Wednesday 9/9: Veeze—"Law N Order"
Today, we share our thoughts on a new song by the Detroit rapper Veeze.
Welcome to Endless Scroll, the brainchild of Eli Enis (he/him) and Eric Bennett (they/them). Since Feb. 2019, we’ve been a weekly podcast about music, the internet, and where those two things intersect. Now we’re, also a M-F newsletter about songs. Our format is simple: a link to a song and a short take from each of us about what we think of it. Each day of the week has a corresponding genre: Monday is indie, Tuesday is punk, Wednesday is hip-hop, Thursday is pop, and Friday is misc.
Today, we share our thoughts on a new song by the Detroit rapper Veeze. We’re joined by none other than Endless Scroll hip-hop correspondent Michael Brooks.
IN THE MUSIC NEWSLETTER GAME, THE READERS ARE REPRESENTED BY TWO SEPARATE YET EQUALLY IMPORTANT GROUPS. THE ARTISTS WHO RELEASE THE MUSIC AND THE WRITERS WHO COVER IT. THESE ARE THEIR STORIES. *DUN DUN*
FADE IN:
INT. ENDLESS SCROLL HEADQUARTERS - NIGHT
ELI, a 20-something music journalist with a penchant for the heavier things in life, awaits patiently for the perfect bop to come across his desk for this Wednesday’s edition of the newsletter. He quietly peruses through his record collection, pausing for a moment on a relic from a bygone era, some Myspace-screamo album he hasn’t thought about since he pitched a retrospective piece on it 45 minutes ago. There’s a bad taste in his mouth, maybe it’s from the Lotto Savage track he dissected last week, or maybe it’s from the leftovers he had for lunch. His phone buzzes, it’s a DM on Twitter from MICHAEL, who is a respected authority on music in his own right.
ELI: Alright, let’s see what you’ve got me for this week.
MICHAEL: I think you’re really going to dig this one, it’s a rapper from Detroit—
ELI: *laughs* Let me guess, does he go by the name of Big Sean? If that’s the best that you’ve got for me then take a hike, kid.
MICHAEL: Actually, his name is Veeze. He’s got this new song out called “Law N Order” and it’s totally bonkers, but in all of the right ways. I’ll send it over now.
Eli clicks the link then proceeds to watch the music video for “Law N Order” in his web browser. There’s really nothing about the video itself that he hasn’t already seen before, but there is something about the song that he can’t quite put his fingers on.
MICHAEL: love that “I knew this shit was gon’ come just like I seen it in The Simpsons” line.
ELI: Same here. And that beat, I—
MICHAEL: I know, right? The sample is kind of funny when you first hear it, but pretty quickly you forget about that because of how perfectly it fits the song. He’s got such a soothing flow, too. I could listen to him rap all day.
ELI: For sure.
MICHAEL: What did you think about the track? I think that it would be perfect for the newsletter this week and I have a really cool idea for how we could do the blurb.
2.5 hours go by before MICHAEL gets a response from ELI. The man can be terribly unreliable at answering DM’s, texts, and other instant messages in a timely manner because he’s constantly distracted and preoccupied with other forms of media. Some of that likely stems from undiagnosed ADD that negatively impacts his productivity, ability to retain information, and response time to non-work-related messages. Sadly, because our government does not offer free healthcare for all, and as a freelance writer with no employer-sponsored health insurance, seeking a prescription medication for this ailment would be costly, an expense he likely can’t afford in the midst of a looming economic depression. Such is the plight of the downwardly mobile millennial in today’s world, and sadly it is highly unrealistic that either of the administrations we have the opportunity to vote for in this coming election will provide ample health insurance opportunities for citizens such as ELI. Instead, tens of millions of Americans will be left to suffer—either to rot in the street or be consumed by heaping medical debt—as the wealthy and the few middle class stragglers who manage to survive catastrophic lay-offs eek by safely despite the ever-worsening global pandemic. But eventually, ELI does answer MICHAEL’s DM.
ELI: I like this one, dude! Let’s do it! What’s your idea for the format?
MICHAEL: *In between bites of a Fuddruckers Hamburger, which he, for some reason, in this story, ordered with two-hour shipping from an Amazon drone to deliver to him at his work once he saw that the beloved Hamburger chain’s parent company was liquidating all its assets, thus presenting a situation where MICHAEL needed to get his hands on one of those tasty Hamburgers if he ever wanted one again*
I think it would be cool if we make the review into, like, a script of a TV show where—
ELI: Wait what if we just made it into a script of a TV show where, like—
MICHAEL: Yeah, I know that’s what I was saying dude, I was thinking it would be cool if we made it into a script of a—
ELI: Dude you’ve got some Fuddruckers Hamburger pickle in between your teeth. Might wanna get that out of there lol.
MICHAEL: Oh, thanks dude, but wait how do you know I’m eating a Fuddruckers Hamburger right now? And how can you see what’s in my teeth?
ELI: Ah, don’t worry about that, man. “You swore on god you was getting money, you going straight to hell.” That’s a fuckin’ great bar. Veeze is sleek, dude.
MICHAEL: Yeah, man Veeze is really good but I’m still pretty confused and honestly a little concerned that you knew what I was doing at this very second.
ELI: “You ain’t hot like me, you’re drinking spinach.” Gold!
MICHAEL: Ha, yeah but like—
ELI: Honestly this guy has such a relaxed flow and completely zonked-out demeanor, and usually I can go either way with rappers like that. But Veeze has such a dry yet piercing sense of humor in his writing, and his stoney delivery totally reinforces that. Like, we’ve written a lot about really colorful and zany Detroit rappers on this Wednesday hip-hop segment (Sada and Kasher Quon in particular), but Veeze manages to translate that level of personality without having to move his lips too much.
MICHAEL: Dude—
ELI: He’s kind of got the scam rapper speak-rap thing, but not quite. It’s funny, he’s a natural. I’m interested. Definitely gotta check out more of this guy.
At this point, MICHAEL takes four hours to respond to ELI. It’s past 11 P.M. and the newsletter is supposed to go live early the next morning. ELI isn’t concerned at first but then he begins to worry that he said something that pissed MICHAEL off. Or maybe he just forgot. Suddenly, ELI hears a loud knock at his front door. It’s dark in his house and no one else is home, so he hesitantly sneaks downstairs and peers out the front window to see if he can make out the figure who just slammed on his entryway. No discernible shapes that resemble a human’s shadow, but he cautiously approaches the door, tepidly laying one hand on the doorknob and preparing one swift twist-and-pull. He executes it and winces with fear, adrenaline cranking through his veins, only the worst possible outcomes racing through his head. As he prepares for a blow to the face or a tire iron to his head and instead feels nothing, he looks down and sees something even more terrifying. A fully intact Fuddruckers Hamburger with visible steam lines billowing off of it, as if it was just taken off the grill and slapped on the paddy. ELI glances from side to side and eventually calls out to see if anyone is hiding in the bushes and is playing an elaborate prank. He doesn’t eat meat, so after a few minutes of nothing but cricket noises and the echo of a dog barking down the road, he shuts the door and heads back inside. Once he gets back to his computer he opens Twitter and sees a message from MICHAEL.
MICHAEL: Yeah, dude I definitely agree. He toes the line between Teejayx6 and someone like Shoreline Mafia’s Fenix Flexin. Real glad you like this one so much, I think Veeze is really underrated!
END *dun dun*