You've heard tracks from all those typical producers, with their overused stock sounds, right? Well, look out unoriginality,
Black Spade is here with a laundry list of unconventional influences to serve us beats that are anything but stale.
The music is unavoidably tied to his home locale of St. Louis, but he wants nothing to do with the radio giants of similar origin (
Nelly,
Chingy). These pop acts don't walk the same line that Black Spade does. His one man show (he writes, produces and MC's) creates off-kilter beats and unexpected twists and turns with every layered vocal and synth. His "melting pot of sound" has been attributed to his eclectic music taste, which includes not only an extensive hip-hop library, but his fathers collection of jazz and soul, psychedelic rock, folk, comedy, and more. He listens to
Prince and
Dilla on the same day as
Bloc Party and
Radiohead. And then he uses all of them as ingredients in his bubbling pot of hip-hop soup. Good thing the stock is always his signature voice; spitting some serious flow over his consistently engaging mixes. Tasty.
To Serve With Love (
OM Records) is out now. -
joe puglisi
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Black Spade on Myspace
