Culture

The Hamilton Mixtape: a brand new take on the musical featuring artists from Busta Rhymes to Sia

Lin-Manuel Miranda announces the track listing, confirms it’s going to blow us all away.

by Caroline Framke

Updated Nov 4, 2016, 12:48 PM UTC

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Hamilton the Musical: Broadway’s revolutionary hit show

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Caroline Framke wrote about culture, which usually means television. Also seen @ The A.V. Club, The Atlantic, Complex, Flavorwire, NPR, the fridge to get more seltzer.

Just when it seemed Hamilton might release us from its vice grip of tight rhymes and unbridled enthusiasm, Lin-Manuel Miranda went ahead and announced the official release date and track listing for The Hamilton Mixtape — and by the looks of it, we’re in for another solid year of getting Miranda’s melodies stuck in our heads all over again.

The mixtape — which you can preorder starting November 4 for a December 2 release — is a collaboration between Miranda and a host of other artists. Everyone involved will be taking on tracks from the musical, and even some of the musical’s cut B-sides, in their own styles.

And whoa, it is stacked.

Some highlights, according to the track listing currently on Amazon UK:

None other than Usher will perform Aaron Burr’s show-stopping number “Wait for It.” Jill Scott will croon her way through “Say No to This,” the too-sexy-for-comfort infidelity jam that lands Hamilton in so much hot water — but her version may be sung more squarely from seductress Mariah Reynolds’s perspective, since it’s called “Say Yes to This.”

Miranda even got Busta Rhymes — an inspiration for Hamilton’s Hercules Mulligan — to join Slaughterhouse’s Joell Ortiz and Fun’s Nate Ruess on “My Shot,” the rollicking group rap number that establishes Hamilton as a force to be reckoned with from the start. (You can buy this one now on iTunes, or listen to it for free on Spotify.)

Meanwhile, Wiz Khalifa will be doing a version of Act Two’s smooth diss track “Washington on Your Side” called “Washingtons by Your Side.” So that’s excellent.

The rest of the mixtape truly runs the genre gamut, from piano virtuosos Regina Spektor and Ben Folds taking on ballad “Dear Theodosia” to Minnesotan spoken-word singer Dessa performing a searing Angelica Schuyler outtake to Kelly Clarkson reporting for heartbreak duty on “It’s Quiet Uptown” (which you can also buy now on iTunes, or listen to for free on Spotify).

Also, if you ever turned on a radio around the turn of the millennium, the track “Helpless (feat. Ja Rule)” by Ashanti might spark some giddy nostalgia. (Or maybe that’s just me, but if so, I have to ask: Why must you deny yourself joy?!)

Original Hamilton cast recording producers the Roots also tap in throughout the mixtape. As Questlove told Vanity Fair in March, “The brilliant thing about [Hamilton] was and is that this project has legs beyond just the play and the cast album.”

In other words: Creating a mixtape with some of the artists who inspired Hamilton in the first place — not to mention those inspired by Hamilton — felt like a natural next step. Looking at this track listing, it’s a hard point to argue.

So if you, like me, are a fan who thought your interest in Hamilton might be waning even just a little, it looks like we’re all going to have to prepare ourselves for a whole new wave of obsession.

Here is the full track listing for The Hamilton Mixtape:

1. “No John Trumbull (Intro),” the Roots

2. “My Shot (feat. Busta Rhymes, Joell Ortiz & Nate Ruess) [Rise Up Remix],” the Roots

3. “Wrote My Way Out,” Nas, Dave East, Lin-Manuel Miranda & Aloe Blacc

4. “Wait For It,” Usher

5. “An Open Letter (feat. Shockwave) [Interlude],” Watsky

6. “Satisfied (feat. Miguel & Queen Latifah),” Sia

7. “Dear Theodosia (feat. Ben Folds),” Regina Spektor

8. “Valley Forge (Demo),” Lin-Manuel Miranda

9. “It’s Quiet Uptown,” Kelly Clarkson

10. “That Would Be Enough,” Alicia Keys

11. “Immigrants (We Get the Job Done),” K’naan, Snow Tha Product, Riz MC, Residente