Rap Blog: Livewires EARTHGANG and Cochise spark up on “ELECTRIC”

Rap Blog is a weekly showcase of a standout rap song.

EARTHGANG wants to talk about Artificial Intelligence. This isn’t exactly new territory for the duo — their last two EPs, late 2023’s RIP Human Art and early 2024’s ROBOPHOBIA, were also ostensibly preoccupied with the consequences of generative machine learning. Their new album, however, treats the conceit more like a moodboard than a thesis statement. In place of an eco-friendly plea for listeners to stop using ChatGPT, Perfect Fantasy reimagines a positive future for AI while bending the pair’s Southern revivalism into pleasingly psychedelic form; these songs beg to be played at high volume while enjoying the final dregs of pre-Daylight Savings sunshine.

Newly independent, the pair come bearing a number of high-wattage features on Perfect Fantasy: Pharrell, Snoop Dogg, and T-Pain, but also Little Dragon, Damon Albarn, and Eric Bellinger. But my favorite of the bunch has to be the Cochise feature “ELECTRIC,” which takes a pristine rage beat and sets the trio loose in a labyrinth of technicolor synths.

Naturally, the song’s title prompts allusions to Pikachu and Zeus, though EARTHGANG’s Johnny Venus and Doctur Dot seem totally happy to also let Cochise briefly hog the spotlight. The Florida rapper sounds perfectly at home — indeed, “ELECTRIC” would have fit right in on last week’s WHY ALWAYS ME?, Cochise’s third studio album. “Mona Lisa money I got piiiiles of them bricks,” he keens before going phonetic, wordlessly zigzagging his flow, ah ah ah ah. “ELECTRIC” is less a flash in the pan than a ball of aluminum in the microwave, charged up and combustible, ready to explode at any moment.