A Sufi & A Killer

by Gonjasufi

This is a hard album to describe.  It opens to the sound of native drumming and chanting, creating a sinister feel to the album.  From there, we begin to hear a very distorted hiphop beat; it's a little like listening to rap music coming from a different floor of an apartment building, while a few units over another neighbour sings through a megaphone.  That's how 'Ancestors', the second track, sounds to me.

This aesthetic is the dominant one, but there are other tracks, such as 'Sheep,' a song about the differences between lions, sheep, and vegetarianism, which is very loving and delicate.

The production is mostly by The Gaslamp Killer, with other tracks provided by Flying Lotus and Mainframe (sounding nothing like his Johnson & Jonson album with Blu).  This disc constantly surprises as it moves through many moods and themes.  At times I detect a country influence, and I thought that 'Klowds' sounded a lot like Mos Def, circa The New Danger.

This works as a nice companion piece to the new Flying Lotus album, both musically and in terms of its artwork and design.