Fusing the old and new school with aplomb, few rappers of his generation can go bar-for-bar with Nef The Pharaoh. Serving up a mob-flavored slapper, Nef struts his stuff on “Beat That Vest Up,” his new video single.
Produced by DTB, one of the Bay Area’s most reliable purveyors of regional fire, “Beat That Vest Up” finds a snarling Nef unleashing his aggression, coming straight for the neck of an unfortunate enemy: “The sun was peeking through the clouds, it was still hella early/This n**** scared of the Chang, a little bird told me/And I’on know if you don’t got something, but f*ck your dead homies.”
Premiered by The FADER, who called the song “a two-and-a-half minute adrenaline hit,” the track features an appearance from Nef’s KIL FMB cohort, Sacramento rhymer ShooterGang Kony, who contrasts Nef’s animated anger with a steel-eyed intensity: “Hit his dirty-ass dreads and made his hair curly.” In the video, the two rappers and their posses cook out in a countryside trailer park, before they retreat to a dimly-lit cabin to plot their next move.
Says Nef The Pharaoh to The FADER, “I don’t promote violence, but this tracc puts you in murder mode. It’s a real gritty song about fonk hours.”
Directed by Marco Alexander, “Beat That Vest Up” is the latest video from Nef’s upcoming album Mushrooms & Coloring Books, following the NSFW clip for “TYP,” which features a cameo from Too $hort, and the uber-local “South Vallejo.” The new video also follows “High Voltage,” the album’s pressure-cooker of a lead single, blessed by a guest verse from Tyga.