A$AP Rocky has always been one of rap’s great stylists. It doesn’t naturally explain itself in the music the way iconic rappers like Cam’ron or Project Pat might. The act of rapping doesn’t inherently exude the buckets of charisma he has. Instead, he embodies the intangible idea of ‘cool.’ He’s telegenic by nature, informed by his lavish tastes and eye for aesthetic. Rocky can simultaneously wield Harlem World Mase and Max B croons with gleaming grills and an affinity for codeine that places him in Houston. Streetwear and designer work hand in hand. Clams Casino atmospheric grays, glitches and deafening bass alters the complexion of how we understand luxury rap. The confidence and free-spirited nature made A$AP Rocky feel massive when he first came out. Rocky’s self-assured taste eventually led to natural experimentation. After the tragic passing of his mentor A$AP Yams, he tinkered and experimented in psychedelia. The music got murkier and cloudier, smoky and delirious. He retreats further into fashion, he elevates his A$AP Mob cohorts. Then, he experiments further into odder textures and high art aesthetics. Meanwhile, A$AP Rocky never loses sight of what made him an alluring presence, even if some of his later projects lose some of the effortlessness that painted his earlier taste-making.Nowadays, he’s taking his spiritual cool to the big screens. Under Spike Lee and next to Denzel Washington’s breezy coolness, Rocky feels massive on screen for Highest 2 Lowest. He can easily stick with acting but he’s still teasing a new record after a long hiatus. In the seven years since he’s released Testing, he’s handed out some singles, married Rihanna, had some kids. Can he still capture that old feeling? Who knows. Regardless, his best work still stands out as distinctly cool in how he tinkers with different musical flavors. Here’s the cream of the crop from Rocky that showcases his vast palette. Four of the Best A$AP Rocky Songs of All Time“Wassup”In Jeff Weiss’ Pitchfork review for LIVELOVEA$AP, he came the closest to distinguishing what made A$AP Rocky such a compelling presence in hip-hop. He didn’t have the tools the way his obvious inspirations do. Not as formally impressive a rapper as New York legends like The Lox or Rakim. Not the same measure of breezy, saccharine singing like Max B or 50 Cent. Instead, it’s his sharp, singular mind for what makes all these intangibles great and nabs little aspects accordingly. Rocky knows how to funnel his skillset and his various interests into something wholly distinct to himself. “He cherry-picks from the best of internet micro-trends– taking celestial based weirdness, the funk of country rap, the stoned pace of screw, and the tape-warp of Memphis. But at the core is the French-braided, gold-toothed kid from money-making Manhattan, inflecting his songs with hints of third-generation Spanish Harlem and West Indian patois,” Weiss writes.“Wassup” is the quintessential A$AP Rocky song for these reasons, the record that synthesizes his entire appeal. “Pretty n***a in some shit you never hear of/Only thing bigger than my ego is my mirror,” he flaunts. It’s rich bragging over brooding, techno-dystopian digitization. The fragmented, ghostly background vocals, cooled synths, and floor-splitting bass make for chilling, mind-numbing hypnosis. The kind of luxury Rocky presents feels unreal, something only he could conjure.“LVL”“LVL” is the kind of record car speakers blow out and die for. Beats headphones lose their steep price point after playing the Clams Casino masterpiece. His penchant for synthetic, stuttering vocals and hiccuping synth progressions with deafening bass is an interesting one in the age of the internet. In a world that can frequently rely on nostalgia like a clutch, Clams Casino provides a sense of modernity and acceptance of the gray coldness that comes with being online. Rappers can feed into it or color with their own personalities like A$AP Rocky did. He may have anointed the record as “boom bap mixed with new raps.” That declaration never held as prophecy as Rocky might’ve wanted. But truthfully, that distinction is what made “LVL” and Clams Casino so special in the first place.“Fine Whine (feat. Joe Fox x Future x M.I.A.)”Underneath the charming smiles and smooth talk lies A$AP Rocky’s magnum opus AT.LONG.LAST.A$AP. The album fluctuates from brooding mood boards to overwhelming head highs and slurred words. “Fine Whine” towers over the rest of the tracks, a lethargic sludge that feels less like lighthearted escapism and more of an active attempt to shut down the brain from overthinking. A$AP Rocky is far too fried to even remotely care that the relationship is looking down the barrel of a gun. All he can do, and what he advises his girl to do as well, is get drunk and let it pass over. Then, the slow grind whips into cascading drums soberingly quick. The reality of the pain strikes M.I.A. into seething anger and Future grapples through every stage of grief. None of this breakdown comes together if it isn’t for one of the greatest Future verses of all time. In the aftermath of his extremely public breakup from ex Ciara, he looks at everything he’s went through and how she put up with it all. But he couldn’t. Hedonism was his self sabotage but it kept him from thinking about it. He accepts that this is his lifestyle and he’s doomed to remain this way. It’s what makes the transition back into the muddy, pitched down A$AP Rocky vocals so heartbreaking. It was inevitable to try and numb themselves from the agony.“Purple Swag”If someone were to ask me what 2010-2012 felt like, I would show the video for “Purple Swag.” It’s a hyper-fixation on aesthetic, a post Bush, Obama era recession feel where maximalism still exists through the DIY lens of the internet. The video gets put through numerous filters, with enough weed smoke to catch a contact high. Additionally, it leaves nods to Houston and the greater south, with closeup shots of grills and double cups at every angle. There’s even shots of a white blonde with a grill rapping along with the n-word for maximum accuracy.A$AP Rocky and his affinity for lean sipping and DJ Screw fits him seamlessly. A$AP Ty Beats distills the visuals of cough syrup going into a Sprite bottle, drowsy, disorienting, slowly consuming until everything fits a purple haze. With the pitched down vocals, it’s essentially chopped and screwed 101 without the DJ scratches to repeatedly run lines back. In Rocky’s pursuit of cool, regionality dissipates. Eventually, the internet would catch up and follow the lead away from as much regional flair that ruled the 2000s.The post The A$AP Rocky Mt. Rushmore: His Top 4 Songs of All Time appeared first on VICE.