Bake Sale - The Cool Kids

With their 2008 EP, The Bake Sale, the Cool Kids deliver enough goodies to assuage any concerns that their MySpace hype was overblown. With 10 tracks of little more than late '80s drum-machine boom-bap and strategic synth jabs, Chuck Inglish and Mikey Rocks recreate Golden Age hip-hop with more giggly sincerity than irony. That earnestness keeps The Bake Sale from becoming cash-in nostalgia. The duo's mouths are full of uncomplicated rhymes about their stylish bicycles ("Black Mags"); selling black-market cones when the ice-cream truck runs out ("What Up Man"); and being so original that the average b-boy can't understand pants that fit, vintage Sega game-system enthusiasm ,and boutique clothes ("A Little Bit Cooler"). And of course, per the Cool Kids, the ladies find all this irresistible. It would all be standard fare with a retro sheen, but the Detroit/Chicago pair often point the humor at themselves, which a shrinking number of rappers are willing to do. That self-deprecation gave them a hip indie-music fan base. The real trick is keeping the underground cred as they move toward the mainstream. --Kris Kendall