Chrome Lips is an album that a teenaged Barbadian rapper named Haleek Maul made with Chicago duo Supreme Cuts, two dude-bros who make trippy, chilled-out footwork-influenced beats, wear soccer jerseys and bang on MPCs with drumsticks at their shows. It’s really weird and interesting, and not just for the fact that it was released by a fashion label. Spin and Noisey both covered it, but I don’t think people talked about it enough. Here’s why.
First, Chrome Lips is legitimately creepy. This album sounds like nightmares. I’m sure there are a million wannabe Satanist rappers getting upside down cross tattoos because of Odd Future, but this record is more aurally disturbing than anything OF or their copycats have produced. It’s a bugged-out, hectic version of the Shabazz Palaces record from a few years ago, but starring a ball-tripping 16 year old instead of a middle-aged former butterfly, and with cloud rap synth pads and trap hi-hat rolls.
It’s hard to pin down exactly what’s so creepy about it without coming back to “atmosphere.” This is hazy music, except the smoke is half weed and half, like, some kind of horrifyingly disfiguring acid. The thing is, it’s not intentionally, purposefully, scary — the lyrics feel like an honest reflection of Haleek Maul’s feelings. It just so happens that he’s feeling suicidal, misanthropic, and/or harassed by evil ghosts. It succeeds, I think, because it comes off as sincere. That’s always been the thing that makes Odd Future feel more campy than actually disturbing: it’s calculated provocation, not earnest expression.
Imogen Heap samples aside, cloud rap has always had a bit of a bite to it, but I think this basically it’s most extreme extension so far, especially because of how far it stretches into the Three 6 Mafia vibe. These beats don’t owe much more than ambience to (pre-trippy) Juicy J, but you might glance at this and mistake it for a skittery SpaceGhostPurrp record.
It’s reductive to say that Supreme Cuts just put footwork polyrhythms under the most menacing strand of Clams Casino atmospherics, but part of what makes these songs so disorienting is that there are two percussionists playing more or less “live.” Even the most progressive rap songs generally stick to 4-bar drum loops; the fact that the drums are constantly clanging around into and under each other here makes it harder to keep your bearings. It’s stressful to listen to this stuff.
Last, Main Attrakoinz and Shady Blaze make cursory appearances, letting Maul kiss the ring of the cloud rap royalty, but Deniro Farrar is the most important feature on here. He’s the closest stylistic analogue Haleek has right now, and his record with Blue Sky Black Death (Cliff of Death) is probably the closest thing to this. I’m not sure what Kool AD is doing here, other than just general involvement with avant-garde non-rap. Also, Tree has two verses, which is great. I’m pro-Tree.
I wish we could just all agree that this is a better template for ominous demon-rap than the slowed-down RZA-via-Pharrell plodders that Tyler, the Creator cranks out. Not to take anything away from Odd Future, and I realize it’s kind of unfair to keep bringing them up as a strawman like this. A lot of the Raider Klan stuff is just as bad at mistaking a dark vibe for actual menace. I just think it’s time people realized that there’s a more vivid and dynamic way to make nightmarish angst-rap. I think fear feels confusing and exciting, and that’s how this album feels.
Email me when Sean Quigley publishes or recommends stories