Shabazz Palaces - Black Up
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Up until the past few months, Seattle hip-hop group Shabazz Palaces had been shrouded in a fair amount of mystery. Their initial, official promotional photo featured a man with what looked like a black hole – or a galaxy – for a face, seated in a sci-fi, CGI-generated planetary landscape. The image happened to be rather apropos when it came to representing the project. Following 2009’s self-released Of Light and Shabazz Palaces EPs, interest in the group only skyrocketed. While it’s not strictly a solo project per se, there is a particular individual who’s at the forefront of Shabazz Palaces ascent and music: Palaceer Lazaro (aka Ishmael "Butterfly" Butler of 90’s rap group Digable Planets). The latter fact will certainly be used to give context to Shabazz Palaces, but, honestly, there is nothing quite like this out there right now – Black Up, the debut album, proves it.
