Trystyl

Beginning with the sound of a needle dropping on a scratchy LP, Trystyl’s latest is an insider’s record, made for and by crate diggers and notebook poets. Over Trystyl’s smooth, ice-cream-with-spinkles production — electronic plus East Coast hip-hop and soul plus a passion for old records — guest rappers dish on the hard-knock life of the underground hero and how girls often complicate it. Throughout, Trystyl does the heavy lifting, building a mansion of diverse and often dark sonic fixtures. Unfortunately, the guests often muddy the rug and smear up the crystal with talk of the same old crap. On the catchy but bland “KCHUSTLE,” area battle MCs Ben Grim, Dutch Newman and Swayzorblades discuss coming up as hip-hop moonlighters; their voices are loud, but their souls are tired from lugging too many backpacks to too many open mics. Many of the other guests have got girl problems, and we feel bad for them — not. Not all the MCs bore. Info Gates delivers a deft performance on the album’s slinky banger, “A,” wrapping his verse around the beat’s repeated shout: So now I’m packed and movin’ from the U-S-A!/Bought a one-way ticket on T-W-A!/Sat down in the back, seat 32-A!/Headphones up loud/Listening to A!-ceyalone. Perhaps on Vol. 2, Trystyl will tap even more MCs whose lyrics are as good as Trys’ beats.