Rubberband Roc puts a unique spin on the trending sounds of hip-hop with effortless confidence. The Scarborough native grew up admiring his father and cites him as a major influence within his music. His debut EP “Trap Still” however is a love letter to the streets and music to motivate. “I came up with the title while trapping. I wanted to make music for the trappers or anybody in a workplace environment trying to get through a day’s work but just needed a little motivation.” The project came together over a period of a few months with his main engineer Sammy Sosa. Adopting a more melodic approach to his creative process, this led to Roc freestyling two-thirds of the project. It causes tracks like “Stamps” to come across as effortless when playing them back as his confidence shines bright during the fifteen-minute runtime of the project. It also helps that his ear for production has become so refined over his career that he knows exactly what pockets of the beat to attack, finding a firm grounding on instrumentals with rapid-fire percussion and smooth synths.
The motivational aspect of the music is present in Roc’s lyrics which need to be highlighted heavily. Take a track like “Full of Doves” for example, where we see a realization of the lifestyle he used to live with him painfully belting out bars about how he needs “just the money, I don’t need no love, I’mma go flood the town full of these drugs.” It would be easy to wrap about flipping packs and such, but it is “the passion and pain in my voice,” as Roc puts it, that allows his records to stand out for the rest of the pack. These records are the ones he cites as his favorites from the EP as they exhibit all of the elements that have made his music so successful up to this point. His delivery sets the mood on every track, and he can easily rap aggressively and go bar-for-bar on records like the intro record, but opt for a more melodic and experimental route with a track like on “Murder 1.” Rubberband Roc is one of Canada’s brightest stars, and this EP cements his place firmly in the scene as one of the hottest up-and-comers of 2020!
Connect with Rubberband Roc
Instagram: @RubberbandRoc
Spotify: RubberbandRoc