Music
ASAP Ferg And NLE Choppa Help The Emerging AG Club Rep For ‘Memphis’
The Bay Area collective breaks convention to borrow from another area known for its trademark regional sound. …
Although the emerging youth rap collective AG Club — short for “avant-garde” — proudly represents San Francisco, their breakout single is hardly beholden to the sonic conventions of the Bay Area. In fact, “Memphis” sounds much more like the bass-heavy trap rap of its namesake as it does the post-hyphy party rap of fellow NorCal denizens SOB X RBE or Guapdad 4000.
So the addition of guest rappers ASAP Ferg and NLE Choppa to the song’s remix, “Memphis Pt. 2,” is actually fitting in many ways. Like AG Club, the ASAP Mob eschewed local solidarity for an omnivorous sound that saw the blog era breakouts sampling from places like Houston, London, and yes, Houston to form their sonic playgrounds. Meanwhile, NLE Choppa is a resident of Memphis who has shown an increasing versatility beyond regional sounds as his popularity as a featured artist grows — yet here, he sounds right at home. The video finds them all linking up to wreak havoc in Los Angeles, just to really mix things up.
In an introductory interview for Vice’s i-D Magazine, AG Club gets compared to ASAP Mob as well as the LA-based diversity collective Brockhampton, while the group’s members Baby Boy, Jody Fontaine, and Mick Antony say their mission is “to take over every form of media from music to TV, film, and fashion.” Beginning with the breakout viral hit that is “Memphis,” we’d say they are well on their way.
Watch AG Club’s “Memphis” video above.
NLE Choppa is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.
Artist Spotlight
“Subterranean Homesick Blues” finds a new direction through Ghost of Panama
Rearranging a song that carries six decades of cultural weight is a creative challenge, but Ghost of Panama approaches “Subterranean Homesick Blues” with clear purpose. The rock band radically reworks Bob Dylan’s counter-culture hit, reshaping its identity while keeping its rebellious spirit. It’s a tribute to musical heritage and a statement of artistic independence all in one.
This new interpretation is very much shaped by the production, made at Ghost of Panama’s home studio in West London. The setting allows an intimate approach to reinterpreting a familiar song and lets the group engage directly with the material, taking it in a new artistic direction.
“Subterranean Homesick Blues” centers on the tension between conservation and transformation. Ghost of Panama is true to the song’s rebellious spirit without adding to its legacy, and this approach gives the release an adventurous feel, grounded in countercultural energy but driven by a desire to see what the composition can become in a different musical context.
Their version of this 60-year-old classic shows that respecting a song’s history can also mean breaking the rules and finding new ways to express its spirit. Fundamentally, “Subterranean Homesick Blues” presents Ghost of Panama as artists who want to engage with the past without being tied to it. The release’s strongest identity is a familiar heritage reimagined through a singularly forward-looking creative vision.
Artist Spotlight
“NO MORE” by Amanda Holley connects healing, awakening, and survival
“NO MORE“ carries that kind of emotional weight, and some songs feel like they come from lived experience but reach for something bigger. Amanda Holley blends R&B and soul, turning a lifetime of survival into a vision of healing, awakening, and the determination to move beyond what caused the pain.
“NO MORE“ is a healing anthem for people who have gone through bad experiences and reached a place of higher awareness, but it’s also an emotionally charged protest. The duality is introspective and outward-looking at the same time, turning personal survival into a broader declaration that some experiences, conditions, or cycles should end.
Holley had a premonition of the song six months before the world went into global shutdown. In the vocal booth, working out melodies with her collaborators, she pictured people in the streets. Those images were hard to imagine at the time, but subsequent events would make them painfully familiar.
“NO MORE“ is given a particularly contemplative underpinning by the context. The identity of R&B and soul leaves room for emotion. The song’s themes link survival, awakening, resistance, and the need for change. Amanda Holley is an artist using music to process personal endurance and a broader sense of social awakening. It’s got a complicated significance, and its release feels like a glimpse of a moment when personal intuition and public reality collided in an unexpected way.
Photo Credit: Yulia Shusharina
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