Rap music has a long history of speaking truth to power, dissecting politics and giving voice to the marginalised. North London artist Louis VI’s output is a welcome addition to that lineage, centring the climate justice movement amid more personal musings in his woozy, psychedelia-tinged soundscapes.
The self-taught producer, multi-instrumentalist, rapper and activist released his debut, Sugar Like Salt, in 2018. Its follow-up, Earthling, feels like a step-up of intention. Weaving together a love for melody and a multitude of genres (hip-hop, sweet licks of Afrobeat, jazz, funk, electronic), it’s cut through with atmospheric field recordings that pull from his time spent in the natural world: storm sounds from the Amazon rainforest sit alongside lush birdsong from woodland in the UK. Earthling is full of timely lyrics ruminating gently on questions about individualism, colonialism, capitalism and the state of the nation (on Orange Skies he observes: “Politicians got me moving cutthroat/ Scapegoating migrants into sunk boats/ While they spend our taxes on some top coke/ Chopping down our forests till we cough smoke”).
Calling on friends and peers such as Lex Amor, Oscar Jerome and Mick Jenkins for some outstanding features, Louis VI is making work that brims with uncomfortable truths encased in a rich, warm musicality.
Earthling is out now on Hiyaself Recordings Unlimited. Louis VI plays the Lower Third, London WC2, on 3 May
