Number Ones

At its original 19-track length, <i>Shoot for the Stars Aim for the Moon</i> was a brawny last hurrah for Brooklyn MC Pop Smoke. The addition of 15 unreleased songs for the deluxe version turns the official debut of a tragically murdered star into a comprehensive archive of unrealised potential. Pop Smoke’s range expands just a little bit further here, the additions finding him dabbling in Afrobeats (“Tsunami”), downtempo R&B (“Backseat”) and spacey trap (“Be Clearr”). The expanded edition also doubles the original’s guest list, adding marquee names like Jamie Foxx, Gunna, Young Thug, Davido, Burna Boy and A Boogie wit da Hoodie. There are also verses from Brooklyn MCs and long-time Pop Smoke affiliates Fivio Foreign, DAFI WOO and Dread Woo. If there is a single song on <i>Shoot for the Stars Aim for the Moon (Deluxe)</i> that comes off as more disturbing than Pop Smoke could have foreseen, it is “Hotel Lobby”, where he remarks, “I got a feeling n****s tryna line me.”