Bullet Symphony - Horns and Halos #3

iTunes Review

The fourth full-length collaboration between Bay Area rap veteran Andre Nickatina and his younger protégé kicks off with one of the duo’s strongest songs to date. “A Peez Paradse” builds slowly, beginning with alternating spoken word snippets from the two stars. An eerie loop of a woman laughing enters, and low, liquid beats erupt from underneath. Soon Nickatina and Equipto are passing the mic back and forth, alighting the groove with fantastical pimp wisdom. It’s a futuristic funk stomp, invested with the force of Run-DMC’s “Peter Piper.” Though Nickatina is well-known for his penchant for bizarre beats, Bullet Symphony is a lyrical platform. He comes out and has a blast with concept songs like the alliterative “Purrfect Storm” and “Candy Bars,” which focuses solely on candy metaphors. The beats are relatively straightforward by Nickatina’s standards, but there isn’t one boring verse on here. While Equipto is usually outshined by his older mentor, he is quickly elevating himself to Nickatina’s level, especially on “Comb Your Hair,” in which he boasts that he’s “smooth as silk, I spit milk and make butter.”