Mac Miller: Blue Slide Park (2LP) [ROSTRUM]

Why you'll love it

This 2LP set gives the debut room to breathe across four sides. Blue Slide Park entered the Billboard 200 at No. 1 with 144,000 copies sold, the first independently distributed debut to top that chart since 1995.

This edition

• 2LP set

About the album

Blue Slide Park is a real place: a corner of Pittsburgh's Frick Park, a short walk from where a teenage Malcolm McCormick grew up. When he named his first proper album after it, Mac Miller was telling everyone exactly where he came from, and the record carries that hometown pride all the way through.

ID Labs handled most of the production, with E. Dan and Jeremy Kulousek giving the beats a bright, breezy bounce, and Miller kept the guest list empty so every verse is his. "Frick Park Market" became his biggest single to that point, "Party on Fifth Ave." brings the summer block-party energy, "Smile Back" and the title track went out early as gifts to the fans, and "Up All Night" and "Loitering" capture the carefree side of a kid on the rise.

It's the sound of a young artist having the time of his life, made on his own terms with a small Pittsburgh label behind him. His older brother Miller McCormick designed the cover, which beats any birthday card we've ever had from a sibling.

Also at Kops: more Mac Miller on vinyl · browse Hip Hop / R&B

Tracklist

Listen

On Rostrum (cat# RSTRM-218), a reissue of the 2011 album.