#bay area underground

[thelensofyashunews]

OVRKAST. SHARES NEW CARDO COLLAB EP  KASTGOTWINGS – OUT NOW

Fresh off his run supporting MAVI on his headlining shadowbox tour and an appearance on Sway In The Morning that saw him freestyle with Lupe Fiasco, Oakland rapper and producer Ovrkast. has just shared his new EP KASTGOTWINGS, a seven-track joint tape with fellow production heavyweight Cardo. Marked by smooth, piano-fueled beats and pensive lyricism, KASTGOTWINGS is a sleek fusion of jazz and hip-hop from two of rap's most inspired maestros. The release follows "CUT UP", which was praised by Hypebeast, HipHopDX, Okayplayer, and BrooklynVegan, as well as recent singles "PAYMEAGRIP" and "BIPPERS JOINT".

After first making waves with his 2020 debut solo album Try Again, KASTGOTWINGS serves as the exclamation point on a career-minting run for the Oakland newcomer. He's recently collaborated with the likes of Drake ("Red Button" and "The Shoe Fits"), Earl Sweatshirt ("EL TORO COMBO MEAL"), redveil ("automatic"), and MAVI ("Chiasma" and "Reason"). Known for his work with Drake ("God's Plan"), Kendrick Lamar ("GOD."), and Travis Scott ("goosebumps"), it's also been a massive 2024 for Grammy award-winning super-producer Cardo, who has already laid key tracks for Playboi Carti, ScHoolboy Q, 21 Savage, Lil Yachty, and Brent Faiyaz this year.

Hailed for his jazz-influenced, sample-based production style and meditative bars, Ovrkast. has made a name for himself as one of the new faces of Bay Area hip-hop for his thoughtful lyricism and minimalist sound. Following the aforementioned Try Again, he released six-track project RESET!in 2023, which featured "TBH!", his biggest song to date, and made a standout appearance alongside MAVI on Charlotte rapper MESSIAH!'s "silent heel" this summer. Now, Ovrkast. has teamed up with Cardo for their new collab EP KASTGOTWINGS — further solidifying him as one of the most sought-after tastemakers of his generation.

[randomvarious]

1998 San Francisco Playlist (YouTube)

Really ain't nothin' like the city of San Francisco when it comes to the music. The hippie-psychedelic Haight-Ashbury vibes of the 60s ended up getting baked into the cyber-psychonautic underground rave scene of the 90s; there's been a whole bunch of house music; a rich folk tradition; Bay Area hip hop developed into its own oft-overlooked entity; a pretty deep pocket of turntablism; and, of course, plenty of indie rock too. Quite a mix of scenes, and I'm obviously missing a bunch too!

So this week I'm giving you all something that feels like a long-forgotten CD that some college kid who was attending school in San Francisco may have burnt back in 1998. It's an eclectic, completely underground mix of electronic, hip hop, and a little bit of indie too; and it's been collecting dust at the bottom of a drawer now for over 25 years!

We kick off with a dubby deep house remix of Paris' A Reminiscent Drive's "Two Sides to Every Story" by SF native Charles Webster—14.4K plays on YouTube across a handful of uploads—and then we follow that up with a mix of UK group Globo's "Breakdown" by legendary breakbeat/trip hop pioneer Jack Dangers of Meat Beat Manifesto, who started calling the Golden Gate City his home in 1993—under 500 plays on that one as of right now. A little after that we get more breakbeat from a *very* obscure duo called Astralabe, whose cinematic, tribal-psychedelic masterpiece, "Guimbri Dub (Self-Cremating Fire of Passion Remix)," appears to be the only song that they ever released, and is included exclusively on an uncredited DJ mix called The Vertical Iris; currently sitting at a measly 92 plays.

Then on the hip hop side of things, we have some lo-fi dustiness from Double Life and Raw B called "Cycles of the Mind," as well as a 7-plus-minute medley by Sacred Hoop, DJ Marz, and Z-Man called "Not Our House," which I think can only be best described as Tony Hawk Pro Skater soundtrack vibe. Those songs have 28.8K and 6.6K plays, respectively. And then for some killer turntablism, we've got a few tunes, including something from DJ Badrok called "1-800-Coming Correct," which has a little under 400 plays.

