Clipping (band)

Biography

Diggs and Hutson met in grade school, and Hutson and Snipes were college roommates. The group began in 2009 as a remix project, with Hutson and Snipes taking a cappellas of mainstream rap artists and making power electronics and noise remixes of them to amuse themselves. Diggs joined in 2010 and began to write his own raps over their compositions. They self-released their first album, Midcity, on their website on February 5, 2013. Though their expectations were low, and despite minimal promotion, the album was well-received, and five months later, they signed to Sub Pop. Their second album, CLPPNG, was released on June 10, 2014.

The group does not see their abrasive sound as a rejection of mainstream hip hop or reaction against it, but as part of a hip hop tradition including the likes of Dr. Dre and Public Enemy producers The Bomb Squad, who experimented with production and also used harsh, musique concrète-esque techniques in their music. Similarly, they think of themselves as a rap group rather than industrial-rap, noise-rap, or other mash-up genres.

On June 14, they released an EP entitled Wriggle. They then released their second studio album, Splendor & Misery, on September 9.

Style and influences

The group has drawn comparisons to the likes of Dälek, Death Grips, My Bloody Valentine, Tim Hecker and Shabazz Palaces. The Guardian described their sound as "the sort of shrill thrills you imagine could function as incidental soundtrack music for a documentary about abattoirs or might conceivably be the work of a young band intent on twisting industrial metal into brutal new shapes. With rapping on top." Rolling Stone called them "[n]imble-tongued, beat-fractured L.A. hip-hop spilled over the abrasive crunches, squeals, clangs, slurps, and static of experimental musique concrète."

Mixtapes

Albums

Remix Albums

Extended plays

Singles

Remixes