Check out Lupe Fiasco’s Latest Track … from a Decade Ago

A previously unreleased track recorded before the release of Lupe Fiasco’s 2006 debut album Food & Liquor has debuted as the third single on 1st & 15th Entertainment’s “Chill’s Spotlight” playlist. Curated by 1st & 15th co-founder Charles “Chill” Patton, “Chill’s Spotlight” is a compilation of some of the label’s previously unreleased tracks that are finally being released to the world. The first two tracks on the playlist, “Run Game” by Lupe Fiasco and “Gametime” by Wildstyle, are both featured on Monday Night Football this NFL season.

“I vividly remember the day Lupe recorded this song,” Chill says in a statement. “I got the beat from the producer and played it twice for Lu while we were riding in a white Suburban, 20 minutes later we made it to the studio and he immediately went in and knocked out the whole song—verses, hook, ad-libs, etc. It was natural for him, but not so natural for me to see this, and I had been around some of the greats. This is when I knew he was a Monster!! It’s been in the vaults for many years, and now we are excited to share it with his fans.”

The music video for “Hey Lupe” is oddly nostalgic. The four-minute-long video intersperses clips of old-school hip-hop scenes and breakdancing with a more contemporary look at hip-hop culture today. The song itself is a Fiasco classic: a throwback straight into the mid-2000s, yet a fresh sound that stands apart from all the mumbling rap on the radio today.

Take a step back to the time of popped collars and sweatbands, and check out Lupe’s latest (or is it earliest?) below.