There's also a fat, buzzy bassline drum n bass remix by a guy named DJ Abstract of "Dukes Up," the original version of which is by someone who simply went by the name of W, that has a little over 6.5K plays (sorry about the super annoying part at the end of it 😕); and a couple tunes that show the versatility of a dude named Cole Marquis, whose solo indie folk tune, "48's," only has a little over 140 plays, and his much peppier, college/indie rock, keyboard-aided bop, "Dirt Bike Rider," by his band The Snowmen, has a little over 170 plays.

This playlist is ordered as chronologically as possible.

Reminiscent Drive - "Two Sides To Every Story (Love From San Francisco Remix)" Globo - "Breakdown (mixed by Jack Dangers of Meat Beat Manifesto)" Daisy Glow - "Right On! (User Friendly mix)" Astralabe - "Guimbri Dub (Self-Cremating Fire of Passion Remix)" Rasco - "Cordless Mics" Cole Marquis - "48's" Double Life feat. Raw B - "Cycles of the Mind" Live Human - "Almost Live" Sacred Hoop feat. DJ Marz & Z-Man - "Not Our House" DJ Badrok - "1-800-Coming Correct" Apollo, Vinroc, Shortkut & Richness - "Live at Cue's" W - "Dukes Up (DJ Abstract's One A.M. mix)" Snowmen - "Dirt Bike Rider"

And here's a list of the compilations and mixes that were used to put this thing together:

Club H Vol. 2 by Harry the Bastard (2000, Statra Recordings) The Chemistry Set (1998, Hypnotic Records) The Vertical Iris (1998, ZoëMagik Records) Observation of Ruins (1998, Baraka Foundation) Cleaning House: A Devil in the Woods Compilation (1999, Devil in the Woods) Cue's Hip Hop Shop Volume One (1998, Dogday Records) Eclectic Electric (2000, eMusic)

And this playlist is also on YouTube Music.

So you've got about 66 minutes of some pretty obscure 1998 San Francisco underground music here, the likes of which I don't think anyone else besides that hypothetical college kid that I made up before would ever put together 😁.

Going back to the 70s next week with an update to a genre playlist that I haven't touched in a *very* long time 👀.

Enjoy!

More to come, eventually. Stay tuned!

Like what you hear? Follow me on Spotify and YouTube for more cool playlists and uploads!

[adware1k]

https://youtu.be/3IapygP25Xg Vitamin1000 – Club Vitamin 3

[wwwdlabrie]

SAT 8/12 - DLabrie performing Live in Daegu,Korea - Hip Hop/Afro Beats/Caribbean/Dancehall/Latin/Soca... Bruk Out/Party + J-God,Big Easy,Woosah,Obie

SAT 8/12 - DLabrie performing Live in Daegu, Korea - Hip Hop/Afro Beats/Caribbean/Dancehall/Latin/Soca...Bruk Out Party + J-God, Big Easy, Woosah, Obie

SAT 8/12 – DLabrie performing Live in Daegu,Korea – Hip Hop/Afro Beats/Caribbean/Dancehall/Latin/Soca… Bruk Out/Party + J-God, Big Easy, Woosah, Obie New Playlist – DLabrie – Afro Beat/Dance Hall/Hip Hop Mash UPS for DJ’s & Fans! Remixes by J-God & Big Easy Click to Listen to New Playlist – DLabrie – Afro Beat/Dance Hall/Hip Hop Mash UPS for DJ’s & Fans

[gorillacampflow]

LAYY-REALLY Shot By T.BrittVisuals

[votava-records]

Brain Stormin · Grouch

Album: 20,000 Leagues Under The Streets: Volume 1

[mannyblacque]

[trapangeles]

The Liq Podcast Episode 51: Bay Area Talent Shines with Tooch MaGooch Taking the Crown

Another electric night at The Liq Podcast went down this week, with Episode 51 serving up unforgettable performances, heated competition, and plenty of vibes. If you weren’t tuned in, you missed out on an epic showcase featuring rising talents and one undeniable standout.

