Armand Hammer’s resident experimental half ELUCID bookended 2025 by beginning it with one of its best and most underrated albums in the self-released single-track long player, INTERFERENCE PATTERN, and then capping it off in the backend with another solid display of heavy-headed rhymes in tandem with billy woods and producer the Alchemist on Mercy. More properly, the edge of springtime again hears him back in solo mode backed by the production of veteran Swedish beatmaker, Sebb Bash, for his next album, I Guess U Had to Be There. Looking through the ether of its earliest preview, “First Light”, its latest, “Make Me Wise”, hears the NYC underground rapper further removing himself from the harsher industrial elements of INTERFERENCE PATTERN and his 2024 standout, REVELATOR, in favor of crystal clear transcendency that serves as a reflection pool for refining his id.

Artwork by: GENG PTP

ELUCID & Sebb Bash’s I Guess U Had to Be There will be released March 13th on Backwoodz Studioz.