- The Texan artist puts a Southern spin on Northeastern club music.
- It took Northeastern club music less than a decade to dominate the internet. Results have been twofold: fickle success for the genre's native disciples and misrepresentations beyond their control. Producers have since flooded feeds with their own regional adaptations and buzzwords to match ("Mexican club," "Japanese jersey club," etc). Similarly, "Southern club music" has become a practical descriptor for the mix of club and Southern rap music galvanising the region's underground. Origins aside, the term's intersection with the ongoing conversation between Southern rap and dance music highlighted an age-old question: where does the South stand in the electronic music world?
It's a fair question. DJ-producer Asa "Big Ace" Davis has an answer. After earning his first co-production credit on a standout Kali Uchis track, the Houston native bounced between three coasts to collaborate with stars like Maxo Kream and Reggie. His debut EP, HOLD TIGHT, thoughtfully curates his experiments with the sounds he's encountered on the road (club, juke, bass, techno) and the genres he grew up with (rap, chopped and screwed, bounce, and Miami bass.) With painstaking precision, Davis adds these generational Southern elements where you'd least expect them.
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On "THATS MY JUVIE," the late New Orleans emcee Magnolia Shorty chants over a pulsing Baltimore club break; the project's opener, "MANN," flips the Big Moe anthem of the same name, driving its stringed melody with marching snare drums. "BESTFRIEND," the breakout track, retools a Young Thug classic with humming guitars and punchy claps, crescendoing with Thugger's exuberant cry. Davis carefully blends traditional Southern classics with contemporary club sound, showcasing the region's versatility to a broader audience through familiar vocal cuts and instrumentals.
The project whips through its tracks with breakneck transitions: "BESTFRIEND" careens into "MONSTER"—a deafening "pop-bang" reimagining of a beloved Future cut—which gives way to the EP's undeniable climax, "WERK IT OUT." A clear hard techno homage, the track transforms Sauce Walka's leering come-on ("pussy fat, let me work it out for ya") into a refrain fit for raves. But for all its bass, HOLD TIGHT ends on a dreamy note with "I LIKE THAT," Davis' "club&b" take on a Miami classic.
Davis's use of classic Southern trap elements puts a unique spin on classic and approachable club music, and HOLD TIGHT makes a dynamic introduction to his animated world while leaving enough room to continue adding depth to his still-evolving sound.
Tracklist01. MANN
02. I CAN DO THAT
03. THATS MY JUVIE
04. BESTFRIEND
05. MONSTER
06. WERK IT OUT
07. LIKE A PRO
08. I LIKE IT