Album Review: 656 by Roc Marciano
The Hempstead pimp laureate returns with another self-produced luxury manual. Another set of immaculate contempt, and the pen stays sharper than ever. Still cold, still funny, still hitting.
Certain codes don’t get explained. You either already understand why someone would iron their drawers before putting them on, or you’re exactly the type of person who gets laughed out of the room. Good taste as gatekeeping. Consumption as proof of arrival. Harm delivered casual, with the joke attached so you catch yourself laughing before you clock what just happened. Roc Marciano built a catalog on that code. 656 is his third project in under two years, fully self-produced, which means more vintage soul samples. The title comes from the hook on the opener—the pimp commandment that no matter how thick, thou shall not trick. It’s scripture for a very specific congregation.
The album’s intro spells it out plain. A fiend shows up at the door trying to cop, and Marci says that’s a straight violation—you gotta knock the man out right there. Then he drops the phrase that threads through everything: “This shit quiet luxury, nigga. Y’all niggas got horrible taste.” That’s the thesis. On “Childish Games,” he says everything about your artistry is novelty, that he could write a novel or three with Cartier quality.
Violence moves through 656 like paperwork. On “Trick Bag,” knife work is a thing of beauty, leaving somebody bleeding profusely in a two-seater. On “Prince & Apollonia,” there’s a stab coming to someone’s daughter thorax—but first he hung his jacket on the NordicTrack and had a glass of water. The mundane detail does the work. On “Yves St. Moron,” he runs down the résumé, from carjacking, trapping, to kidnapping, bitches is flat-backing. As my benefactor, nigga, been a factor. The bars stack up cold and efficient.
Humor slips the threats through. On “Vanity,” Marci says he pisses on the floor in Dior and Louis Vuitton, shits on the floor in Givenchy and Yves Saint Laurent, does what he wants in Isabel Marant. It’s absurd and specific in a way that makes you laugh. On “Rain Dance,” he admits maybe he is a dick and insists on pissing in the lobster bisque. The joke is always the confession.
“Uh, maybe I am a dick
I insist to piss in the lobster bisque
How I spit pussy, pussyfoot’s not a good look for me
I was looking to sink my hooks in a freak, but all a hooker need is two good feet
Look, you way too busy playing footsie underneath the table, but it was just a waste of some good eats.”
The “quiet luxury” obsession runs deep. On “Childish Games,” Marci dismisses the rap industry because what it takes to be placed in the top rapper space is way too much dick sucking for his taste. On “Melo,” he says they would’ve gave him flowers if he was fake, that native New York hate means if he was from out of state then he’d be Drake. The dismissals are constant. Your diamonds are quiet like Hawaii, plus you got champagne taste but Kool-Aid for brains. The judgments never stop.
Where 656 gets interesting is when Errol Holden shows up. On “Rain Dance,” he flows about monetizing dust juice, turning base metals to gold, mixing Laurent with Enfants. His verse builds its own texture, talking about ironing his drawers because they feel better when you put them on. But “Trapeze” is where he really delivers. He’s on the phone with someone in FCI, then gets a FaceTime from another person locked in Copper Cove. The verse tells the story of hoods in Maine getting rich off pills, buying a thousand blues from a dude who doesn’t use deodorant. He talks about someone who ran so long he forgot what he was running from, then got reminded when they caught him and gave him a hundred-something years. No tears, just a grin—he took it on the chin. Never let them see you sweat, we took that as a win. That’s a whole short story compressed into bars, and it hits different from anything Marci does on the record.
Marci himself stays locked in. The pen game is elite with dense internal rhymes, obscure references that reward attention, and punchlines hit hard. On “Trapeze,” he says if he ain’t top ten, the list was created by atheists. On “Easy Bake Oven,” he runs through the revenue streams: dope money pulled me out the hell hole, coke money pulled me out the hell hole, and jux money pulled me out. On “Tracey Morgan Vomit,” he mentions welfare jeans with the grits as how he started, and the outro turns into an absurdist rant about government cheese and throwing chihuahuas off project roofs.
The consistency is real because nobody writes like this. The Berluti shoes, the Issey Miyake bombers in oxblood, the Baccarat body wash, the fifty pointers in the necklace—the inventory never stops and it never gets boring because the bars holding it together are that good. On “Hate Is Love,” he talks about bagging somebody at the Ritz and, after kidnapping her, stealing her wallet out of a Goyard clutch. Before y’all judge, clean your own yard up. On “Good for You,” every line fed her meshed together like bread and wine at the restaurant.
Great (★★★★☆)
Favorite Track(s): “Childish Games,” “Vanity,” “Trapeze”