Strange Neighbor is proud to present two instant classics produced by the forever prolific and highly acclaimed, Swarvy. This second official release on our LA based label brings you the first two taster tracks from the forthcoming Oscilations project. An album which has been in development for more than a year, Oscilations will feature more from Swarvy as well as a host of other productions and first time collaborations which combine the likes of Georgia Ann Muldrow, Blu, Med, Jimetta Rose, Dizz1, MNDSGN and Nia Andrews.
Raised in Philadelphia and now based in Los Angeles, Swarvy has had a huge year with the success of the full length collaborative album with Lojii, Due Rent, (Fresh Selects) as well as his releases on Paxico Records, Matthewdavids Leaving Records and the House Shoes run Street Corner Music. Truly ‘from the school of Prince’ - as his regular MC, Pink Siifu often puts it - Swarvy is an arranger, producer and multi-instrumentalist who deserves every one of the comparisons to Madlib he often gets. Swarvy’s endless experimention has seen him shapeshift through a number of projects which regularly involve his equally prolific crew members Knxwledge, Devonwho and MNDSGN.
Displaying the kind of musical depth that had Swarvy singled out in the first place, ‘So Bad’ is a masterfully arranged gospel flavored slice of soul featuring the one man choir known as Clark and the Community. A Chicago native, Chris Clark spent some time engaged in the Los Angeles movement up until a year ago and was immediately drawn down to Swarvy‘s studio. Also a multi-instrumentalist and producer in his own right Clark has generated high praise from the Stones Throw massive, the Boiler Room circuit and the BBC tastemakers on the strength of his solid string of self released projects. Swarvy joined here by MNDSGN offer minimal yet perfectly laid guitar over kick and rim percussion leaving Clark all the space he needs to fly all over this. A sweet reminder of all the things that led us to put our faith in D’Angelo back in those Brown Sugar days.
Straight off the back of one of this years most celebrated and forward thinking hip-hop releases comes ‘Zhen’. More stashed away gold from Swarvy and Lojii’s Due Rent sessions. Formerly known as Uhlife - whose timeless Lord Raja/ Knxwledge/ Swarvy produced mixtape Barely (Uh)live still turns heads - Lojii assumed his current moniker apon the release of early leaks from his Lohfi project (coming soon on Young Bloods). Already inspiring massive support from the OkayPlayer camp Lojii’s gritty, vagabond, stream of conciousness rhymes fall into the same un-namable rap catagory that his close friends Zeroh and Jeremiah Jae also inhabit. Like everyone else on this release Lojii is certainly one to keep a close eye on.
