep a Mirror in my Pocket." Even in the face of performing alongside certifiable legends, Cavalier holds it down with a spellbinding performance that somehow blends veiled Biblical references with dry-witted quotables. Combine that with the song's haunting instrumental, courtesy of DJ Preservation and marimba player Jane Boxall — as well as woods and ELUCID's own stellar performances — and it makes for one of the best moments on the entire project.
On the subject of features, New York rapper Junglepussy — best known for her TikTok hit "Trader Joe's" — makes two incredible appearances on this album, showcasing a distinctly non-poppy side to her rapping that speaks to an immense amount of versatility. She shuts the house down on "Y'all Can't Stand Right Here," riding one of the seemingly least rap-able beats on the project with absolute deftness: "Mindin' my business, buildin' my iron/Sittin' on his face till I feel inspired/Why fuck him, I'm a better writer." Another stand-out performance comes from Philadelphia based polymath Camae Awaya, AKA Moor Mother — the other half of the aforementioned 700 Bliss — on the track "Don't Lose Your Job." A frequent collaborator of both woods and ELUCID, Awaya's evocative grumbles are a perfect match for the abstract jazz-rap production concocted by Black Noi$e and Backwoodz signee Jeff Markey. The song is a notable break from the rest of the album's intangibility, and while it's certainly not the sort of thing you'd ever hear Drake rapping on, it's definitely one of the more accessible and easy-to-loop cuts on the record.
As one could have predicted, however, despite the incredible selection of features, the real heart of We Diabetic Test Strips lies in the performances of its two stars. "The Gods Must Be Crazy" serves as a reminder of what it is the duo actually does better than just about anyone else: rap. The track plays like a cypher from Hell, with billy woods and ELUCID trading bars back and forth over a pulsating, El-P-produced breakbeat. Just when you think ELUCID has dropped the best line of the album ("Why I still gotta dress for a thought crime?"), woods retorts with a contender ("Dick suck glyphs on tablets"), and so on and so forth for the song's entire three minutes. The song "Niggardly (Blocked Call)," is another absolute standout, and not just for its quadruple-take-inducing title. Produced by frequent Armand Hammer affiliate August Fanon, the song begins by accompanying ELUCID's introductory verse with a screeching series of woodwinds and horns, guided by an airtight set of jazz drums. As abruptly as it begins, the song suddenly transitions to one of the most head-nodding instrumentals on the project, and the listener is treated nearly three minutes of uninterrupted billy woods. His dangerously catchy chorus serves as the inspiration for the song's title, and his verses are an emotional gut punch littered with vivid imagery. "God marked Cain so nobody could hurt him/Stained by that first murder/Hard rain, face upturned/A sun-blackened goat herder." I've said it before and I'll say it again: billy woods is the best songwriter currently making music, and getting to live in the same era as his work is nothing short of a blessing.
In many ways, We Buy Diabetic Test Strips feels like the exact sort of next step that Armand Hammer could have been predicted to take. After years of successful releases, both woods and ELUCID now bear the simultaneous honor and weight of being two of the most lauded and sought-after figures in underground music. Test Strips is certainly a continuation of what their music has been in the past, but it's also their boldest and most definitely avant garde work yet. The pair aren't just pushing the envelope on this one; they're creating brand new modalities for hip-hop as a whole. Admittedly, this makes the album more difficult to go back to than their previous works, and a full listen of the entire runtime definitely requires a fair bit of persistence. On repeat listens, I found myself getting somewhat burnt out by tracks eleven and twelve, which isn't at all a testament to their lack of quality, but more a result of the toll that comes from giving this album your full attention.
We Buy Diabetic Test Strips bears a lot of similiarities to the phenomenon after which it is named. Just as desperate pushers and diabetics subject themselves to a Sisyphusian hustle, so too do billy woods and ELUCID seem resigned to pushing the boulder of their artistry up the inescapable hill that is the music industry. No matter how boundary-pushing their music is; no matter how defiant and truthful; no matter how much it connects with those who listen to it; it's ultimately still a product that needs to be pushed. In the same way that daily travesties unfold on the blocks they hold dear, their own positionality in music seems to defined by its lack of support. We Buy Diabetic Test Strips is most certainly bleak, but even in the face of beleagured existential surrender, the album is a beautiful refusal to accept that assessment with any sense of finality. The record is a collection of artists collaborating to create something on their own terms, and while Brooklyn may never have sounded quite as hellish as it does on this album; it's a depiction that never has — and probably never will — occur in the way that it does here. There's so much here to digest, and regardless of how difficult it may be to come back to, rap fans are truly lucky to have been given a work of this caliber. When I wake up, you better believe I'm asking Siri to play me Armand Hammer.
Favorite Tracks: Woke Up and Asked Siri How I'm Going to Die, When it Doesn't Start With a Kiss, I Keep a Mirror in my Pocket, Niggardly (Blocked Call), The Gods Must Be Crazy, Don't Lose Your Job
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