PRISM MEDIA
PRESENTING REALITY IN SLOW MOTION.
Lil Zay has had a quietly tremendous 2023 if anybody has been paying attention. Not to be confused with the Chicago rapper Lil Zay Osama (Lil Zay Osama formerly went by Lil Zay and is currently awaiting sentencing for a firearm charge), Lil Zay has been on the scene since 2019 when his deeply romantic track “Bae Cation” made a bit of a splash. Since then, he’s been keeping his head down and grinding, clearly honing his craft.
He opened the year with the excellent “Didn’t Believe”, pairing him with Gucci Mane, one of the greatest rappers ever and an artist who matches impeccably with Zay. He followed that up with “Too Playa” and “Up Da Score”, both terrifically rapped, even if they don’t always exacerbate what makes Zay such a skilled emcee and he has now kept at it with “Deep End”, an excellent single that really shows off all Zay can offer as an artist.
Though Zay can be relentless with his rapping and go bar-for-bar on any song with relative ease (as he displays on “Too Playa” and “Up Da Score”), his music seems to really soar when he leans into his emotional side and get vulnerable. It gives him a multi-dimensional style and is genuinely endearing. “Deep End” accomplishes this and becomes quite evocative because of it. His voice has a chillingly pained warble in it, especially as he raps lyrics like, “They hate that I’m famous, I did came a long way from the basement/ Used to be fucked up, now I’m getting racks on the daily, we ain’t had much, but I always had faith”
It appears Zay has deservedly signed or became an affiliate with Gucci Mane’s label, 1017 Global Music, seeing as every one of his 2023 singles have been released through 1017; this should only help him continue to perfect his sound and codify his style as well as bring further visibility to his artistry. It will be exciting to watch his career blossom to new heights in real time.