The awaited release of experimental hip-hop artist RiTchie’s (formerly Ritchie With A T) debut solo album is one that makes me suddenly aware of the passage of time. A member of disbanded experimental hip-hop trio Injury Reserve, RiTchie has had a lttle over two years to hone his experimental sounds explored on the group’s final album “By The Time I Get To Phoenix”. I can vividly recall late 2021 when I first listened to the trio’s last outing, and I remember the strong whirlwind of emotions it stirred in me upon repeated listens. The group, now recognized as a duo under the name Bye Storm, had combined the turmoil of the past year’s intense wave of Black Lives Matter protests, election chaos, and the death of member Stepa Groggs to create an album that still feels as emotionally potent in a post-pandemic world as it did almost three years ago. The experimental, jagged, and fractured sampling and atypical beats of the record, together with the intense vocal performances and personal subject matter, made for a record that explored feelings of grief, confusion, despair, and aging in a way that no experimental hip-hop record has since its release.
 

It’s an album that resonated with enough listeners and critics for them to deem it one of the best of 2021. Since then, hip-hop has continued to evolve with new sounds, yet the sound that Injury Reserve presented in their discography has escaped the threat of aging and still sounds cutting-edge and unique. In late 2023, the announcement of group members RiTchie and Parker Corey having reformed under the name Bye Storm and a release of a new single left fans anticipating new work from the duo. Though the day for this release is still unknown, RiTchie has had time to explore sounds in his new solo career and drop a full debut LP as an appetizer for fans to chew on while they wait for any new material from Bye Storm. And while much of the LP’s best material comes from the singles, RiTchie still manages to deliver a comedic, relatable, and ear-grabbing release; albeit, a very rough and unpolished one.
 

Because much of the uniquely morose lyrical content on “By The Time I Get To Phoenix” was specific to ongoing events at the time of its production, it would be misguided to expect the same level of emotional potency and sadness from this solo project. The chaos of the pandemic, death of Groggs, and intense protests is not something that should be sought out in this new record. Rather, the aesthetic and energy RiTchie brings with his production choices and performances feel akin to the more humorous, warm and down-to-earth personalities of Injury Reserve’s earlier works. Meditations on age, the mundanity of repetitions in life and music, clout-chasers and the triple-digit intensity of Arizona heat are fused with a more unfinished variant of the sounds explored in the trio’s swansong album. The rough mixing courtesy of former Injury Reserve member Parker Corey (among others named in the last track) and constant reference to the heat make for a listen well-suited for sunny weather.
 

The album’s opener “Wings (Intro)” is a short track with warm synths over which RiTchie humorously sings about chicken wings and growth: “There’s so much more to know (Let me know)/There’s so much room to grow (know)/I don’t know if you’ve scoped/But there’s so much left on the bone”. The following track “WYTD?!?!” is a noisy, energetic and blaring entrance into the rest of the album, and RiTchie begins to make constant reference to the intense triple-digit heat and asks the simple question “What you tryna do?”. The third track “RiTchie Valens” is a highlight of the tracklist that sounds dense in the vocal layers applied yet relatively polished compared to many other tracks with a strong chorus. Over the instrumental, RiTchie likens himself to 50s rock-and-roll star Ritchie Valens while he dishes out insults against rappers he considers to be fake “Okay, Mr. Fishbowl, go and get it (Ritchie, Ritchie)/’Cause we can see all through your sh*t with no tinted/And all that little hatred that’s blurring your vision/And all that little fake sh*t you calling yo’ friendships”.
 

After this, the track “The Keepers” features a more minimal and lowkey beat that RiTchie hops on to take his aim at music gatekeepers who harbor snobbish and elitist attitudes towards sharing music with others “Always tryna keep the gate you can hold that…On the same sh*t, now you paint it as throwback/You a little kid for that (They gatekeeping on you)”. The following track “Only You” is a spoken word interlude with RiTchie once again referring to the ways the intense Arizona heat affects the behaviors and sentiments of people in his area. This interlude sets up the lyrical topic of the following title track “Triple Digits [112]”, which has one of the more indiscernible and clustered tracks on the project production-wise. This clustered feel is not entirely to the track’s detriment thanks to RiTchie’s lyrics that more vividly detail life under the blistering sun “It’s sticky on the floor/Outside it’s dry/In here, it feels like Floridian coast/Can feel the wave/If you standing outside of the door/If you need to breathe/There’s a place you can probably just smoke/See the condensation?/Look up, ‘bout to drip on you, bro”.
 

