The first two tracks on clipping.’s new album Dead Channel Sky give you the blueprint for the scuffed up rapture that is yet to come. The opener ‘Intro’ is full of dial-up whine and staccato words that sound like the album booting up. It cliff-edges into ‘Dominator’ with static bursts fizzing around a sparse backing, a simple keyboard riff, beats like hammer blows, and the dazzlingly fast delivery of words by rapper Daveed Diggs.
clipping. are the trio of Diggs and producers William Hutson and Jonathan Snipes working at the experimental end of rap/hip-hop, an exhilarating sub-genre which seeks to stretch the boundaries of a globally ubiquitous style of music that’s now 50 years old. With modern technology’s ability to manipulate, warp, deconstruct and rebuild sounds in myriad ways clipping. mix the beauty and beast into their exquisitely chaotic tracks.
clipping. are not afraid to explore sonic abrasion. There is cathode tube snow, digital malfunctions and the data-overload feel of white water rafting down fibre optic data cables. This is ‘GlitchWorld’, a digital theme park and they are your guide on a wild ride that brings sci-fi to the hi-fi, and this is an act that have had two of their records nominated for Hugo Awards.
It’s often hard to comprehend how anyone can lay down so many words, but on cuts like ‘Dominator’, ‘Change the Channel’ (video below) and ‘Dodger’ it’s emotionally and literally breath-taking to hear Diggs fire out lines with such crisp delivery. Every syllable is on point without stumble or slur, and by the time you have read “Scanning international space for a satellite that’s out of place shouldn’t be a red light shining on the face of this analyst but the interface is all solid and that’s bad. Time for everybody to find a crash pad or bunker nobody would a thunk, but it’s plain to see another unexplainable anomaly if money’s unavailable inevitably anything depending on a stable internet is gonna crash (Tear it down). Debatable what happens after that it doesn’t matter really all she gotta know is that it’s bad so she ring the alarm please be on guard tho these things are often harmless no need to be alarming but please be warned easily this leads to carnage” Diggs will already be home, have ordered pizza and had it delivered. Only on ‘Code’, ‘Scams’ (featuring a star turn from actress, rapper and Sub Pop label mate Tia Nomore ), and ‘Keep Pushing’ do we get the kind of laidback delivery you would get from Snoop Dogg.
This album is the glorious union of synapse and syncopation, as clipping. navigate the hectic collage of modern life with its drones, trillions of lines of code, hackers, crypto and Polaroids. The standout tracks for me are ‘Dodger’ (above) and the truly exceptional ‘Mirrorshades. Pt 2’ featuring another label mate, Cartel Madras which I have not been able to get out my head since first hearing it.
Rather than trying to map the digital chaos, clipping. are riding it like a mechanical bull and they are fractal generators creating endlessly hypnotic spirals of sounds-and-words. Dead Channel Sky is utterly compelling and built for repeat listening. It’s a glitch you won’t want to scratch.
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Review by Paul F Cook
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