Hit-Boy was a machine behind the boards in 2022 and he capped off the year with another banger heading overseas to recruit Avelino for “2 Certified.”
Hit takes the baton from the British MC and showcases his lyrical prowess looking for proper respect over his own beat supply.
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“I dealt with envy and I dealt with jealousy/Play with your bitch, don’t play with my legacy,” he raps. “You made a lil’ paper, I went at their neck and made history/Dumbin’ out on my own beats/Hot like I threw ’em in grease.”
The glitzy visual directed by THIRDEYERAZ finds Hit-Boy and Avelino staking their claim for the rap throne with a staged press conference featuring journalists shoving microphones in their faces and paparazzi fawning over their every word.
“My engineer David Kim, who was mixing the Nas album, was also mixing Avelino’s album down the hall,” Hit-Boy relayed to Billboard. “So Avelino came through and by the end of the night we had this record done.”
The West Coast legend is preparing his sixth studio album, which is reportedly set to arrive in the early portion of 2023.
Hit-Boy has been on a scorching winning streak as he book-ended 2022 reuniting with Nas for a pair of projects with Magic on Christmas 2021 and King’s Disease III to close out the year in November.
He also produced full-length projects for Pacman Da Gunman (Bulletproof Soul) and Dreezy (HITGIRL) and notched placements on The Game’s Drillmatic – Heart vs. Mind and worked with Dom Kennedy and Beyoncé, the latter of which earned him a Grammy nomination on Renaissance.
The grind didn’t stop there as EA Sports took note of Hit’s run where he was also tapped to curate the soundtrack to Madden 2023.
With another decorated campaign under his belt, the 35-year-old took home honors for the HipHopDX 2022 Producer of the Year over the likes of Alchemist, ATL Jacob, Harry Fraud and Metro-Boomin. It’s Hit-Boy’s second time receiving the award in three years as he also won HipHopDX Producer of the Year in 2020.
