Spoek Mathambo makes the Afro-futurists look old school. With the arrival of his second album, 'Father Creeper', he's one man building up an army to make his creative visions a reality, rewriting any artistic laws in his way.
Johannesburg's Spoek Mathambo (real name: Nthato Mokgata) first hotwired our world with a series of collaborative projects-Sweat X, Playdoe-that placed his smart, dirty vocals on top of electro-rap bangers that activated dancefloors across the globe. Things went darker and deeper with his 2010 debut album, 'Mshini Wam' (translation: "bring me my machine"), a record which took Spoek's love affair with South African culture and his coined "township tech" as a starting point. As always, he pulled those influences in a direction all his own (think: a pitched-down wobble-house cover of Joy Division's "She's Lost Control"). Mathambo topped things off with a grip of visually thrilling videos depicting a fresh-to-death urban gothic vibe, and months of touring across US, Europe, and South America.
'Father Creeper' took shape during this touring. They began with haunting lyrics about conflict diamonds, penned by Mathambo's wife Ana Rab (aka Gnucci Bananaa), fleshing out the verses into an epic, synth-driven post-dubstep heater. "Put Some Red on It" would become Father Creeper's first single.
