Cash Cobain

Cash Cobain is billed for a late-night Blue Note appearance in Manhattan. The listing names no additional performers and gives no indication of whether he will work alone, with a DJ, or with a live band, so the shape of the set remains open. What is confirmed is a Cash Cobain set in the club’s second-show slot, with the music presented in Blue Note’s close-to-the-stage listening-room setting.

Bronx-born and New York-based, with a later move to Queens, Cash Cobain is a rapper and producer widely identified as a key architect of “sexy drill,” a playful, melodic strain of drill. His sample-driven approach builds recognizable hooks into bouncy production, while his Slizzy sound has made room for a rap and R&B crossover that Rolling Stone called a “blueprint for a new kind” of the form. He has worked with Chow Lee, Ice Spice, Bay Swag, Drake, J. Cole, Don Toliver, Lil Yachty and A Boogie wit da Hoodie. Writing on Play Cash Cobain, Variety praised its “cheeky wit” and “stylishly atmospheric soundscapes,” calling the record “versatile, laugh-out-loud funny” and “distinct”; Rolling Stone heard a “singular” voice able to “construct sonic universes.”