Raury

One Liner:  Genre-hopping folkie guitarist rapper bounces all over the map.

Poster Position: 14

Thoughts:  I have no clue what I am listening to with this guy at any given time.  One song may be an earnest sounding indie folk song, the next is an electronic-laced soul song, the next starts as a folk number but then turns into a rap and then goes back to folk.  Raury is from Georgia, and apparently threw himself an 18th birthday musical festival before starting out to create his own musical genre. Wikipedia says "He has stated that he is influenced by Andre 3000, Kid Cudi, Kanye West, Bon Iver, Queen, Fleet Foxes, Marvin Gaye, and The Keyz."  Well, alrighty.

He's got an early mixtape (2015's Indigo Child) and then one true album (2015's All We Need), and that new album has some cool musical guests like RZA, Big K.R.I.T., and Tom Morello.  I really feel like I have heard the Morello track ("Friends") before, but I don't know where.  His most listened-to track is from that new album, with 8.5 million, this is "Devil's Whisper."

Starts out like a gospel/blues track you would have heard on Justified or Walking Dead during a montage as characters tried to escape death.  Then a Kanye beat drops in and it turns into a pretty solid rap.  Right?  Pretty sweet track.
Taking off from that same point in the video (lying on the roof with a weird flag), here is the most popular track on that earlier mixtape.  This is "God's Whisper," which has 5 million streams.  See what he did there?  God whispered to him, then the Devil did?

Right on.  We are the saviors.  Well, buddy, the saviors aren't going to make it long enough to save much if you keep lighting fireworks sideways and then throwing them.  Professor Safety explicitly disavows those actions.  One other track, just because I think it is really interesting, called "Trap Tears," really shows the juxtaposition of folky rhythms and rap beats.

The opening guitar picking sounds like one thing, then the chorus sounds like a Young Thug song broke out.  Then it goes back to the finger-picking guitar.  I generally like this music, even though its all over the place.  Which just makes me confused. Do I like it?  Is it too weird?  I wish some songs would just stick to the genre they start out in instead of morphing. I definitely think that the new album is better than the old EP.  May be interesting to go check out at the 'fest, although who the hell knows what to expect to hear in person?