The London-New York link-up is never more vivid than when illustrated by Skepta and A$AP Rocky. Designated trendsetters of their respective cities, the two rappers are comrades-in-cool and logical counterparts when it comes to a high-end brand's street-style co-sign or a gritty-but-pretty rap feature. Each artist's affection for his city is evident in dialect, attitude and delivery. The new video for A$AP Rocky's "Praise The Lord (Da Shine)," from his just-released third studio album Testing, shows just how similarly Rocky and Skep's influence reign over the neighborhoods they each call home.
More than half the visual shows Rocky and Skep split-screened, bouncing around Harlem and Tottenham — faded bodega awnings, Avirex jackets and dim hallways — along with some vertiginous special effects. High-rise buildings contract to the bass line like slinkies, while Skepta and company head nod and half-jump.
The end of the video finds Rocky and Skep together, in the same city with their combined crews. The chorus for this Skepta-produced track sums up the ethos in the simplest of terms: "I came, I saw, I came, I saw / I praise, the Lord, then break, the law."
This isn't the first time fans have heard the two rappers on the same track. Rocky visits and records the U.K. frequently and Skepta has worked with many A$AP Mob members on songs past; the grime star dropped the Vicious EP last October featuring Rocky on the song "Ghost Ride."
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