Photo by Natalia Vacheishvili

Complimentary to the noise-rap poetry of kindred collaborator Moor Mother, billy woods’ rap game is out here writing a new book on Black history as it truly is through dark art for these times. With his forthcoming album, GOLLIWOG, its title alone suggests a dive into hard truths dealing with racism and oppression which still haunt this land ’til this day in a writ of storytelling he says he began conceiving when he was just a child. Pen refined, the LP’s latest preview, “BLK ZMBY”, conjures lore from Haitian voodoo culture where the concept of a zombie isn’t necessarily that of the scary and undead, but rather a physical embodiment of slavery — the forced debt and punishment of being a captive servant against your will. In the current, that would be the shackles provided by capitalism. Backwoodz Studioz producer Steel Tipped Dove’s beat for woods is a thing of cinematic horror, lurching out like a climactic night of the living dead sequence that can’t lead anywhere good for its main characters. “You already know that chauffeur gold Mercedes is a go / Did a harvest where the house and chains are, that oil gotta flow / Zombies go home to platters of prawns and escargot / Moët and Chandon bottles bust against the bowels of both.” Money can’t mask the scent of those who are already dead inside, and the by end of it, maggots and flies are swarming to consume their bodies.

billy woods’ GOLLIWOGG will be released May 9th on Backwoodz Studioz.