Earl Sweatshirt & MIKE

Across several albums and widespread critical acclaim, Earl Sweatshirt has cemented himself as a definitive poet chronicling growth, self-discovery, and the resonant moods of a generation. MIKE is a quintessential old soul — his calm delivery and measured questioning carrying a quiet wisdom. Once making waves in NYC’s underground hip-hop circles with the [sLUms] collective, MIKE’s inner world has come further into focus as his career has expanded. 

“Feel like all of this life that I have, man, this shit could inspire a book,” MIKE raps with conviction on “F.E.A.R.”, the eighth song on a new collaborative album, POMPEII // UTILITY, with rapper and friend Earl Sweatshirt. The record’s whopping 33 tracks, produced by NYC’s hyper-present post-pandemic supercollective SURF GANG, compile an intimate chronicle of experience, memory, and kinship into a record that, in breadth and detail, digests like a book. A project several years in the making, POMPEII // UTILITY unites two kindred spirit rappers from opposite coasts within SURF GANG’s world-building genius, to trace a musical bond and mutual admiration shaped through early collaborations and features, shared stages, mutual friends, and a devoted fanbase.

The album began simply: SURF GANG’s Harrison sent around beats that both artists recorded over the course of a month or two before deciding to develop it into a full project. The album’s title and conceptual framework draw from the eruption of Pompeii, with themes of building and destruction reflected in both the artwork and ethos. During one particularly baked studio session, the energy in the room slipped into a haze where they describe feeling “frozen in time,” sparking the image of Pompeii. 

Masters of internal monologue, both rappers unmask across the project with signature self-interrogation, swapping unanticipated flows over SURF GANG’s quick, browser-tab-like structures. On “this2shallpass,” Earl sounds almost like Chief Keef in his big-talk: “Before we start, let’s get one thing reestablished, it’s only up that’s the destination.” On “Rectangle Lens,” he channels Chicago rapper LUCKI’s meditative haze, while on “Chali 2na” and “Don’t Worry,” his voice pitches upward, as if speaking to a younger version of himself. Both rappers treat language carefully: fragmented, coded, and sometimes withheld. Embedded in their artistic alignment and kinship is a layer of intergenerational mourning — music that holds the weight of grief which predates them yet endures: colonial violence, exile, and rupture, without turning it into performance.