Rod Lee’s “Puff That Lye” is a remix of the 1996 banger “Puff That Lye” by KW Griff, DJ Booman, and K-Life, who handles the vocals and beat. K-Life traces that original back to a local world where weed was everywhere but not necessarily something people in Baltimore were making records about.
“I really made it for, like, the hood,” he told the Beat. “It wasn’t really nothing that I was expecting to be out there like that.”
K-Life says the song took off around Oliver Street and Milton Avenue, with cars pulling up loud, people hearing the song on the block, dancing, and then going back to whatever they were doing. It is a better picture than any broad statement about influence could give: The song didn’t become important because somebody declared it important; it became important because the neighborhood heard itself in it.
K-Life says “Arizona” was the strain in the air back then, placing the song in an older Baltimore weed memory, before Sour Diesel became the shorthand.
“I bang all my pieces out from the hi-hat all the way to the bass,” K-Life says, noting that he was using a fully expanded analog ASR-10. You can hear the hands-on construction in it, the grit and punch of something built close to the body instead of assembled at a distance.
A decade later, Lee remixed the track as “Puff That Lye.” It works because he didn’t talk about the track like a museum piece, but recognized it as a record built to move. “I’m a DJ before I was on beats,” he says. “I make beats as a DJ, not as a producer.”
You can hear that, with the drop, timing, and swing utilizing the ASR-10 to make something meant to hit people in real time, not just sit there as a revision of an old favorite.
“When I hear something,” Lee says, “I already know what I want to do.” That directness suits “Puff That Lye.” The record does not feel overworked. It feels instinctive, the kind of Baltimore Club remix that understands exactly where to push and where to leave the original alone.
But Lee’s weed stories bring in some looseness without pulling the song off course. Asked about smoking, he drifts into a memory of taking a smoke hit too hard while DJing off Charles Street. It also gives the piece a useful contrast: K-Life sounds like the rooted neighborhood voice of the record, while Rod Lee sounds like the remixer who knows how to turn that raw material into movement.
And when K-Life comes back in, on Lee’s version, it brings the song back to its roots, like an old friend stopping by with a blunt.
“Puff That Lye” by Rod Lee is available on Bandcamp and elsewhere. (Derick Little Jr.)
One night I shared some of the weed tincture I make with members of the trans glam punk band Suppai Helwa, and they found themselves too stoned and arguing with each other in front of The Royal Blue as John Waters walked by. A beautiful Baltimore moment.
The band returned the favor by writing one of my go-to too-stoned songs, “We’re OK.” Because, let’s face it, sometimes we toke up because the world is just too fucking much — and then, instead of calming us, the weed ramps up whatever weirdness we were feeling about the state of the world.
I imagine this is all much more intense for trans folks, so “We’re OK,” off the band’s debut album, “Shiny,” from the tail end of 2024, isn’t a statement of blithe optimism, but rather a burst of defiance that begins with singer Min (they prefer not to use last names) counting off to “One, two, fucking A,” followed by an almost surprised “I feel OK today,” which finally erupts into the chant “What the fuck? What the fuck? We’re OK.”
The vocals are a bratty, brash singsong lilt backed up by drummer Hellcat’s fierce pounding, a propulsive bassline by Ebi, and guitarist Vikki’s choppy, churning riffs. “I was aimlessly driving around one day when ‘Song 2’ by Blur came on. As I was listening to it, I couldn’t help but wonder what that song would sound like if it was less British and more good,” Vikki told the Beat over text. But, when Vikki brought the song to Min, it quickly transcended its original impulse.
“I really wanted us to have a band theme song like the Power Rangers, a mantra we could shout to lift our spirits when things feel hard,” Min said over text.
That’s a gift to us all, who can use the song in the same way, as I’ve done countless times when I’ve found myself one toke over the line. Fucking A.
“We’re OK” is available on Bandcamp and elsewhere. (Baynard Woods)
One night in 2020 after binge-watching “At Home With Amy Sedaris” in his Baltimore living room, Micah E. Wood got high out of his mind. The next day, he began writing one of his better-known dance cuts. With vocals inspired by Steve Miller Band’s trippy “Fly Like an Eagle” and cameos from local musicians including Dan Ryan of indie rock band Super City, “Too High” reflects Wood’s admiration for pop groups like ABBA, as well as his love for his now-wife.
“I was thinking about the first time I knew I loved her, which was at a Cate Le Bon show in DC at the Black Cat. I just looked over at her, and the lights were shining on her in such a beautiful way. The disco ball was down. I think we can all kind of put ourselves [there], at a concert, looking at someone we love,” Wood, a friend and collaborator, told the Beat.
Most stoners can also relate to Wood’s struggle of being too high to enjoy being high, too. It’s a delicate balance. But, sometimes, dancing it away can help. This track presents the perfect groovy, lovably neurotic opportunity to do just that.
“Too High” is available on Bandcamp and elsewhere. (Grace Hebron)
Apollo RNGD’s “Magic” is the kind of song that hides its weight inside its ease. On the surface, this decade-old song plays like a laid-back smoke track, something airy enough to ride with and loose enough to let the hook settle in. But underneath that easygoing pull is a song about survival, self-medication, friendship, and the small forms of gratitude that can keep somebody grounded when life feels unstable. That tension is what gives “Magic” its shape. It floats, but it does not drift.
“Magic” gets a lot of its staying power from Dre Rodner’s production, which gives Apollo RNGD a hazy, steady backdrop that lets the song feel warm without softening its emotional core. Apollo does not oversell its meaning.
RNGD wrote this song coming out of a dark headspace, when music finally made it “feel like it was okay to be here.” That feeling gives “Magic” more depth than a typical 420 track. It is not just a song about smoking; it is a song about what smoking, community, and reflection can represent when somebody is trying to steady themselves.
He describes the first verse as gratitude, shaped by “the people around me” and by “this wonderful plant that we have,” framing weed as one part of a wider circle of support. The second verse, he says, is for “the haters,” where he leans into harder bars and uses pressure as motivation. By the third verse, the song softens into what he calls “a little love note,” giving “Magic” a structure that moves from appreciation to defiance to tenderness.
“Magic” does not sound like a copy of the city’s dominant rap modes, but it still feels tied to Baltimore through its looseness, its directness, and the way it treats vibe as something communal rather than disposable.
“Magic” is available on Soundcloud and elsewhere. (Derick Little Jr.)
“You are now listening to 103.5, The Johnny Lama Radio / We got the best tunes, we got the best vibes.” There’s just something about hearing local musician John Tyler, who sounds like a young Baltimore Barry White when he sings and talks, set the smooth stage for this mellowed-out banger, his very own “Ode to Joy.” If you try hard enough, when you listen to his signature guitar work and appreciate that ultra-funky bassline, you can teleport to Pennsylvania Avenue’s Robert C. Marshall Park (one of the many homes of Love Groove, Tyler’s annual music, arts, and culture festival) and spread a picnic blanket in the sunny grass.
“Joy” is available on Bandcamp and elsewhere. (Grace Hebron)