Hipster rap has paralleled the rise in Southern hip-hop's popularity over the past couple of years. Both genres are musically based on thin and anemic 808 beats, with the former leaning more on the conventions of '80s hip-hop and the latter settling on synth-heavy sampling. Southern rap has unquestionably held an advantage over hipster rap, though, striking a chord with a mainstream audience and propelling its major players into the spotlight while hipster rap remained in the underground.But that doesn't mean that hipster rap isn't good or hasn't built a fan base, even if you aren't aware of its key characters. The Cool Kids are a perfect example of an underground hipster rap duo that has recently been making waves in the mainstream music world, turning heads long before they officially released an album by being hailed as one of Rolling Stone's "Artists to Watch in 2008" and having their track "Black Mags" featured in a Rhapsody commercial.
The duo, consisting of Chicago and Detroit's own Antoine "Mikey Rocks" Reed and Evan "Chuck Inglish" Ingersoll, have finally put out their debut EP The Bake Sale, a popping collection of tracks that have all been previously released in low quality formats. The ten songs, all alike in musical and lyrical style, feature clanging drums and a library of industrial-sounding synths, embodying the boom-bap sound of the '80s and '90s while incorporating otherworldly sounds of the future.