Brooklyn-via-Maryland rapper Oddisee, 35, is leaving a real estate meeting when I call him for our interview. The rapper born Amir Mohamed el Khalifa is considering investing in houses throughout Brooklyn over a handful of years to create non-music-based revenue streams.
Throughout his 10-plus year recording and performing career,Oddisee and his worldly perspective and live-band hip-hop sound have bred an everyman relatability that grounds projects like 2017’s The Iceberg and 2020’s Odd Cure, his latest EP, out today.
Created over eight weeks — two of which he spent in self-isolation in his Brooklyn studio — Odd Cure is an attempt at navigating the looming anxieties of a global pandemic in the broadest sense.
Aside from phone call interludes with his family and friends and explicit references to the coronavirus on “Still Strange,” the whole of Odd Cure isn’t bound to any specific time.
“I didn’t want to make a record dedicated to a global crisis and a pandemic,” Oddisee explains. “I was fearful of how it would age as a product or how it would be viewed by ears that listened without context. You gotta take responsibility for your art.”
Our conversation, lightly edited for content and clarity, follows below.