Wrapping up the first half of the LP, “Dizzy” featuring frequent collaborator with Injury Reserve and hip-hop artist Amine has the most catchy and accessible chorus on the album and features humorous yet painfully truthful lyrics about aging and privileged clout-chasers whose priorities lie in their self-image rather than providing for their loved ones “Look, you the type to link-and-build at a urinal (True)/Your granny died, you taking fit pics at the funeral (True)/…Your mama in the same crib, you got a new coup (Damn)/Priorities fucked up, boy, you is not us”. Kicking off the album’s second half, “Looping” provides a moment of emotional tension lyrically over a piano-laced instrumental. RiTchie references daily mundanities and confusion regarding one’s direction in life and likens these feelings of repetition to sample looping in music production, making this a standout track in this second half.
 

Unfortunately, the second half loses much of the steam from the first and presents lots of underdeveloped or filler tracks. The ninth track “Your Worst Nightmare” is a piece of spoken-word slam poetry rapped by an unknown individual that lasts less than a minute. The next track “How?!” is a relatively straightforward and bare instrumental with a feature from Niontay that doesn’t make much of an impression musically. RiTchie manages to deliver some commentary on how he’s experienced artists who wait so long for the perfect moment to drop material or who work so excessively on a track that they erode its more daring or exceptional qualities “…shit get watered down, ‘cause they tryna polish thangs/…If you like the way that sh*t sounds, you gotta let it bang/They be like ‘No way, that ain’t how we gon’ play’/’Don’t need the whole thing, we can make it more safe’”.
 

The eleventh track “Get A Fade” is a cover and slight lyrical alteration of indie rock band Radiator Hospital’s “Cut Your Bangs” with bit-crushed, pixelated vocals and instrumentals, giving listeners one of the more head-scratching and non-essential moments on the LP. It’s inclusion doesn’t further many of the themes already mentioned on the album and it’s an odd standout musically in the tracklist. The momentum slightly picks up again on the next track “The Things” featuring abstract hip-hop rapper Quelle Chris. RiTchie and Quelle pen bars about various vague “things” that elicit emotions of irritation, frustration, and pain over a hazy yet relaxing instrumental with RiTchie’s vocals meshing well in the chorus “It be the things that just grind all your bones/It be the things that just nobody knows/…It be the things you don’t let in your home/It be the things that just rotten in your soul/…How many things you let stop all your flow?/How many things you let block all the dough?”.
 

The penultimate track “5onthe.” reintroduces themes of uncanny familiarity and repetition in life creating a sense of deja vu that lingers even as one ages “It’s five on the dot/We hit them streets/We lock them doors/Act like you been here before/Untuck your shirt/Loosen up your grip/Find you some kin/We been here before”. The attempts at a more bare and stripped-back instrumental hit more emotionally than previous attempts on the album, and it serves as the album’s lyrical closer. The following track “[Credits]” is a thanks from RiTchie himself to both listeners and the names he lists who helped with the making of the album.
 

While the album gets bogged down by pacing issues, underdeveloped tracks, head-scratching detours and filler, RiTchie’s solo debut LP makes for a sufficiently enjoyable piece of experimental hip-hop to listen to in anticipation of material from Bye Storm. The charm, wit, and unique production choices littered throughout this album outweigh its more jagged and undercooked ideas. It is simultaneously reminiscent of earlier projects from Injury Reserve while maintaining the experimental edge of “By The Time I Get To Phoenix” and is most definitely a recommended listen for any fans of the now defunct trio. Even after three years of inactivity in an ever-changing genre of hip-hop, Parker Corey and RiTchie still maintain a reputation of experimentation and humor that still feels as though many hip-hop fans underappreciated it. Ultimately, this flawed yet admirable album creates more hope and hype for whatever the duo has in store for fans.