So I meant to write this one a long time ago, but I’ve had a lot on my plate lately. Too much, some might say. That being said, I have good, though urgent news: dälek‘s new EP is great.

The urgent aspect of this is that the EP is vinyl only, with its release on March 22 to coincide with their European tour. As such it’s only available from those tour dates and from a few online retailers. They’re so dead set on this that there actually isn’t a way for me to embed anything for you to preview, though you can head over to Brooklyn Vegan to hear the title track.

The EP features six dense tracks that are heavy on the ambiance and texture, totaling around a half hour when all’s said and done. The whole EP is a great mix of texture and socially conscious message and the standout track for me was “With These Mics,” with its floating, synthy lines to introduce the track before the instrumental goes into an almost post-punk angsty guitar pattern for MC dälek to lay his bars over. It’s moody and spacey and perfectly atmospheric. “Molten” has similarly great atmosphere, though it’s dissonant and heavy and sounds much more frustrated and angry.

The combo of these otherworldly, spacey tracks that build up textures and overtones over time, mixed with MC dälek’s bars is truly something incredible to behold and I wish I could show you. I highly recommend this if you can get your hands on it. It’s a well-crafted alternative hip-hop EP that really does deserve to be heard.

4/5 Flaming Toilets ov Hell

Respect to the Authors is out through Exile On Mainstream and Earsplit Distro.

Tour Dates

3/28/2019 BLA – Oslo, NO

3/29/2019 Folken – Stavanger, NO

3/30/2019 Kuudes Linia – Helsinki, FI

3/31/2019 Lexington – London, UK

4/01/2019 The Lanes Bristol – Bristol, UK

4/02/2019 Cave aux Poètes – Roubaix, FR

4/03/2019 Het Bos – Antwerp, BE

4/04/2019 Hafenklang – Hamburg, DE

4/05/2019 UT Connewitz – Leipzig, DE

‪4/07/2019 Sneek – Het Bolwerk, NL

4/09/2019 Magasin 4 – Brussels, BE

4/10/2019 Albani – Winterthur, CH

4/11/2019 Südpol – Luzern, CH

4/12/2019 Sommer Casino – Basel, CH

4/13/2019 Roadburn Festival – Tilburg, NL (as Doolhof)

4/14/2019 DB’s – Utrecht, NL