About

"Rock creek park is & has always been one of my favorite places in Washington, DC. It has a way of aging with you & adapting to where you are in life. When I was younger, it was a place for skipping rocks, bike rides & imaginary adventures in the woods. As a teen it was a place where I played basket ball, had cook outs with friends & walked through with dates. As an adult it's my short cut through the city, my quickest way from Silver Spring to George Town. One thing it still is and always well be is my retreat.

Listening to the Black Byrd's "Rock Creek Park" inspired me to create an entire album around the park & my relationship with it. If the park were to have a soundtrack, what would it be? What does walking along the trails of the park sound like? What does driving on the narrow tree lined roads sound like? This album is my interpretation of Rock Creek Park through break beats, samples & live instrumenta-tion." – Oddisee

“Only one track on Rock Creek Park features vocals: Opener “Still Doing It,” which has a verse from fellow Diamond District member yU. After that, it’s all impressionistic drum-ripples and dizzy soul strings. There are samples in there, but Oddisee also used live-band arrangements. The production walks a tight-line, staying away from looped-up monotony on one side and session-player gloss on the other. And so the whole thing breezes by in 43 ridiculously pleasant minutes. Oddisee’s named the tracks after specific local geography (“Beach Dr.,” “Clara Barton”) or specific memory-trigger phrases (“Skipping Rocks,” “All Along The River”). And even though it’s not generally wise to read too much emotional connection into instrumental music, the album really does evoke the beauty and solitude of being a kid alone in a park, and traces of the clatter of the city around it also creep in. It’s a deeply pretty and thoughtful piece of music” – Stereogum

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