FlareScouts - P.O.O.R. Tapes VOL. 1

It's been five years (!) since I've seen the name FlareScouts pop up on my radar. How it did that again, I'll save for another post, but the important thing is that it got me Googling, which put their November 2020 release P.O.O.R. Tapes VOL. 1 in my sights and then ears. Whether or not you've caught their previous work, the first notes of P.O.O.R. Tapes opener "We Seen" lets on you're in for some different shit. Alternative-alternative hip-hop, like that subgenre but better dressed, the tape (un)incorporates a little of this and a little of that, as FlareScouts do, like Lakeview being in both West Hempstead and Rockville Centre but also its own place.

Flare Scouts - "Show Me Love" / "Lake Views"

Lakeview-based brothers Ace and Ty might be influenced by '90s hip-hop aesthetics, but they're not so much carrying the torch of any prior movement as they are sparking the flare for their own. Like the clothing designs they fashion re-imagining thrift wear, their sound is truly one-of-a-kind.

If their first release, Flare Scouts the Mixtape, was a signal fire, its followup, Project Extremis, looks from the first two singles to be a four-alarm blaze. Stream both tracks below and support one of Long Island's brightest up-and-coming anti-brands by sourcing something from their website, FlareScouts.com.