★★★★★
Signing with the hottest label in the rap game brings forth unwieldy expectations. Jay Rock, Ab-Soul, Schoolboy Q, and Kendrick Lamar have all established their place in the game and have rocketed Top Dawg Entertainment to a position among the elite. While this enables the artists to reach a wider audience than ever, it also opens the door for many more fans and critics to voice their opinions if they don't feel you live up to the hype, as Schoolboy Q is soon to discover with the release of...
- www.popmatters.com
2014-03-05
★★★★★
Towards the end of 2013, the always-boisterous Top Dawg, CEO of TDE, claimed that his crew ran hip hop during that year without releasing a single project - a bold, but not entirely inaccurate claim. What was even bolder was his guarantee that TDE would release six projects in 2014. But in 2014, if any crew can pull off the No Limit circa 1998-style feat, it would be Top Dawg Ent. And their stream of releases was headed off by the newest member of the crew, Tennessee rapper Isaiah Rashad...
- rapreviews.com
2014-03-06
★★★★★
Isaiah Rashad :: Cilvia Demo :: Top Dawg Entertainment
as reviewed Zach 'Goose' Gase
Towards the end of 2013, the always-boisterous Top Dawg, CEO of TDE, claimed that his crew ran hip hop during that year without releasing a single project - a bold, but not entirely inaccurate claim. What was even bolder was his guarantee that TDE would release six projects in 2014. But in 2014, if any crew can pull off the No Limit circa 1998-style feat, it would be Top Dawg Ent...
- www.rapreviews.com
2014-03-05
★★★★★
Props to the good people at Top Dawg Entertainment for finding their fifth starter, Isaiah Rashad, in a place nobody else was looking. Chattanooga is known for a few things, probably (nothing springs to mind, honestly), but rap has never been one of them. Despite being just a couple hours northwest of Atlanta, Chattanooga has only recently been placed on the genre's map thanks to the native it has in Rashad...
- consequenceofsound.net
2014-02-25
★★★★★
Every story and hook on Isaiah Rashad's "Cilvia Demo" connects on a human level. What it lacks in depth is covered by excellent production and raw talent. One BET Hip Hop Awards Cypher rhyme is all it took to catapult Chattanooga, Tennessee native Isaiah Rashad into the mainstream consciousness. Ultimately though, it was not a case of what he said, but who he said it with--appearing alongside the rising in Rap prominence, Top Dawg Entertainment crew--that mattered...
- www.hiphopdx.com
2014-02-21
★★★★★
Isaiah Rashad Delivers Classic Southern Stylings On 'Cilvia Demo'
Feb 4th, '14 • Music • by XXL Staff • 8 Comments
Mere moments into Cilvia Demo you get the feeling that young Isaiah Rashad is still searching for meaning. Throughout his pilgrimage, within sundry soundscapes, he grapples with his own existence as a product of both inherited behaviors and conditioned ones...
- www.xxlmag.com
2014-02-21
★★★★★
The opening track on Isaiah Rashad's latest mixtape clocks in at just one and a half minutes but still lays the groundwork for the entire EP by sharing lessons Rashad learned - and hasn't been able to entirely unlearn - from his father. In the single verse, Rashad explains: "My daddy taught me how to drink my pain away, my daddy taught me how to leave somebody." The following 13 tracks unapologetically reflect on where the 22-year-old is today...
- www.nowtoronto.com
2014-02-21
★★★★★
The previously Los Angeles-centered TDE crew's adoption of a Southern member isn't so strange. Since they already feel like a modern iteration of the Dungeon Family approach that has seeped into the second-generation Cali gangsta, finding an inverse in Isaiah Rashad makes perfect sense. He's an OutKast fan from the South who's also comfortable in the context of a West Coast that gave us Labcabincalifornia and Me Against the World the same year...
- pitchfork.com
2014-02-13
★★★★★
The natural rapport that exists between Kendrick Lamar, ScHoolboy Q, Ab-Soul, and Jay Rock (collectively known as Black Hippy) is a sore thumb of sincerity within the cynical mainstream. See, most rap crews these days are pretty much just tiny corporate conglomerates, and when Rick Ross' Maybach Music Group or Kanye West's G.O.O.D. Music scoop up a new artist, it feels like they're franchising -- extending their reach to another region they're hoping to wrap their brand around...
- www.spin.com
2014-02-08
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