Pink Siifu Ensley

stream Pink Siifu's 'ensley,' see him in NYC w/ Quelle Chris & Armand Hammer tonight

Tonight (10/9), Ridgewood, NY venue H0L0 (1090 Wyckoff Ave) hosts an all-around killer bill of indie/underground/experimental rap with Quelle Chris, Pink Siifu, Amani, Armand Hammer (aka Billy Woods + Elucid), Ted Kamal, and AKA $olo. Tickets are on sale.

We wrote earlier this year about Quelle Chris’ great new collaborative album with Jean Grae, and Armand Hammer’s great new album Paraffin, and we’d also like to shine a light on Alabama-born, Cincinnati-raised, LA-based rapper Pink Siifu’s great new album ensley. Pink Siifu’s Bandcamp is full of tons of music under his Pink Siifu, ilye, and [email protected] monikers, and spans various genres including rap, soul, jazz and punk. “I love dub and jazz. I love Sun Ra and Andre 3000. They’re my favorite musicians ever. I love a lot of Prince. I love Bad Brains. My ex and her friends put me on to Bad Brains. I was like, ‘What the fuck? I have to make that shit for us.’,” Siifu told Passion of the Weiss. He also namedrops D’Angelo, Erykah Badu, Jill Scott, OutKast, Lil Wayne, and Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon as formative influences. For ensley, Siifu made a sprawling, 25-song album of psychedelic jazz rap that should probably appeal to fans of classic stuff like Digable Planets and newer stuff like Noname. It’s a little more lo-fi than those artists, but in a way that still sounds warm and rich. Siifu’s got a skillful delivery that can go from poetic to conversational, and on this album he tends to favor gorgeous, colorful instrumentals. It’s very cool stuff and we recommend streaming it below.

Also listen to other artists on the bill…

Quelle Chris Pink Siifu