- Mon, 2010-12-13 12:07
We’ve already featured underground hip hop producer Oddisee this year following his superb work on the new album by Trek Life and now he’s back, this time manning the desk for emcee Stik Figa, a resident of Topeka, Kansas, on his new EP From The Top.
Coming from a small mid-western town, it should come as no real surprise that Stik Figa has found it hard to make much of an impact beyond local grassroots scenes; opportunities are few and far between in his neck of the woods where hip hop is a marginal genre in a traditionally white Republican town with a troubled racial past. But despite the tricky hand dealt him by his hometown he still has love for the place, and it’s upon this complicated relationship that he expounds in a fantastic show of lyricism on title track From The Top.
Oddisee backs Stik’s lyrics up with an epic-sounding production. Opening with a brittle and simplistic piano riff, a weighty beat and doleful horns create a portentous atmosphere that builds to a chorus swathed in beautifully arranged strings, tinged with a slight hint of dissonance as if to reflect the tensions about which Stik raps.
Check out the mini-documentary with Stik Figa below, and head to Oddisee’s bandcamp page for a free download of the EP while the offer lasts.
