The cover of Grieves’ fourth full-length album, Winter & the Wolves, features the Seattle-based rapper standing in a wintery landscape, his black-clad frame engulfed by snow and ice. He’s holding a pickaxe, as if ready to take on whatever challenge might come his way. It’s a curious cover art choice in a Hip Hop world often bound by conformity.
It can also be seen as an easy metaphor for a 30-year-old guy who grew up in Chicago and whose life has included stops in Colorado, San Diego and New York before settling in the Northwest — a white guy in a black man’s game, an introspective rapper inevitably compared to his fellow Rhymesayers’ label-mates in Atmosphere.
Grieves’ delivery certainly brings to mind his obvious inspiration, Atmosphere’s Slug, but Winter & the Wolves also seems to be courting the kind of success experienced by another Seattle rapper — Macklemore immediately comes to mind when taking in the new album’s sleek production and easily digestible raps.
Exhibit A is “How’s It Gonna Go,” a piano-driven relationship tune about a guy who waits by the phone for his lady to call and tell him, “How’s it gonna go/Tell me what you’re thinking/I can’t get a read on you anymore.” It’s a syrupy song about a vulnerable guy, and its straightforward hooks and soaring guest vocals by producer B. Lewis sound readymade for mainstream radio (whatever that might be these days).
GRIEVES performs at 20th Century Theatre on Wednesday, May 21. Tickets/more info
here .
This article appears in May 21-27, 2014.