The Maine-based rapper, producer, and record store owner Milo is a truly singular figure. As a rapper, he’s a vivid and sharp writer, but he doesn’t operate the way many other rappers do. Instead, he follows his own music, chasing arcane and complicated punchlines or finding poetically expansive ways to dig into black identity. He’s a fascinating figure, and every time he puts out a record, it deserves serious and dedicated attention.

Lately, there have been quite a few Milo records. A little more than a year ago, he released a pretty astonishing album called Who Told You To Think​?​!​!​?​!​?​!​?​! — the one that finally convinced sleepy souls like me that his was a truly vital rap voice. At the beginning of this year, under his Scallops Hotel alter-ego, Milo also released the album Sovereign Nose Of (Y)our Arrogant Face. And Milo is also half of the duo Nostrum Grocers alongside the similarly cerebral Brooklyn rapper/producer Elucid (who himself is half of Armand Hammer). Just last month, Nostrum Grocers released their self-titled album. You should hear all of those records.

And you should also make time for the brand-new Milo album. Today, Milo comes out with the excellently titled new LP Budding Ornithologists Are Weary Of Tired Analogies. Once again, he’s rapping deep and discursive and playful words over fractured, contemplative beats, many of them produced by Milo himself. We’ve already posted the early track “Stet,” but you can now stream the whole album below.

Of the new album, Milo writes:

this album doesn’t have an arc or a point or a moral to preach. it’s a contemporary rhythm and poetry album made by someone who loves the form and enjoys creating what they want to hear in the world. all of my songs become spells. i go out into the world, corralling small groups together and we yell and cry and howl and laugh around these words, some being gorgeous lies that come true. with 7 years of urban shamanism under my belt i no longer seek the story of the adventurer, i seek the experience. i cannot tell you all about it as that would commodify, as that would turn what is decidedly non fractal into SEO keyword. i refuse. so what you hear in this album is simply a pamphlet. little aphorisms and landmines to burst your mind out of the mundane a moment, broken myth and hopes and torments, riddled out of myself as they came, very little editing.

this record is on the other side of time and guarded from the avantgarde and their cynicisms as well as the mainstream and their perpetual boredom tropes. my collaborators and i got funky and we dared to share that feeling with you, we allowed ourselves to feel ourselves and what followed was exhilarating. a long time coming been coming a long time.

budding ornithologists are weary of tired analogies.

charlie parker was a great electrician who went around wiring people.

i want to be a great electrician.

rf

Budding Ornithologists Are Weary Of Tired Analogies is out now on Ruby Yacht.