Atlanta Soundtrack: New music by Wiley From Atlanta, Baby Tate and more

Baby Tate — ‘Jersey’

Heartbreak isn’t necessarily what we’re used to hearing from Baby Tate, whose confident lyrics usually convey a kind of invulnerability to the slings and arrows of life and love and an unwillingness to suffer fools. But with her latest single, “Jersey,” we find her lost amid the crowd, feeling sad over someone who broke her heart, in a club in New Jersey, of all places. (But really — is there a location more fitting?)

Baby Tate took her talents to Brooklyn’s AfroPunk festival at the end of August, shaking off any lingering negativity following her appearance two years ago at the Atlanta iteration of the festival. She went viral after that gig, when she addressed a wave of mean-spirited criticism online about the outfit she wore. (Just a sample: “Please go project your insecurities onto a piece of paper, burn it and throw it away.” Mic drop.)

Undeterred, Baby Tate has continued to promote body positivity and ownership over her striking personal style. And Vogue took note this year, citing her wardrobe at Brooklyn’s AfroPunk as one of its fashion bests — particularly the “sharply shoulder-padded hot-pink trench coat.” (Photo by Jonathan-Weiner/Courtesy Warner Records)

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Wiley From Atlanta — ‘Make It Look Real’

Hailing from ATL’s East Side, rapper/singer/songwriter Will Bryant, otherwise known as Wiley From Atlanta, draws inspiration from an eclectic mix of genres and musicians — including Gnarls Barkley, Tom Waits and Outkast. You’ll for sure hear the beginning of that distinguished Waits vocal grit and recognize some of that distinctive rooted-in-place-and-time lyrical finesse from those other two Atlanta favorites in Wiley’s work here.

In 2022, he joined another Atlanta Soundtrack favorite, GRIP, for that rapper’s “I Died For This?” tour, named for GRIP’s album and released under the Slim Shady label owned and operated by Eminem. This year’s major project, Wiley’s new five-part mixtape, is called Killing Time Before the Flood and will be released two songs at a time over the course of three months.

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Yin Yang Twins — ‘Salt Shaker’ (featuring Lil Jon & the East Side Boyz)

So what’s the best way to get salt, anyway? That is . . . not really the point of this 20-year-old earworm, the epitome of early-aughts party rap, whose central command to “shake it like a saltshaker” was everywhere you went for a time. The silliness of the main refrain, combined with the irresistibly danceable production behind it, launched performers (and 100% not-actual-real-life-twins) Kaine and D-Roc into superstardom. Of course, it didn’t hurt that the track also featured the Kings of Crunk themselves, Lil Jon & the Eastside Boyz.

The Ying Yang Twins had already accumulated some sizable hits at this point. They burst onto the scene in 2000 with their debut single, “Whistle While You Twurk,” a play both melodically and lyrically on the gem-mining capitalist anthem from Disney’s 1937 Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. 

But 2003 was the top of the mountain, not only for this song but for high-profile collaborations. That same year, the duo would also appear on Lil Jon’s classic “Get Low,” as well as Britney Spears’ “I Got That (Boom Boom)” off her “toxic”-gifting hit album In the Zone. In total, they wound up releasing six albums across their career. More recently, they’ve been performing together again, including a spot on the Y2K-nostalgic Millennium Tour in 2021.

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Want Atlanta Soundtrack in your ear all day, every day? Check out our compilation of previously featured songs and artists on the ArtsATL Atlanta Soundtrack Spotify playlist here: