The Night’s Gambit

Kaseem Ryan’s quietude speaks as loud as fellow Brownsvillians M.O.P. — even on the tracks with minimal drums. But in the greater scheme of things (and the things of schemes), he’s part of a lineage that includes collaborators like GZA and Roc Marciano, less glamorizing the hard times than the fact that he’s weathered them. His voice completes those scenes, deceptively affectless yet delivered with a precise, detailed clarity which makes his emotionally weathered witnessing strike fast and hard in high-contrast black-and-white.