- A thrilling mixtape that both subverts and builds on the possibilities of rap music, featuring production by Space Afrika, Slikback and more.
- Iceboy Violet has always emphasized vulnerability and deeply felt emotion to undermine rap music conventions. Their noise-heavy debut EP Mook was inspired by their love of grime, offering a queer perspective on a genre in which they heard "a pain that’s kept hidden away by the pressures of hypermasculinity." 2020's ambient release Drown To Float took a different approach, sampling and reimagining mainstream US trap anthems by artists like Young Thug and Lil Durk, excavating instrumental loops to expose a dark and delicate core. These ideas come together beautifully on Iceboy Violet's debut mixtape, The Vanity Project. Violet brings a distinctive, expressive and sometimes invasively direct vocal style to beats that use ambient fog or abrasive noise to twist grime and hip-hop into barely recognisable shapes.
The mixtape boasts an intimidating lineup of producers. Space Afrika and friends from Iceboy Violet's Manchester-centered scene appear alongside other artists from around the world: Kenyan producer Slikback, Miami-based Nick León and Mun Sing, one half of Bristol’s Giant Swan. Violet’s ability to ride unaccommodating beats without getting lost ties this patchwork of styles together. On "Are U Connected," their vocals wander loosely over ambience before connecting with Emily Glass' gliding 808s. "DEATHDRIVE" takes the opposite approach. It's an explosion of noise and stuttering kicks courtesy of the Helsinki-based Exploited Body, where a battered but defiant Violet screams "I'm still alive, I will survive."
Across seven wildly different tracks, Violet channels contradictory and fluid emotional states. On "Vanity," which tells the story of a potential hook-up, the lyrics "He whispered in my ear / Down my spine sent a shiver / Sunk his teeth deep / Felt my blood run thinner," mix anticipation with panic. Punctuating their monologues with manic voice breaks and sharp intakes of breath, Violet imbues their cryptic lyrics with twisted, visceral meaning. On "Atone/Blankface" their mangled raps are delivered in a growled whisper, as if from close distance. Produced by aya (a close friend and a key inspiration), it highlights both artists' abilities to play on the porous line between seductive and uncanny.
For their early live sets, Iceboy Violet created the persona of a "rapper with a very fragile ego," as they explained in an interview from 2019. This onstage character would hide their vulnerability behind an "ice cold," "disengaged" and "nihilistic" facade that would slowly crack and disintegrate over the course of the performance. On The Vanity Project, these masks disintegrate completely, only to reveal an even more complex, vulnerable and occasionally frightening persona. Violet's vision of rap music is strikingly individual: vivid, adventurous and laced with anxiety, fragility and fluidity.
Tracklist01. Urban Ambience (prod. Space Afrika)
02. Are U Connected (prod. Emily Glass)
03. VANITY (prod. Jennifer Walton)
04. Antiskeptic (prod. Slikback & Nick León)
05. Lillith feat. Blackhaine, Daemon & Orlando (prod. Mun Sing)
06. DEATHDRIVE (prod. Exploited Body)
07. Atone//Blankface (prod. LOFT)