The night belonged to Bay Area’s very own @toochmagooch_, who claimed the top spot with a performance that brought energy, charisma, and lyrical finesse. Representing for female artists, she showed why the Bay is always a force to be reckoned with. Whether it was her stage presence or her undeniable connection with the crowd, Toochmagooch_ left it all on the mic, proving that the future of hip-hop is in good hands. 🏆✨

Holding it down on the turntables was Dj Cheeseburger, who set the tone for the night with his dynamic mixes and crowd-pleasing tracks. From classic bangers to new hits, Cheeseburger kept the energy high and the audience locked in from start to finish.

As always, The Liq Podcast delivered a platform where indie artists get their shine, and this episode was no different. It’s a space for discovery, connection, and celebration of the raw talent that’s shaping the music scene.

Missed Episode 51? Don’t trip—catch the next one LIVE every Monday and Wednesday at 9:00 PM PST. Who will take the crown next? Only one way to find out. Tap in and witness the future of music unfold.

💻 Stream episodes and join the movement as The Liq Podcast continues to amplify the voices of the underground.

Have you been spending all your money and time on making music and shooting videos, but still not getting any exposure? Tired of just spinning your wheels? You know to get exposure you need to get featured on blogs, radio stations, playlist, and get your music e-mail blasted out to the masses. Need help getting all that done? Then check out the Package we’ve made available for you below!

Like & Listen To Our Spotify Playlist

trapLAXradio On The Air Now!

The Latest Music, Videos, News, Entertainment……

[thelensofyashunews]

SEMATARY SHARES NEW MIXTAPE BLOODY ANGEL

Sematary, the Northern California-based experimental rapper and producer, has just shared his highly-anticipated mixtape Bloody Angel, along with a music video for the intro "Bloody Angel". Since releasing his pioneering debut mixtape Rainbow Bridge in 2019, backed by fan-favorite tracks like “Bunny Suit” (13M+ Streams) and “Slaughter House” (12M+ Streams), Sematary has gained a massive cult-like fan base, accumulating over 100 Million streams as an independent artist. As the founder and leader of the Haunted Mound collective, Sematary's emerged as the leader of his own wave – pulling elements from the drone-influenced sounds of Salem, and the SoundCloud-era Trap music from Gucci Mane and Zaytoven to create an unforgiving, distorted sound. Typically rapping over blown-out 808s and self-produced guitar riffs, the accompanying deep-fried visuals and haunting aesthetic have become synonymous with Sematary and his movement, evoking the feeling of rural American decay. Pushing the sonic boundaries of genre and meshing all of his influences together into a raucous sound, Sematary has performed at Lyrical Lemonade’s Summer Smash Festival, toured as direct support on $uicideboy$Grey Day stadium tour and kicked this year off with his long-awaited Chief Keef collaboration on “Fuck the World” from the forthcoming FTP mixtape. Following up last year's Butcher House tape, Sematary's fifth project Bloody Angel is out now.

Backed by its lead singles “Wendigo”, which features a self-produced shoegaze riff and a synth-pop drumline and "Headlights", which features a blown-out 808s and self-destructive lyricism, Bloody Angel is an embodiment of all his artistic influences. After spending the past four tapes pioneering the distorted Trap / Black Metal mashup sound, Bloody Angel finds Sematary fully leaning into these influences and cementing his influential stature in this scene. Boasting select features from Wicca Phase Springs Eternal, Haunted Mound members Hackle and Buckshot, as well as Chicago rapper Lil Flash, Bloody Angel even finds Sematary sampling Darkthrone on "Hearse Truck". While tracks like the intro "Bloody Angel" and "Mordor" push the limits of extreme distortion, tracks like "Demon In Pain" showcase the candid vulnerability behind Sematary's music – capturing the spirit of a true outsider who's stuck to his own sound without paying any mind to mainstream trends.

