D’Angelo is back to tease us — again. In a rare music appearance, the low-key Grammy winner leaves his soul imprint on hip-hop artist Rapsody’s new banger titled “Ibtihaj” featuring GZA.
The 9th Wonder-produced cut finds D’Angelo singing the haunted chorus in a distorted vocal. As Rapsody and GZA alternate between highly literate rhymes, the neo-soul leader revitalizes spare lines from the latter MC’s tough classic “Liquid Swords” featuring RZA.
While D’Angelo does not cameo in the official video, hip-hop heads Roxanne Shanté and Mary J. Blige bring their New York swag into the mix.
It was reported in April that D’Angelo was on the brink of a comeback after his Devil’s Piece — D’Angelo premiered at the 2019 Tribeca Film Festival.
“He’s actually doing really well, and he’s very excited,” revealed director Carine Bijlsma during a Q&A after the film debut. “He was in the studio these past weeks. He has big plans for the future, so you’ll definitely be seeing more of him.”
D’Angelo’s upcoming solo project will mark his first full-length effort since 2014 Black Messiah. The LP featured contributions from his band The Vanguard and won a Grammy for Best R&B Album in 2016.
Last year, D’Angelo made a brief return to the soul landscape and gave us “Unshaken” for the Red Dead Redemption 2 video game soundtrack.
Watch the dope video for “Ibtihaj” below.
