Clipping share a surreal, post-apocalyptic drama by Patrick Kennelly (“Body & Blood”) inspired by their current album, Splendor & Misery.
The 405 had this to say of the film (and album), “Early this past fall, L.A. rap deconstructionist trio, Clipping delivered their latest challenging experimental full-length album. It was billed as a thematic release that “follows the sole survivor of a slave uprising on an interstellar cargo ship, and the on-board computer that falls in love with him.” On top of the technical rap reflections that make up the album, the trio are supporting their intriguing narrative with a short film of the same name, that brings the album’s unearthly concepts to life. Director, Patrick Kennelly helped piece together the surreal post-apocalyptic drama that’s equal parts fascinating and equal parts difficult to watch.
Splendor & Misery is available now worldwide. The album features the highlights “Baby Don’t Sleep,” “A Better Place,” and “Air ‘Em Out,” was produced by the band, and mixed by Steve Kaplan in Los Angeles.
Wriggle is also available from iTunes / Google Play and all good records stores in New Zealand.
What people have said about Clipping:
“…A fervent, chaotic and uncommonly beautiful noise-rap allegory about slave rebellion and computer love told through a futurist narrative that takes place in outer space.” [Splendor & Misery] – New York Times
“A magnificent, nerve-jangling and altogether rather riveting blast of unflinching white noise and throb, virtuoso rapping and, most improbable of all, richly romantic gospel-choir interludes designed as much to disconcert as to offer tuneful respite from and guidance through the surrounding sonic shrapnel.” [Splendor & Misery, 9/10, Album of the Week] – Loud & Quiet
“A hugely inventive slab of sonic theatre plotted to the tiniest detail..” [Splendor & Misery, 4/5] – MOJO
“Suffocating, stressful, and challenging, Splendor & Misery is uncompromising in its desolation, and it’s all the better for it.” [Splendor & Misery, 8/10] – The Skinny
“Devastating yet optimistic, Splendor & Misery is a stunning leap forward for clipping., and one of the most impressive albums of the year.” [Splendor & Misery, 4.5/5] – All Music
“Replete with sci-fi references and nudges to Afrofuturist musicians before them, the album confronts the crushing darkness inherent to the alienation of black diaspora and speculates on the identity as an intrinsically fluid process. Splendor & Misery is sincere and staunchly ambitious. With it, clipping. Have solidified their position at the forefront of experimental music.” [Splendor & Misery, 8.6/10] – Northern Transmissions
“The production, helmed by dual composers William Hutson and Jonathan Snipes, make use of field recording techniques only instead of chimes and sampled radio alarms, the sharp clangs of breached hulls and airlocks closing are the content used to createthese paranoia inducing and dissonant instrumentals. What makes Splendor & Misery beckon for repeat listens, bar Daveed Diggs torrential flow, is how concise and dense the record is. It flows like a satellite in orbit, emerging over horizons witnessing serene beauty only to encounter disruptive asteroid belts moments later like the three ‘Interlude’ tracks where Daveed spits over broken and static-laced connections.” [Splendor & Misery, 8/10] – CLASH
“A wonderful trip.” [Splendor & Misery, 8.5/10] – Louder Than War
“Utterly uncomfortable, but with such an imaginative foundation that you can’t help but feel invited back to try to learn a little more about the strange and beautiful world of Clipping.” [Splendor & Misery, 8/10] – Under the Radar
“Amid all the experimental noise and dystopian sci-fi, it’s crucial to remember that Diggs is one of the most talented rappers of our current era — on both technical and lyrical levels — and that every single one of the beats Hutson and Snipes make is original.” [Splendor & Misery] – Uproxx
“The result is the brilliant, labyrinthine Splendor and Misery, a self-described “Afro-futurist, dystopian concept album that follows the sole survivor of a slave uprising on an interstellar cargo ship, and the onboard computer that falls in love with him. With Splendor and Misery, clipping. may be the first rap group to claim equal influence from Octavia Butler and Dr. Octagon….it’s somewhere between Samuel R. Delany and Deltron 3030. Diggs flips the Jay Z phrase “all black everything” to describe the abyss of space. He tweaks a classic UGK hook into a “pocket full of stars.” Snipes and Hutson evoke a paranoiac lunar drift with ingenuity.” [Splendor & Misery] – LA Weekly
“Spirits are present in clipping.’s video for “Air ‘Em Out.” We open on frontman Daveed Diggs settling in to another shift at his jumpsuit-requiring place of employment. As the beat builds, however, mysterious tremors start to unsettle Diggs and the litany of office supplies at his desk. It’s another top-quality video from a group that has made a habit of just that, a simple idea perfectly executed.” [“Air ‘Em Out,” Best Videos of August 2016] – Pigeons & Planes
“”Baby Don’t Sleep” is noisy, layered and absolutely frightening.” [“Baby Don’t Sleep”] – NPR Music
“Beatmakers Snipes and Hutson send you plummeting into the mainframe with a musique concrète cut-up beat of television fuzz and white noise. Negative space sucks the air out of your chest as Diggs raps in an arresting staccato, deconstructing the hegemony in a most deliberate manner: “Saviors are fiction / memories are fading like ghosts.” [“Baby Don’t Sleep”] – Passion of the Weiss
“This bangs, in the most enervating fashion possible.” [“Baby Don’t Sleep”] – Stereogum
“A solid as hell EP.” [Wriggle] – Passion of the Weiss
“For all of clipping.’s most abrasive instincts, there’s something undeniably fun about Wriggle, yet by no means absent its confrontational nature. That’s ultimately when the group is at their best, finding new ways to turn noise and mayhem into unlikely hits.”[Wriggle] – Treble
“Mr. Diggs is a crafty and dexterous rapper, an inheritor of West Coast eccentrics from Freestyle Fellowship to E-40. And he’s percussive, as well, playing musical shootout with the skittish, glitchy production of bandmates William Hutson and Jonathan Snipes….The title track is frenetic and salacious, an industrial updating of Miami bass music that sounds like what might happen if you took a pneumatic drill to a 12-inch single of Outkast’s “B.O.B.” It samples a song by the pioneering extreme noise band Whitehouse that is full of naughty lyrics, which Mr. Diggs happily echoes and adds to…” [Wriggle] – New York Times