The new release of Bloody Angel arrives on the heels of the forthcoming Haunted Mound Angels Tour – kicking off in Florida next week, where he'll be joined by fellow Haunted Mound members Hackle, Buckshot, Oscar18 and Anvil, performing throughout North America before making their way through Europe and the UK. As he continues to lean into his distorted sound and terrorizing aesthetics, Sematary is revitalizing the very sound that he’s spearheaded, taking his brazen self-production to ambitious new heights while contributing to his mercurial status as the pioneer of a burgeoning underground scene that defies trends.

[randomvarious]

California Hip Hop Playlist (YouTube)

This ain’t your typical Cali rap classics playlist, folks. No N.W.A, no Ice Cube, no Dr. Dre, no Snoop Dogg, no 2Pac, and not most of your more popular underground-ish crews either, like Hieroglyphics, Souls of Mischief, or Pharcyde. Simply put, I didn’t come here to give you what you might already know; I came here to drop some obscure and ephemeral Cali-made gold on all your asses: a series of L.A. and Bay Area boom bap raps with hard-knocking, head-nod-inducing beats, along with some exquisite turntablism excursions too. I’m talking Soul Father Rasco, Evidence, Planet Asia, Visionaries, Lootpack, Insane Poetry, DJ Babu, KutMasta Kurt, and Rakaa-Iriscience, to name just a few.

And those are actually just the more popular underground names that appear on this thing, because I’ve got even more cool obscure shit from acts you’re even less likely to have ever heard of too, like Double Life, who appear to have been doing lo-fi hip hop before it became cool to study to; Izm da Mad Soul, who’s on some lyrically dense and dark, abstract shit; and Sacred Hoop, whose lighthearted, seven-minute, multi-beat, “Not Our House,” could’ve easily appeared on a Tony Hawk soundtrack. Plus, rare versions of songs that seem to have only appeared exclusively on mixtapes and nowhere else.

But before you start to dive into all of that goodness, things actually kick off in a bit of an unorthodox fashion, with some late 80s left-wing manifesto alt-industrial hip hop from a little trio called Consolidated, who were birthed from the only place that such a type of music could’ve ever come from at that time: San Francisco. Then after that comes all the boom bap and cuts n’ scratches 😎.

This playlist is ordered as chronologically as possible and links are provided below to songs that have been posted about previously in order to give them more context:

Consolidated - “Consolidated (Adorno Strength mix)” Rasco & Kutmasta Kurt - “Me & My Crew” Rasco feat. Defari & Evidence - “Major League (M-Boogie Remix)” Rasco - “Cordless Mics” The Visionaries - “Blessings” Double Life feat. Raw B - “Cycles of the Mind” Izm da Mad Soul - “Maintaining Izmatic Degrees” Live Human - “Almost Live” Sacred Hoop feat. DJ Marz & Z-Man - “Not Our House” DJ Badrok - “1-800-Coming Correct” Apollo, Vinroc, Shortkut & Richness - “Live at Cue’s” Rakaa feat. DJ Babu - “On Deadly Ground” Joey Chavez feat. Evidence - “Reservation for One” Kutmasta Kurt feat. Master of Illusion & Motion Man - “Magnum Be I” Planet Asia feat. 427 - “Bringin’ It Back (M-Boogie Alternative Version)” DJ Dusk - “Meditation, Part 1″ Lootpack - “Weededed” Babu - “I’ve Always Wanted to Be a DJ” Insane Poetry feat. DJ Melo-D - “Lyrical Catacombs”

Playlist is also on YouTube Music.

Also, consider checking out these more specific Cali rap playlists too:

1990s California Hip Hop: YouTube / YouTube Music 1998 California Hip Hop: YouTube / YouTube Music

Enjoy!

More to come, eventually. Stay tuned!

Like what you hear? Follow me on Spotify and YouTube for more cool playlists and uploads!

[gorillacampflow]

Caveman | "MERKED HIM" | Shot by @INFGANG

[votava-records]

The Gift of Gab "Protocol"

Rest in Power!

