There are obvious reasons why people get hype on Puerto Rican rapper Audri Nix — the new PR hip-hop renaissance led by Álvaro Díaz and producer Young Martino has yet to put out its first Lisa M. or Ivy Queen, women vocalists who have dominated their respective scenes. But who needs tokens in 2016? Audri Nix has a flow that’s all her own. Her debut EP, which we premiered earlier this year, gave a us a good look at her measured, narrative verses, some of which touch on the mental health issues that she struggled with while recording the project with influential hip-hop producer Overlord. Her music is smooth and steady, with a control that looks good on the moody instrumental washes of her debut release.
Now we have Nix’s follow-up effort, a reunion with Overlord, whose work she’s been following since high school, and who she finally met in person when her older brother hired the DJ to play at her birthday party. “Más” falls squarely into R&B territory, the single’s orchestral score (the opening strings sound like we’re in England setting out on a hunt) traversed by Nix’s offerings on the alter of ambition. Over creeping drum kicks, she spits, “Nunca es suficiente/soy muy impaciente.” As she told Ebro when the song premiered last night as part of Beats 1’s Latino initiative, “What I’m talking about in this song is pretty much about ambition. When I wrote this song I was kind of in the mood of, ‘I want to talk about power.’”
There’s no lie. For further proof that Nix is planning on surfing this initial wave of interest far into the future, one need only look to the title of her 2016 EP: El Nuevo Orden Vol. 1. “I’m thinking about releasing a new version, Volume 2,” she told Beats 1 over the phone. “It’s going to be a like a version of El Nuevo Orden of La Niña de Oro, The Golden Girl. ‘Más’ is the start of a whole new sound.”
Stream the song exclusively on Apple Music below.