Lorde returned last year with her highly-anticipated sophomore release Melodrama, an album that explores loneliness and the process of recovering from a breakup. Now the singer has shared a remix of her track “Supercut” from her fellow tourmates Run the Jewels (a.ka. El-P and Killer Mike)
While the original version is an upbeat dance bop, El-P incorporates an eerie mix of distorted instrumentals and an ominous thumping bass. Both Killer Mike and El-P add verses to the track, trading Lorde’s optimistic verses for their signature hard-hitting bars. As Mike raps in his first verse:
We is the villains, and there ain’t no chillin'
Get body bags and the toe tags, yeah
Scoundrels in housin', we tore through your town
And we reload it and now we back, man
Forgiato rollin' on a ‘96 Impala
With a pretty thing, show me where I’m slayin’
I ain’t playin' with you lames
700 horse in the Hellcat
Take ya bitch, where ya at?
Genius contributor @Liiight broke down Mike’s relationship with Impalas and Hellcats in an annotation:
El-P also plays off Mike’s car references and menacing lines:
Dirty, all-black Jeep, 2018
With the clean rhyme rappers on deck, check
Came with the bad bars, bully with the big box
Trust we’re the runners on set
G-G-Give it up, you don’t got a bit of luck left
Nah, not even a itty bit of fresh (Good lord)
Fall on your sword for the crime abhorrent
That’s your reward for the mindless whorin'
Lorde teased on Twitter earlier this week that she had something in the works, prompting her fans to check their email for a surprise. The remix was shared in a newsletter as a free download, just as the singer kicks off her world tour today. Run the Jewels will be joining Lorde on tour, so it’s likely they will all perform the track together live.
This is the first time Lorde has teamed up with the duo, but her songs have undergone hip-hop treatments in the past. Her breakout hit “Royals” received a Rick Ross remix, and her other Melodrama track “Homemade Dynamite” was also remixed by Khalid, SZA, and Post Malone.
Read all of the lyrics to “Supercut” (El-P Remix) here on Genius, and subscribe for a download of the song here.