The Gift of Gab "Protocol" from the Gift of Gab album 'THE NEXT LOGICAL PROGRESSION' available on Quannum Projects

[wwwdlabrie]

SAT 8/12 - DLabrie performing Live in Daegu,Korea - Hip Hop/Afro Beats/Caribbean/Dancehall/Latin/Soca... Bruk Out/Party + J-God,Big Easy,Woosah,Obie! Celebrating 50 years of Hip Hop! Happy Birthday to the Culture

SAT 8/12 - DLabrie performing Live in Daegu,Korea - Hip Hop/Afro Beats/Caribbean/Dancehall/Latin/Soca... Bruk Out/Party + J-God, Big Easy, Woosah, Obie! Celebrating 50 years of Hip Hop! Happy Birthday to the Culture

SAT 8/12 – DLabrie performing Live in Daegu,Korea – Hip Hop/Afro Beats/Caribbean/Dancehall/Latin/Soca… Bruk Out/Party + J-God, Big Easy, Woosah, Obie! Celebrating 50 years of Hip Hop! Happy Birthday to the Culture RonDavoux Records & Hip Hop Congress Celebrating 50 years of Hip Hop Happy BirthDay Hip Hop New Playlist – DLabrie – Afro Beat/Dance Hall/Hip Hop Mash UPS for DJ’s & Fans! Remixes…

[dogtoling]

RE: Question about whether the Deepsea and the Octarian Domes are directly connected to each other. sorry i'm stealing your reply @bucketsquid but i see a chance to talk about this i have to take it. So idk let's try to decode how they might actually be connected.

This is the obvious conclusion. For the record I think it's the RIGHT conclusion after Side Order because they seemed to REALLY imply it this time. I thought for a really long time that the Deepsea and Octarian domes HAVE TO be connected because not only are they both subterranean but also literally how else do you get that many freaking Octolings in there? Since the metro is connected to the Inkopolis subway anyway wouldn't it be WAY EASIER TO JUST GET SQUIDS? (though to be honest i still stand by this.)

Anyway the obvious assumption is that the Deepsea and Octarian domes connect to each other. though it's not so straightforward. How they connect to each other exactly? we don't really know. Anyway let's get back into this in just a second i need to show what absolutely dashed my hopes and made me really mad when it happened

THIS MAP. THEY POSTED THIS MAP. Before this map I was having a great time because this is what the map was in my head:

"why was that the map in your head" idk. the giant stretches of water surrounding both canyons and inkopolis stretching into said body of water gave me the mental image that the canyons were in the ocean by inkopolis' coast. alongside some of the very old concept art that shows some of the domes even being underneath inkopolis if i'm not mistaken!

from the art of splatoon 1. this is an ancient and I MEAN ANCIENT manga depicting what is obviously an early concept of the story so it shouldn't ACTUALLY be taken as fact (almost nothing in this manga holds up anymore). But some of the things WERE kept! I have to assume this is also why you get into Octo Valley through the sewer in the games because the story mode was meant to take place literally straight underneath Inkopolis... it makes a lot less sense in the final result when you supposedly take the sewer like 50 kilometers (i dont know the actual distances but i think they're able to be deciphered) underground to a canyon in the middle of nowhere.

Why is there even continuous sewage all that way. What is happening. Is it even a sewer or a really long underground secret tunnel that Captain Cuttlefish dug because he's been really bored for 100 years.

kind of besides the point. back to the issue of the deepsea and the octarian empire being connected. You know, with the Deepsea Metro being located in Inkopolis Bay and the domes supposedly being all over the Inkopolis underground and the surrounding locations, it didn't seem that far fetched that they could siphon Octolings from the underground (where they live) to another very close-by fork of the underground (the Deepsea). However,

1. the Deepsea is NOT Octarian territory, but its own type of society. which is really weird considering how much Octarian iconography is down there, let alone how many OCTARIANS are down there

2. We have SO LITTLE knowledge about the true scope of the Deepsea that you can't even say for sure whether the Deepsea is *JUST* the Deepsea Metro and the facilities and industrial cities in that exact specific area, or if it's a big underwater and underground empire similar in scope to the Octarian domes, maybe even built in the exact same dome network - or a neighboring one. (This would mean they have a border somewhere undefined, underground.)

