JPEGMAFIA – “PROTECT THE CROSS”

JPEGMAFIA kept his post-Scaring The Hoes momentum going with last year's I LAY DOWN MY LIFE FOR YOU, and he intends to continue that campaign this year with a new deluxe edition of the album featuring 12 new tracks. As a press release explains it, some of them are songs from the album sessions threaded into the original tracklist, and some are new tracks compiled into a second disc. In a tweet, Peggy says the project will be out next week.

We don't yet have a tracklist for I LAY DOWN MY LIFE FOR YOU (DIRECTOR'S CUT), but we do have lead single "PROTECT THE CROSS." The song is an aggro blast of rap-rock built around blown-out live band sounds. Amidst the overdriven power chords and hard-knock drums, Peggy cuts loose with his usual provocations — lines like "Fuck your writtеns, you bombin' like Charlie Hebdo" and "White bitches ain't vote for Kamala, they lied/ So I lie when I'm trying to get that in that box" — between returns to the refrain, "2025, your politics is a gang sign."

The song is paired with cover art prominently featuring the American flag and a music video to match directed by Peggy and Logan Fields. It's billed as an "exploration" of the idea of patriotism from Peggy, a former serviceman who broke through with an album called Veteran.

In a tweet, Peggy said the patriotic imagery should not be interpreted as an endorsement of Donald Trump: "Before the sensitives start making shit up, i don’t support trump never have never will, and i hope every black person sees what happens when u defend yourself even on small scale. They just get mad and start making shit up lol." He also posted an intrepretive guide to the "PROTECT THE CROSS" lyrics, writing, "I notice some of you never know what the fuck I’m talking about. But most of your misunderstandings of me are more based on our 'different upbringings' than anything else. so here is a guide to help 'some of you' better understand my raps.

Watch the "PROTECT THE CROSS" video below.

"PROTECT THE CROSS" is out now via AWAL.