Ritual by Stik Figa & The Expert

Best Tracks: Cost of Business, Yah’s Shorthand, Uknowhut?
Genre: Jazz Rap, Psychedelia
Year: 2023

Another concise and consistent rapper & producer project to come out of the 2020s. Ritual is for fans of the recent billy woods or Black Thought albums. Old-school-ish hip hop with an alternative, experimental attitude. Ritual is an album that blends raw psychedelic soul with modern jazz rap. It sounds like a mix between Beauty and the Beat and Glorious Game.

The production on this album spends most of its time exploring vintage distortions and feedback. It doesn’t worry about sounding unpolished in the best way possible. The way that the production carries the energy from “The Cost of Business” into the piano solo of “Rob Peter, Pay Pallbearer” is incredible. This album doesn’t only look to the past, though. “Service” and “President Streets” have beats and deliveries that remind me of Run the Jewels, and other cutting-edge hardcore hip hop. It is so refreshing to hear these kinds of instrumentals mixed in this psychedelic style. There’s nothing out there that sounds quite like it.

Ritual is also the perfect album length, not overstaying its welcome. The sequencing is fantastic too. Similar tracks are paired together to create a gradual fade from soulful, to experimental, to hardcore across the album’s runtime. “The Forgotten” is my favourite kind of closing track, climaxing to such heights that you’re left there in awe after the track fades out.

The Expert’s unique, brave production is what makes me love this album, but Stik Figa’s rapping is really good too. It may not blow me away, but I don’t usually care about lyrics unless they’re annoyingly bad. Quality-wise, he is definitely on par with everyone in the mainstream. Hopefully, Ritual will get people to care more about such a skilful artist. I am most excited for what Stik Figa and The Expert do next.