3. At face value with only the map, this is the distance for a Single Octarian to travel in order to get from where they live/are stationed, to get to the Deepsea Metro which is cluttered with one billion octarians

HELLO? THAT IS SO FAR. it's even worse than the distance Agents 3 and 4 are swimming through the god damn sewer. This also makes very little sense if we assume all the subterranean domes in all of these locations are exclusively under their surface counterparts... which... well, we don't know.

We know that the Deepsea Metro is connected to the Inkopolis Underground (it even shows this on the map with the little dotted line). I don't really know the significance of that but I've taken it to mean that the Deepsea Metro that is highlighted in the map shows specifically the area covered by the Kamabo Corporation and the tests there, and honestly again, I don't even know if the Deepsea is any bigger than that. Since it's been stated to be an independent society from Inkopolis or the Octarians, you would ASSUME there'd be ample space for people to like, live, and maybe work, and produce stuff you need to like, live. Instead of the test facility being literally the only place that exists plus a city built around only that to sustain everything.

Furthermore, we don't know if Octarians have cities on the surface in their part of the surface world! This is something that really bothers me because I think knowing whether or not this is the case would change SO MUCH (i'm currently under the assumption it is a barren wasteland with Literally Nothing). However given the location of the Salmonid Swim Zone, we can SEE cities in the background of multiple stages, and judging by this map those would be mainly on the Octarian coasts. This could mean that Octarians have surface cities where they coexist with the Salmon, it could mean that they USED TO have surface cities and abandoned them, OR it could mean that Salmonids actually live on Octarian surface turf while the Octarians themselves live underground! Idk! There's a lot of options!

I kind of doubt Octarians have cities on the surface because if they did, then it would feel redundant for the game to keep coming back to "the Octoling world" being this horrible military regime underground that people try to get to the surface from. If it was that easy to get to the surface it feels odd that it would be a big deal. We know that the Octarian domes, at least in Octo Valley, are specifically an underground *secret* military base.

(*Secret* being explicitly stated before and it would imply that they wouldn't necessarily NEED to live underground, but it's just way easier to do Secret Things underground. Plus the surface is a wasteland so honestly not a lot to lose there.)

We still haven't really seen what they have aside from that. We don't know where they get their food, for example. There's got to be farmers in a society. There HAS TO be some kind of surface access or activity, and if you squint, Octo Canyon IS a surface city that they seem to have free access to. So why not have others? It seems only logical to have more. In this case the oppression of the Octoling world and being forced to stay underground feels really case-specific, but it seems to also be an overarching thing that's quite widespread, so... I don't know, I WANT MORE OCTARIAN WORLDBUILDING *PLEASE* i'm working with crumbs here.

Anyway. my current assumption of the subterranean areas of the Deepsea and the Octarian empire goes something like this, all things considered that I've talked about...

(Not exactly that but you get the general picture)

When you put it this way, it suddenly makes a lot more sense that Octarians would be getting into the Deepsea. Generally I tried to keep the locations of Octarian tunnel systems to their turf, and the locations of Deepsea tunnels under the ocean floor, though with Octarian domes explicitly stated to have been dug by humans there's. really no reason they couldn't stretch into Inkling territory. We have no idea how big these tunnel systems are in scope, NO idea.

And that's also the problem with trying to solve this part of worldbuilding, because my concept could easily be right but it could also be COMPLETELY wrong! It's totally possible that the dome networks are actually secluded and tiny and are *just* under the Octarian craters and nowhere else, and it's totally possible that the entirety of the Deepsea is JUST Kamabo Co and the few settlements surrounding it. I'm not that confident that I'm right but I'm not really confident that we'll get answers to these questions either, at least as long as the story modes keep intentionally avoiding expanding on existing game locations and pretending theyre not in the splatoon world at all by making their key locations abstract and closed off bubbles on purpoCOUGH HACK who said that

