The crackling, bass-heavy sounds of Nocando‘s “Mykraphone Myk” land directly in the middle of his new album, Severed. It’s a song with an us-against-the-world energy, with the song reaching a fever pitch once the Hellfyre Club leader belts out with anger, “I burned so many bridges, they though it was pyromania. When they see us the streets, there’s nothing the can say to us.” In an album where Nocando is often soberingly honest and reflective about past relationships, he’s at his most passionate here.
The video for the Severed single pays homage to Nocando’s neighborhood, Leimert Park, and to one of the his biggest influences, Myka 9. Much of the video sees Nocando (neé James McCall) rapping his song shirtless out in public, but quick shots of Myka 9 are cut between before a freestyle from Myka — or, his verse from the nearly two-decade-old “Life Death” by Prefuse 73 — closes out the video.
Watch the self-directed “Mykraphone Myk” video below.
