Andrew Veeder on February 7th, 2014

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In the vein of Philadelphia’s the Roots or Minneapolis’ Heiruspecs, Los Angeles’ the Concepts are a hip-hop band backed by live instrumentation and a full band. They are fronted by MC Keith Kilgore, and rounded out by Zane Guindon on guitars, Justin Lenoir on drums and percussion, Kyle Newman on trumpet and flugelhorn, Nick Vanetta on keys and vocals, and Ryan Wright on bass. Guindon and Lenoir began producing beats in recording school in 2008, and Lenoir later met Kilgore at a friend’s party where he was freestyling. The trio began collaborating and after months of writing, Vanetta and Wright were added and Newman brought on his brass. Before long, they were opening up local shows for artists like Binary Star, Cam’ron, Macklemore & Ryan Lewis, Slum Village, and Warren G, while jamming, writing and recording songs for their debut, the “Death by Way of Living.” The first single is “Rising Sun/Eclipse,” featuring the sultry vocals of Jessica Shetler over a vibrant groove of dreamy keys, funky bass, gentle punctuations of soulful guitar, and percussion that proves drum machines have no soul like this, switching up the beat with different jazzy flourishes and intensities. Kilgore’s flow is casual and impressive, with lines like, “Cuz I’m living through sunsets, I’ma leave this earth breath taking / holdin’ faith cuz no man can ever take it / This is the renaissance, the world can’t see it / another sunrise, this the day to achieve it / Aristocrats with a home in a backpack / flying with the bird, feeling broke as a Kit Kat / we hold gats in the daytime, pitch black / the sin of death where babies being born at.”

||| Stream: “Rising Sun/Eclipse” featuring Jessica Shetler

||| Also: Check out the video for “Rising Sun/Eclipse” after the jump: