Kilo G — The Sleepwalker EP

In 1992, a teenage boy released his first hip-hop album, a half-hour EP. It's pretty interesting because the boy is Robert Johnson Jr., one of the many faces forgotten by hip-hop, was born in late August 1976 and therefore made his debut in the game at only 15 years old, with the moniker Kilo G. I don't want to go into what drama and what trauma a person must have faced to release a horrorcore effort at this age, but this effort is practically fantastic, it's a simple raw, underground and dark gangsta 'n horrorcore EP that has nothing to envy to the best records of the genre in the early nineties.

Opens a simple rhythm, lean and minimal, with skinny drum machine and tight syncopated, rhythm left to breathe, then Kilo G delivers heavy and rough with a slow, syncopated and smooth flow. The second song is the longest of the EP with over six minutes: dark and gloomy, tense, excellent production, skinny and syncopated drum, almost snare drum, functional hook and slow syncopated delivery smoothness on dope rhythm, excellent tune, Kilo G not asphalts it, but tries to give it value with a thoughtful, careful, studied delivery.

"Psychopatic Killer" if it isn't the best joint of the edition, it goes close to it and is still one of the most interesting: simple, lean, a little boring production with its funky West Coast sound, functional hook and slow syncopated and tight delivery of the young MC. The following track is even tighter, with an almost imperceptible skinny rhythm and the usual economic drum, the delivery of Kilo G is almost spoken, splendid sampled sax in the background. The fifth song, "Kill His Family", takes the title of best track of the edition: slow, simple production, with slow and syncopated, minimal skinny drum, Kilo G slow and syncopated delivery in one of the longest cuts on the disc.

There's an amazing sample of elegant light piano in mid-cut, excellent choice, and sample looped in the background, the production of this choice is fantastic in its lo-fi context; piano now dark and scared in the background under the rapper's slow syncopated bars. "Down Mutha for Ya" basically closes the effort despite the last song, simple rhythm, dark and lo-fi, sensational, functional chorus, regular and distant snare drum in the background and beat made dark by the dystopian tense line, Kilo G doesn't fail above this somewhat cheap pace.

Kilo G gives a non-trivial proof here, on a non-trivial production: it's provided by Victor Diaz and Roland Smith aka Big Ro, former producer of the Geto Boys whose influence you can clearly hear here, this duo provides quite appropriate music for the dark delivery of the rapper.

Rating: 7/10.