Shatter the Standards

Shatter the Standards

Home
Album Reviews
BLAST
Blackpolitan
Lists
Milestones
Soulpolitan
Wednesday Roundups
bmr
Words Past da Margin
Album Review: The Ends, Never Ends by Joe James
Thirteen homes before secondary school, homeless at sixteen, years of silence with his mum. The Essex rapper’s debut turns all of it into the most…
 • Shatter the Standards and Ameenah Laquita
Album Review: The Real Me by Future
Four years after his last solo album, Future promises to be the man behind the Pluto alias. He keeps the promise on a handful of songs that hold his…
 • Shatter the Standards and Phil
Album Review: NEVER SAY DIE by PFG
J. Cole went home to Fayetteville to produce PFG’s NEVER SAY DIE, and the Sheltuh rapper fills his minimal, bass-heavy beats with the hardest, most…
 • Shatter the Standards and Harry Brown
Album Review: Love/Hate II by The-Dream
Nineteen years after Love/Hate turned bedroom synth-R&B into a serial, the Radio Killa returns with Usher, Pusha T, and Rick Ross and picks the dirty…
 • Shatter the Standards and Tai Lawson
Album Review: RHYTHM & MELODY by Sango
On his debut for Mass Appeal, the Seattle producer runs Detroit rap, New Orleans bounce, Chicago footwork, and Rio funk through one set of top-tier…
 • Shatter the Standards and F. Qureshi
New Music Drops: July 10, 2026
As new albums and singles get constantly flooded into our radar, look no further than skimming through the release week of July 10th. We know it can be…
 • Shatter the Standards
Album Review: Highway 79 by Ne-Yo
On his first country-inspired record, cut in Nashville twenty years after his debut, Ne-Yo writes the plainest songs of his career and lets the R&B…
 • Shatter the Standards and Jamila W.
Album Review: YEARNALISM by Baby Rose
After two albums made to steady herself, Baby Rose turns the contralto outward, and the yearning finally has a direction.
 • Shatter the Standards and Ivy Mensah
Album Review: new avatar by Kelela
Kelela wrote her third album while reading Octavia Butler and staring down a lover who went silent. It is the most direct songwriting of her career.
 • Shatter the Standards and Marjani Fields
Album Review: S.K.A.T.E. by Rylo Rodriguez
Three years after Been One, the Mobile rapper comes back with songs about snitching, grief, and double cups. He is one of the best line writers in…
 • Shatter the Standards and Tariq Belson
Milestones: Temporary Highs In the Violet Skies by Snoh Aalegra
The album where Snoh Aalegra sings about wanting everything from love but settles for singing about wanting.
 • Shatter the Standards and Kendra Oluwaseyi
There’s a JAŸ-Z Bar for Everything: 30 Lines That Became Rap Grammar
Board decks, breakup texts, retirement toasts. For thirty years, people who probably never bought a Jay album have argued in his sentences.
 • Shatter the Standards and Phil
© 2026 Shatter the Standards, LLC. · Privacy ∙ Terms ∙ Collection notice
Start your SubstackGet the app
Substack is the home for great culture