.... IllyTheHost and Soduh Beats brew up a Southern African Hip-Hop Classic
There's a reason people linger and love coffee. It's not really about the drink and its not because people who drink coffee are psychopaths. Stay with me.
It's about what happens when you have coffee, the unhurried conversations, the honesty that creeps in once the small talk runs out, the way a good cup slows you down enough to actually say something real.
That's the exact feeling IllyTheHost and Soduh Beats have bottled up on their new collaborative album, 'Good Raps Over A Cup Of Coffee' think coffee and gangster raps, but educated Nigga gangster rap, say Drake during Take Care.
I digress, now across the 14 tracks, the pair prove that hip-hop still works best when it's built on feeling instead of formula.
Illy isn't shy about the fact that he's not a traditional rapper. What he is, though, is a curator someone who knows how to bring the right voices into a room and let them do what they do best.
With Soduh Beats handling every beat on the project, the two built something that plays less like a compilation and more like a sit-down conversation between artists who all happen to love the same thing.
A coffee table, not a compilation
Speaking on the project, IllyTheHost explained that the goal was never just to string songs together.
"The vision was always bigger than just making a rap album. We wanted Good Raps Over A Cup Of Coffee to feel like a cultural conversation happening across Southern Africa," he said.
That's reflected in the roster, artists from Zimbabwe, Eswatini, Lesotho, and South Africa all show up across the tracklist, each bringing their own accent and worldview to the table.
Priddy Ugly brings the kind of technical polish that comes with experience, while names like Oriiginelle and RayKaz bring textures that don't always make it into the mainstream conversation.
As Illy put it, nobody was picked for hype. They were picked because they could add soul and staying power to the record.
Worthnoting is that intentionality carries through to the production. Soduh Beats leans on warm, lo-fi soul samples, loose jazz loops, and twinkling keys that never feel forced.
It's music built for headphones and quiet rooms rather than club speakers grounded low end, unhurried tempos, the kind of sound that rewards you for actually sitting with it instead of skimming past.
Where the name comes from
The ttitle according to Illy whose real name is Karabo Shongwe, it isn't a gimmick.
According to Illy, it's the whole philosophy of the project distilled into six words.
"Some of the best conversations happen over coffee relaxed, honest, reflective and sometimes uncomfortable. That's exactly how we wanted the album to feel.
The good raps half of the title speaks to how seriously lyricism was treated throughout the sessions. The over a cup of coffee half is what gives the whole thing its warmth, so safe to say this isn't turn-up music, it's music meant to sit with you.
A personal favourite, is Coffee and a Blunt, because nothing feels good like a cup of black coffee and a fat blunt, and now a good raps to that, you are high off, literally.
Meanwhile, that metaphor runs all the way through the tracklist, most obviously on the run of songs that lean directly into the coffee concept.
'Peruvian Coffee' and its companion piece, ' 'Peruvian Coffee + MILK' bring together underground heavyweights like K.Keed, Oriiginelle, and ZuluMecca over hypnotic, late-night backdrops, and the chemistry between them is one of the album's clear high points.
Standout moments
The very first song recorded for the project, 'Promises [Coffea Arabica], featuring J-Style and Sean Pages, ends up functioning as the album's thesis statement.
Pretoria's J-Style glides over a smooth instrumental, talking through ambition, discipline, and the promises artists quietly make to their own craft.
It sets up the idea that runs through the whole record, good art takes time, the same way a good roast does.
Then there's 'Ke Monate' the lead single and arguably the project's brightest moment.
Tshego Santana sounds completely at ease over a bed of twinkling keys and soulful vocal samples, delivering a performance that reinforces why he's considered one of the freshest voices coming out of South African hip-hop right now.
The middle stretch of the album slows things down even further. 'Balanced Warmth' featuring veteran Pdot O alongside Tasha HendrixX, wraps around the listener like a late-night conversation that turns into something more reflective than either person planned.
The chemistry behind the boards
Asked how the creative partnership with Soduh Beats came together, Illy described something that grew organically rather than by design.
"We were just making records, but at some point, we realised the music was becoming more personal and cohesive than we expected," he said.
He further mentions that, Certain features landed harder than anticipated, conversations during sessions sparked new directions, and even the sequencing of the tracklist became part of the storytelling.
Somewhere along the way, the project stopped being a collection of songs and turned into something closer to a full experience.
Conscious Rap, still standing
There's a broader question the album seems to be answering, even if it never says so directly, is there still room for intentional, lyric-driven rap in a landscape that rewards virality?
Illy's answer is straightforward. "I honestly think it never left," he said.
Conscious rap has always existed across the continent, in his view it just doesn't always get pushed the way trend-driven music does.
But he's convinced listeners are hungrier for substance than the industry sometimes gives them credit for, and that projects like this one prove there's still real appetite for soulful, carefully sequenced albums that ask something of the listener.
Final Verdict - 8.5/10
'Good Raps Over A Cup Of Coffee' works because it never wavers from what it's trying to be. There's no chase for a viral moment, no shortcut through post-production polish just raw, patient songwriting paired with some of the best production of the year.
Soduh Beats proves himself a genuine craftsman behind the boards, and IllyTheHost confirms his instincts as a curator, someone who understands that the right sequencing and the right pairing of voices can turn a collection of songs into something that feels whole.
Asked what he hopes people take away once the last track fades out, Illy says connection.
Connection between artists, between countries, between people who still care about the culture.
"I want the project to remind people that timeless music still comes from honesty," he said.
It's hard to argue with that. This is a record built for repeat listens, made by people who clearly weren't in a rush and it shows, in the best possible way.
Stream the album here: https://open.spotify.com/album/65srPuYKCFNIjtgW9fp8Az?si=Fp1BwluqRsesO1BEnBIvQQ
