Ideally, every MC in existence would use his or her voice as a prolific musical and linguistic vehicle. Flip through any FM dial band and the sad truth of things becomes apparent all too quickly. Although mainstream hip-hop has a well rooted home in parties and trunk woofers, the majority of it, much like mainstream pop and rock, is easily forgettable and formulaic. In the latest installment to his expansive catalog of crew collaborations and solo work Los Angeles’ Busdriver continues to demolish the genre’s conventions. Bohemian, witty, encyclopedic, and wildly poetic, Roadkill Overcoat packs a non-stop array of rapid-fire lyrical assaults and avant garde beat happenings that dabble in everything from LSD-electro-pop to all out 808 club knockers. Busdriver takes on pop-culture with a scathing tongue, relentlessly tearing into neo-hippies, hipsters, politicians, and of course, whack rappers. A lot of the time he raps so fast that you can’t pick out words, but in those instances, his percussive confidence creates a captivating quality of it’s own. A beautiful liner design by Montreal’s Seripop group tops the album off with irresistible aesthetic appeal. If you’re treasure hunting for substance and the razor’s edge look no further.
