Maps

by billy woods & Kenny Segal

Maps cover art
  • Type: Album
  • Released: 5 May 2023
  • Label: Backwoodz Studioz
  • Country: United States
  • Length: 44:08
  • Community rating: 4.04/5 from 23 ratings

Album Notes & Community Reviews

The second collaboration between rapper billy woods and producer Kenny Segal, 'Maps' is a conceptual travelogue exploring the alienation and strange comforts of life as a touring musician. woods delivers densely layered, surrealist verses filled with poignant observations and deadpan humor, touching on themes of home, identity, and the liminal spaces of travel. Segal鈥檚 production provides a dynamic and often jazz-inflected counterpoint, shifting from lighter boom-bap arrangements with piano and saxophone to more abstract, dissonant textures that reflect the narrative's emotional shifts, distinguishing the album's varied palette from the darker tone of their previous work, 'Hiding Places'.

Genres

Descriptors: conceptual, rap, underground, experimental, storytelling, soulful

Tracklist

  1. Kenwood Speakers (1:21)
  2. Soft Landing (2:53)
  3. Soundcheck (2:56)
  4. Rapper Weed (3:14)
  5. Blue Smoke (1:32)
  6. Bad Dreams Are Only Dreams (1:09)
  7. Babylon By Bus (2:08)
  8. Year Zero (3:40)
  9. Hangman (2:55)
  10. Baby Steps (3:25)
  11. The Layover (2:50)
  12. FaceTime (3:32)
  13. Agriculture (1:40)
  14. Houdini (2:24)
  15. Waiting Around (3:01)
  16. NYC Tapwater (3:08)
  17. As the Crow Flies (2:20)

Credits

  • billy woods - vocals, written-by, art direction, Primary Artist
  • Kenny Segal - producer, mixed by, engineer, Primary Artist
  • Quelle Chris - vocals, Featuring
  • ShrapKnel - vocals, Featuring
  • Danny Brown - vocals, Featuring
  • Elucid - vocals, Featuring
  • Benjamin Booker - vocals, Featuring
  • Shabaka Hutchings - flute
  • Samuel T. Herring - vocals, Featuring
  • Aesop Rock - vocals, engineer, engineer [additional], Featuring, additional engineer
  • Aaron Carmack - rhodes piano, keyboards [rhodes]
  • Aaron Shaw - tenor saxophone
  • Jason Wool - piano, rhodes piano, Keyboards [Rhodes]
  • Joanne - additional vocals, Backing Vocals [Additional Vocals]
  • Mike Parvizi - bass
  • Ryan Crosby - guitar
  • Willie Green - mastered by, mastering
  • Steel Tipped Dove - engineer
  • M. Musgrove - illustration, design
  • Ashes57 - illustration, graphic design

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