SK8R BOI

posted in: Artist Features • Urban

Like Lupe Fiasco, Billa Camp hails from Chi-Town, loves skateboard culture and is an exemplar of alternative hip hop. And here’s another similarity”both appeared in the video for Fiasco’s song Kick, Push.” Still, Camp’s got his own thing going on, like an encyclopedic knowledge of rock, for starters. On Grateful Dread, the rapper name checks dozens of artists, starting with Sublime, Radiohead and Nirvana before moving onto Talking Heads, MC5 and Flaming Lips. Even Phish gets a shout-out on the hypnotic track, which combines lashes of cymbals and droning textures that sound like a deviant version of Aphex Twin’s Windowlicker. Stylistically, Camp’s music runs the gamut”from surf guitars on California to a crackling samples of the 1950s hit Why Don’t You Believe Me on Show Time to the banging Beat Street with its hefty dose of Planet Rock by Afrika Bambaataa. You don’t know where you’re going when you put on a Billa Camp track, but you can be sure you’re gonna have a good time.