Album Review: Spaceghostpurrp - Mysterious Phonk The Chronicles Of Spaceghostpurrp

We are living in an Odd Future. Crews and MCs are sprouting through the newly fertile earth of hip hop's landscape like so many green shoots. They have noms de mic like Lil Ugly Mane, Jasper Dolphin and Zombie Juice, and are propelled into the listener's consciousness by a combination of internet groundswell and guerrilla marketing. SpaceGhostPurrp is the leader of new kids with the glock, Florida's RVIDER KLVN, and because he's the biggest he gets to release the first proper album.

Mysterious Phonk... is a look into the mind of SpaceGhostPurrp from the other side of a tall glass of purple drank. The beats are as dense as the stickiest sizzurp, the lyrics blunted rhyming couplets with little time given to the fanciful notion of wordplay and nothing as playful as a punchline. Track names give fair warning of the content within: Get Yah Head Bust, Grind On Me, Suck A Dick 2012… The Dirty South indeed.

This is not a five-mic shot across the bow of post-Odd Future hip hop from RVIDER KLVN, but it is a bold move into the market. At 14 tracks the album is too long, and the esoteric beats that at first bewitch the ear are but a passing spell. Listener fatigue is aggravated by the relentless provocation and casual misogyny of the lyrics, and by the glaring omission of any guest vocalists – an opportunity lost for the KLVN. Will exposure to a wider audience prove to be an Ourobouros that starts an upward spiral? Let's wait and see.