Lese Majesty

Shabazz Palaces is officially the duo of rapper Palaceer Lazarro and multi-instrumentalist Tendai "Fly Guy 'Dai" Maraire, but it's more fun to think of Shabazz as a project, one imagined from the ground up without a fear of heights.

Frankly, they don't sound like earthlings. Lazarro actually uses extraterrestrial language in his already cryptic lyrics, which, combined with production that recalls the rap-informed loops of Flying Lotus or even the Floyd-isms of Nicolas Jaar's Darkside project, creates an endless-seeming atmosphere of synth trickles, distant drums, sinkhole vocals,various stereophonic blip-bleep-bloops.

Call it planetarium rap.