Guapdad 4000 Kicks Off the Journey to 1176 with How Many

The single marks Guapdad 4000’s first release with producer !llmind and 88rising’s sister label, PARADISE RISING

Guapdad 4000 has something of a reputation for working unexpected samples into his music. To long-time fans, it's almost like a treasure hunt at this point. It's a guessing game of which piece of history he's going to flip and drop bars over. In 2017, harpist Dorothy Ashby’s Windmills of Your Mind laid the foundation for Scamboy. In 2019, he transformed Blac Chyna’s viral “embezzled” meme into a beat. Last year, it was Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata in Alpha. Naturally, the scam rap artist keeps up his streak with the How Many, the first single off his upcoming album.

How Many borrows elements from Alice Deejay’s Better Off Alone—yeah, you know the one—with a staccato strum and the song’s hook sung in a hushed, distant echo. Unlike Alpha and Scamboy, which flips instrumentals simply for the sonic impact, the quiet buzz of Alice Deejay’s voice rings relevant to Guapdad’s storytelling in How Many. The music video—eccentric in true Guapdad fashion—illustrates this visually, too. Cue the scenes of the artist floating solo in a supersized bottle of Belaire.

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As the world’s first taste of his album 1176, the track is a departure from Guapdad’s usual body of work. Granted, the flow and flips remain, but How Many dives deeper, a comfortable compromise between being more existential and less comical. 

If this change of course is any indication of what is to come for the full album, it’ll be interesting to see what 1176 has in store for listeners next month. As a joint project between Guapdad and producer !llmind—both of whom are of Filipino descent—and the first full album to be released by 88rising’s sister label, PARADISE RISING, 1176 sets the perfect scene for Guapdad 4000 to write home.

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Listen to Guapdad 4000 and !llmind’s How Many, available for your streaming pleasure on all major platforms. 1176, drops March 19th. 

Art Alexandra Lara