Sifting through the weekly barrage of new music in order to quickly taste-make isn't my forte or really my style; I like to let music marinate. But over the long weekend I stumbled across St. Paul native Lil Spook (aka Spooky Black), who managed to captivate me despite donning an unignorable moniker that evokes a racial epithet and the fact that he looks like the descendent of Dj Quall's character in Hustle & Flow. Lil Spook's music is like that distantly strange guy in the corner of the bar that you don't speak to unless you both happen to be taking a smoke at the same time. You don't expect him to be well spoken and introspective but amidst ethereal trap productions from Dj Luxurious and Greaf, he has some beautiful insight. Lil Spook's lyrics are more reminiscent of the sensual musings of Rhye and Inc. than the misogynistic and materialistic content that helped inform his sonic influence; imagine if Bobby Brown, D'Angelo, and Lil Ugly Mane's music copulated. Half a sardonic head shake directed toward contemporary R'n'B, half a nostalgic ghost conflicted between life and death, Lil Spook manages to be one of music's most interesting and promising prospects.
Black Silk in it's entirety
