Clipping | Artist
Clipping is an American experimental hip hop group formed 2009 in Los Angeles, California, by rapper Daveed Diggs and producers William Hutson and Jonathan Snipes. The three were friends early on from school and college. Their music consists of hip-hop overlaying abrasive electronic noise and musique concrète static sounds. The group sees their music as an extension of the hip-hop tradition, despite their abrasive sound, not unlike Dr. Dre and Public Enemy producers The Bomb Squad, who experimented with production and also used harsh, musique concrète-esque techniques in their music. Similarly, they think of themselves as a rap group rather than industrial-rap, noise-rap, or other mash-up genres. Their debut album Midcity was released in 2013 earning positive reviews and comparisons with artists like Death Grips and Dalek. The following year they released CLPPNG to even more favourable reviews. 2016's Splendor & Misery album, the EP Wriggle, were also well received. In 2017, the group released a single entitled "The Deep." which was nominated for a Hugo Award. However the group really found another level with their third and fourth full-length albums There Existed an Addiction to Blood in 2019, and Visions of Bodies Being Burned the following year. Centered on ghastly stories of murder, paranoia, and dread taken from both classic horror movies and the group's collective imagination, these albums are a perfect expression of Clipping's fascination with the horrorcore subgenre and influences such as John Carpenter's film scores. The Guardian described their sound as "the sort of shrill thrills you imagine could function as incidental soundtrack music for a documentary about abattoirs or might conceivably be the work of a young band intent on twisting industrial metal into brutal new shapes. With rapping on top." While Rolling Stone described their sound as "nimble-tongued, beat-fractured L.A. hip-hop spilled over the abrasive crunches, squeals, clangs, slurps, and static of experimental musique concrète. Outside of music, rapper Daveed Diggs is also an accomplished stage actor. In 2015, Diggs played Marquis de Lafayette and Thomas Jefferson in the off-Broadway musical Hamilton, reprising the roles during its initial Broadway run. Hamilton was an enormous success, winning 11 Tony Awards, the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, and a Grammy for Best Musical Theater Album. Despite this, Diggs left the Broadway cast during the summer of 2016 to resume playing with Clipping. The band name clipping derives from the term used in sound reproduction when distortion occurs if an amplifier is overdriven and attempts to deliver an output voltage or current beyond its maximum capability.
Artist Website: clppng.com
Featured Albums: Clipping
Related Artists: Daveed Diggs, William Hutson, Jonathan Snipes
Collections: Movers Shakers
