Dinner Land Sound
- Oct 10, 2017

Weekend Money - Guatemala

Weekend Money (W$) releases Guatemala—the debut single from their highly anticipated sophomore release, “You Don’t Know Who I Am, Do You?”. This release comes fresh off of the heels of W$ completing two 2017 European tours, the latter of which was in the company of Kool A.D., ex member of DasRacist, who is currently exhibiting a multidisciplinary art show at Williamsburg’s World Money Gallery, co-owned by NE$$.

In 2012, Iraqi-born producer, Baghdaddy, and dead prez affiliated MC, NE$$, joined forces to create W$, an alternative hip-hop pairing. Teaming up with young New York voices like Awkwafina and Hot Sugar, W$ never sacrifices art in the name of fun or fun for art. With Baghdaddy’s unrelenting atmospheric production and NE$$’s cool, casual, and acute raps, W$ presents Guatemala as both political quandary and answer.

Why "Guatemala?"

NE$$: “In 2016 during a recording session, Bagh and I joked ‘If Donald Trump gets elected, Imma move my ass to Guatemala.’ This was sparked by an earlier conversation with the homie Yasiin Bey, and he was telling me how transcendental it was for him when he moved his family to Central America. He said it was the best thing he’d ever done. This song is about escape. A peak into the mind of a Black man trying to escape the politics surrounding him.”

Baghdaddy: “I was in a really dark place. I felt like I was living in a simulation. I made this because I wanted to enter a zone, an escape; like hearing myself in the future—otherworldly, a futuristic cavern. It was intended as an instrumental but one day NE$$ hopped on it. And the polyrhythms that came alive were really interesting.”