Over a series of recent mixtapes and projects, the New York-via-Detroit rapper Denmark Vessey has established himself as one of the most irreverent and inventive MCs in the business; his tracks are a spinning carousel of images and sounds, and he is as playful as he is outlandish, as whimsical as he is acerbic.
Sun Go Nova, his new EP and beat tape, may be his most daring release yet, both in terms of his vocal performance and the smudged and lurching beats. Although Vessey is himself a prominent producer, having worked with artists including Danny Brown, Slum Village, and Quelle Chris (his partner in Crown Nation), here he largely hands over the keys to two A-list stars: Knxwledge and Odd Future rapper Earl Sweatshirt. The pair have crafted a cocktail of humid tracks that generally eschew anything resembling a hook in favor of free-from horns, synths, and thudding, murky percussion.
It’s the perfect backdrop for Vessey’s bizarre and mesmerizing vocal riffs and patterns, which he pulls off—perhaps here more than ever before—with an air of effortlessness. Although he has already established himself as a torchbearer for the mad hatter MF Doom and a contemporary of the politically-minded Open Mike Eagle, on songs like the title track, he approaches Kendrick Lamar’s nimble, rapid-fire delivery. Later, on “Sellout,” he channels Earl’s own behind-the-beat drawl, adding to the album’s hazy delirium.
Thematically, he is as delightfully scattered as ever, turning on a dime between praise of the Based God, selling shoes on Venmo, and casting Tobey Maguire in a remake of Roots. It’s absurd commentary for absurd times. And although Vessey himself has spoken about the project, which culminates in a series of his own beats, crafted in a similar vein, as merely “a little instant of coolness,” he may be selling himself short. Sun Go Nova is radically uninhibited, and as a result, dazzling.
