By Nicholas Kobe, Staff Writer 

[Hot Girl Production; 2024]

Rating: 8/10

Megan Thee Stallion continues to up her game on “HISS”. This song follows “Cobra” as Megan’s second single in her new snake-themed era. While “Cobra” lyrically deals with Megan’s personal struggles, on “HISS” Megan returns to a place of confidence to put the rest of the rap world around her on blast in one of music’s first big moments of 2024. 

The track begins with a 10-second spoken intro, where Megan makes the mission of “HISS” abundantly clear: “I’m finna get this sh*t off my chest and lay it to rest”. For the rest of the track, Meg does exactly that. Megan’s trademark “hot girl sh*t” braggadocio is here in full force, coupled with some vicious shots at some of her rap peers.

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A lot of ink has already been spilled over “These h*es don’t be mad at Megan, these h*es mad at Megan’s Law”, which many believe was her calling out Nicki Minaj for supporting her brother and husband, who are both sex offenders according to The Slate. While this line has overshadowed a lot of the song, it’s undoubtedly a fantastic moment. 

A majority of Meg’s most pointed moments in the song are about Tory Lanez shooting her in the foot in 2020, and the other rappers who have continued to support him, even though he was convicted and is in jail over the incident. 

Meg’s references to Drake are some of my personal favorites like, “These n*ggas hate on BBLs and be walkin’ ’round with the same scars”. These pointed lyrics add a diss track-like sting to the song, even if Meg isn’t tackling one person for the whole run time. Aside from that, Meg’s confidence is infectious with lines like, “Why every time one of y’all Z-list hoes do an interview, I get mentioned?” and “Ever since I claimed the summer, all you bitches want a season”. 

There are too many noteworthy lyrics in “HISS” for me to mention here, and it’s a testament to Megan’s technical writing abilities. With just a few lines here and there, she can touch so many nerves and drum up so much discussion. 

What production is here is dark. Mainly driven by a pretty standard trap beat, low ominous piano, and an eerie choir thrown in for extra flavor, what is here is good, but it’s not driving the song. That’s Meg’s job.

“HISS” allows Meg to showcase her flow and her voice in an extremely powerful way. Her flow is infectious here and she switches it up at exactly the right moments to give the song a sense of progress. To go along with the lyrics, Meg’s delivery and voice is very aggressive. While there are moments where she seems a little more laid back, Megan is spitting every word of this song with vitriol and dead serious aggression that makes every shot she takes hit that much harder.

Megan Thee Stallion has once again proved that not only can she get people talking, but she has the technical ability and pen game to back up all of the hype. “HISS” is another promising single from this era of Meg, and I’m very excited to see what comes next.

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