Converse & Complex Present: Hanni el Khatib & Freddie Gibbs - "Satin Black" (CONS EP, VOL. 3)

Fresh on the heels of his critically-acclaimed, Madlib-produced Piñata and a series of album-preceding EP's, Freddie Gibbs has now teamed up with yet another unexpected collaborator: Black Keys affiliate, Hanni el Khatib. okayplayer vividly describes their just-released new track, "Satin Black" as a "classic break with gritty, fuzzed-out six strings licks lacquering the cut, all before the backdrop melts into a puddle of funky goo, subverting your inner-rocker in favor of heavy wahs, deep, gurgling organs and a muddied vocal filter on [Freddie] Gibbs' already haze-treated vox." It's vaguely reminiscent of Head In The Dirt producer Dan Auerbach's pre-widespread-acclaim, Rap-Blues Rock-indebted BlakRoc album (2009) concocted along with his fellow Black Keys bandmate Patrick Carney, executive producer Damon Dash, and a gaggle of seasoned, Roc-A-Fella Records aligned rappers ranging from Ol' Dirty Bastard to Yasiin Bey fka Mos Def.


"Satin Black" was coordinated by skate ambassador Kenny Anderson as part of Converse's forthcoming genre-blending CONS EP VOL. 3, which isn't exactly Hanni el Khatib's first time working with a sharp-tongued emcee... he's previously recorded a remix of his album title track, "Moonlight" with expert Wu-Tang Clan swordsman, GZA. Khatib's soon-to-be-released third album has somewhat perplexingly been described as "equal parts RZA, Iggy Pop, and Tom Waits;" ahead of Moonlight's January 20th release, Innovative Leisure has unleashed 100 copies of what they're billing "A Visual Companion to The Album Moonlight VHS," in which director Nathan 'Nacho' Cabrera compiled a collection of "obscure, weird & feared" video clips that magically synch up with each of the album's 11 tracks. Converse's CONS EP VOL. 3, on the other hand, "brings together eight different artists to make four new tracks" and is expected to see a release later this spring, coinciding with the Converse CONS KA3 sneaker unveiling.