Tycoon and the Lucid Smoke

by TLS

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1.	Dreams 02:04	buy track
2.	Karma 03:24	buy track
3.	TLS 02:15	buy track
4.	The Switch 02:26	buy track
5.	Mode (Gangster with No Gun) 02:21	buy track
6.	Recess 03:14	buy track
7.	Hi 03:05	buy track
8.	Screw School 02:28	buy track
9.	Nightfall 01:17	buy track

about

Tycoon and the Lucid Smoke is the exceptional freestyle Hip-Hop project of Frank Ico and Preston Samanda (of the bands: Dead Skin Remedy and Chovu respectively). Titus Nzui (Tycoon) makes it a rap trio. They produce/play all their own tracks with a distinctive old school groove. The trio pay homage to the old school roots of Hip Hop from the ghetto of New York City . Preston handles the bass lines and Frank is the genius behind the beats, arrangement.

The songs were produced over about a period of a month during the pandemic when the city of Nairobi was lockdown from the rest of the country. As curfews where also extended into the nighttime, the 3 artists found themselves sharing a tiny room in the slum of Shauri Ya Moyo.

The trio constructed the songs together using an only iPad and Bass, a Roland KC60 amplifier and a Shure SM-58mic only. They would produce the songs and then immediately afterwards pen the lyrics without revealing to each other what they had written.
“Well ,we usually do this is as a test, we do it like an exam - [We] make the beat halafu we all jam to it and everyone just pens down his deepest of emotions according to how they feel when listening to the track, weird thing is everything kinda matched in the end.” - Frank Ico

Each song was recorded as a live take where each artist would pass the mic to the next. It was a creative exercise that paid off. Lyrically the album is a literary masterpiece of pure poetry. The band unleashes rhymes with a stoic disposition confronting the stark truths and choices they face in their existence. As Frank relates: It's a job that needs a team ready to be vulnerable in every aspect of existence, I'm grateful for meeting my kind out, but it hasn't been easy walking this path.”

credits

released February 6, 2022

Written and composed by Tycoon and Lucid Smoke
Frank Ico - Vocals, Guitar
Preston Samanda - Vocals, Bass
GT - Vocals

All rights reserved 2020 Bin Khalid Sonic Pollution

Produced by Frank Ico and Harvey Herr

Art by Preston Samanda