There is 1 thing I've completely failed to mention in this post and it's that Octo Valley and the Deepsea Metro are like, explicitly connected. Which by the way makes NO SENSE given they're on opposite corners of the map. But between what we know from Side Order and from this Official Snippet from Splatoon Base, the Official Splatoon Story Resource By Nintendo,

Ignoring that none of this makes sense anymore or is intentionally misleading compared to what we know from Agent 8's memory loss now. Anyway. This seems to just imply the Deepsea is *under* Octo Valley. WHICH WOULD LINE UP WITH SIDE ORDER, weirdly enough. It is possible that the Deepsea domes could actually OVERLAP with Octarian Domes, it's just built FAR under sea level, not bound to the actual location of the sea itself.

I want to point out that this segment in the splatoon base and the game itself and dev interviews all tend to contradict each other in some ways when you look at them side by side, which is frustrating, but also serves as a reminder that sometimes the official resources don't know exactly what they're talking about either. so it's often not worthwhile looking them up and trying to conclude something based on it just to find out that it's literally contradicted in the game itself.

anyway, we know One Thing now and it's that there's at least no way that Octarian domes and the Deepsea AREN'T connected to each other in some way. this post doesn't exactly solve the issue of How but there was an attempt. I don't think this is ultimately something you can come to a concrete foolproof conclusion on until there is more information. But in the meantime I guess there's speculation.

[foxdrawsz]

Maxley Mafia AU (yes there will be art for this too dw)

Max

Lives just below the poverty line - with his dad getting fired and being forced to go back to college, they're struggling for money big time

Max gets a job at a large company (bradley's fathers company to be precise) and starts embezzling funds to help support his father

Its not a lot, only a few hundred here and there - enough to get them by but not too much to be caught

Little does he know that the company he works for is the literal fucking MAFIA

Bradley

Is employed at his fathers business

His father runs the most successful business in the country, and naturally with a man as powerful as his father they have *lots* of ties to *a lot* of important people (he basically runs an underground mafia to keep other competitors at bay/out of his way)

When they hire Max and Bradley finds out he's annoyed that he has to deal with him both at college and at his fathers work

He absolutely makes it his mission to annoy Max as much as possible

The company itself def know abt Max's embezzlement but its not a large amount so its not a huge concern

Regardless they set Bradley up to "take care of him" (unalive lol), seeing as they're classmates and Bradley already knows him

So with max now on his hitlist he has to get close enough to Max to take him out (on a date? with a sniper? who knows)

Bradley ends up falling in love with him instead

The plot to eliminate Max is essentially getting Bradley to lure him away and dispose of him, but he keeps fucking up - max catches him off guard by being, well- max

Slipping a drug into Max's drink while taking him out to coffee, only for him to "spill" Max's drink last second, as Max tells him about his struggles for money, how everything he does is for his father.

Hiding a knife up his sleeve as he and Max walk through a secluded area of town, preparing to plunge the blade into his back, only for Max to turn around and grin at him, so happy and content to just be there with him, with Bradley, that he fumbles. That kindness, being directed at him of all people- it’s not something he's ever had before.

Bradley feels bad for trying to kill him but tells himself it wont happen again (it does. a lot.)

Eventually the evil plots become less evil and turn into genuine requests to hang out and spend time with Max. Max is clueless to the entire thing, and just thinks Bradley's being nice, albeit a little insistent, by inviting him out so often.

They find themselves star gazing in a field, and Bradley cant help but reach out for Max's hand- he's so close, Max's body mere inches away from his own. Max glances over, his eyes reflecting the stars above and gods he may as well be the galaxy because Bradley can't stop staring.

They don't talk about what happened that night, but they both know that something changed

After that, Max starts to notice things about Bradley - the faint freckles on his face, the way his hair falls in front of his eyes when he reads, the way he tenses up at the mention of his family, how passionate he is when talking about literature and poetry, how he likes rainy weather and hates the boiling hot summers- he notices everything.

And then he notices something he shouldn't.

A paper- multiple papers in fact -fallen out of Bradley's books after they were tossed haphazardly onto a desk. papers detailing his embezzlement and notes about-

his murder.

Bradley was trying to kill him?