Samurai. Eight tracks, in focus.

There is a moment in the 2015 documentary Amy where Amy Winehouse leaves a voicemail for her producer, Salaam Remi, about the battle raps pouring out of her, and closes by telling him she is a samurai. Lupe watched that scene and asked a question: what if she had actually been one? A battle rapper, in a battle. That was going to be one song. Then the questions multiplied. Where did she learn to rap? What would the battle look like? What was she rapping about? He answered each one with a track, and when he got to eight, Chill told him to stop. Chill was right.

A few ground rules Lupe set for the record. It is not a biography. They never met, and he has said he is not trying to rewrite her story or borrow her legacy to sell an album. In his words, "it could be about anybody." It is a portrait of an artist's working life, the highs and the boring middle and the indignities, told through a character. The word samurai means to serve, and he has framed the whole thing as being in service to the rap community he has belonged to for two decades. Soundtrakk produced every track. There are no guest features, a first for Lupe. It runs 30 minutes and 53 seconds, his shortest album, and most of it was recorded in his living room on GarageBand. Chill, newly home in 2023, helped sequence it and called time. Dakari Patton drew the cover: Lupe as an afro-samurai, sword up.

Samurai came out June 28, 2024 on 1st & 15th and Thirty Tigers. Here is the walk through it.

1. Samurai (3:14). The lead single, out May 17, 2024, and the thesis. Crystal Torres plays trumpet, flute and flugelhorn, JProof plays saxophone, Greg "Brahmulus" Brookshire plays bass, and Anthony "APB" Perkin is on synths. Soundtrakk wanted the album to open like a warm room. It does.

2. Mumble Rap (4:15). Soundtrakk on drums, bass and sampler, and Lupe himself on trumpet, a detail buried in the credits. This is where the character picks up the gift. The title is a wink. The song is not.

3. Cake (3:22). The second single, June 7, 2024. Soundtrakk started with a drum pattern inspired by "The Glory" from Kanye West's Graduation, found a jazz sample, chopped it the way DJ Premier would, and handed the beat over about seventy percent finished. Lupe has said the rapping here is dialed down on purpose, because the voice is the battle rapper's and not his own. Judge for yourself.

4. Palaces (3:45). Written in the room. Lupe walked into the lab in Chicago with only the hook, wrote the verses in front of Soundtrakk and Chill, and asked for the beat to change under the third verse so the tension would climb. It did. The remix, with Troy Tyler on the hook, got its own video on October 31, 2024.

5. No. 1 Headband (4:23). The oldest beat on the album. Soundtrakk built it in 2016 by asking a keyboardist for a "Paris, Tokyo" feel, then layering two different drum-break techniques over the loop. Brian L. Brown plays electric piano, Brahmulus switches to electric guitar, and Luv Moore and LaJé sing background. The video came out the same day as the album. The title tips its headband to Afro Samurai.

6. Bigfoot (3:45). Soundtrakk in what he calls his piano-chopping mode, slower than the rest. Nicolas Isaiah and Trumaine Jordan co-produce with APB. It is the deep breath before the last two.

7. Outside (4:14). This one was out first as a standalone single on June 30, 2023, a year before the album. On the album it sits in the story's after-hours, with Kush Baby co-producing and Soundtrakk adding flute, harp and strings under the drums.

8. Til Eternity (3:55). The closer. Crystal Torres returns on flugelhorn and horns, APB moves to piano, and Soundtrakk and Brahmulus share the bass. Whatever happens to the character after the battle, this is the sound of it.

Lupe took it on the road on the Samurai Tour from October to December 2024. On August 22, 2025 came Samurai DX, a deluxe EP with two songs from the sessions, "High Note" with Luv Moore and the self-produced "SOS," plus Troy Tyler remixes of "Samurai," "Palaces" and "Bigfoot," with instrumentals on the vinyl's B side. Pitchfork called the album jazzy and subdued; Clash gave it 8 out of 10; it reached No. 23 on the UK R&B Albums chart. Thirty-one minutes, top to bottom, and then start it again.