Today, VINSON — a Detroit native whose shadowy and futuristic sound reverberates with the pulse of Detroit musical innovators from Motown to The Belleville Three, Slum Village, Bruiser Brigade, and beyond — releases his debut album RAW HONEY, a prismatic swirl of experimental R&B, soul, hip hop, techno, and house.

Listen to RAW HONEY here.

On April 29, VINSON is playing an album release show at The Airliner in Los Angeles, with special guests including the deeply emotive and energetic raps of Kwame Adu alongside the psychedelic R&B stylings of Cousin Mouth, with DJs Miss Dragao and Wadood serving a mix of diasporic and club sounds. Tickets and more info below and here.

Throughout RAW HONEY, VINSON invites listeners into his psychic reality: the carnal sensations of sex and liquor, sobering reflections on heartbreak and Black struggle, and the insidious ever-presence of systems that dictate life beyond individual control. Mixed and mastered by Jake Viator at Stones Throw Studios, it’s a sumptuously rendered opening statement from an artist whose beguiling combination of bass-heavy future-soul and evocative slice-of-life lyrical flashes demands serious headphone listening.

Lead single and title track “Raw Honey” is a moody and anticipatory string of late night come-ons purred over a clattering J Dilla-style shuffle. Recent single “On The Low,” featuring Bruiser Wolf, the Detroit rapper known best for his work with Danny Brown’s Bruiser Brigade, is a sweet and smooth R&B slow jam that feels like a deep cut from the 80s. Bruiser Wolf’s flow fits perfectly here, and as VINSON adds, “follows in the Detroit tradition of street sensibility and humor but still has an ear for some of hip-hops best production. Having a feature like that on this record is something that pulls the city in a way I haven’t seen done in a while, where Soul music meets the Hip-Hop world. Everything seems so siloed at the current moment.”

Earlier this year, VINSON shared “Liquor Brown,” a slow-simmering serving of intoxicated deep house infatuation. Watch the “Liquor Brown” video here.

A Detroit native, VINSON grew up steeped in the city’s rich musical history. While techno and ghettotech filled the radio waves throughout his youth, he also was also exposed to the rich history of soul music as his uncles were apart of Motown era singing groups The Four Tops and The Contours. After moving to Los Angeles in 2019 to make the music work and get in-tune with himself, VINSON quickly got immersed in the underground alternative and hip hop scenes, opening shows for Black Milk, Ghostface Killah, and DUCKWRTH, and collaborating with Open Mike Eagle, Bruiser Wolf, Nappy Nina, and more. In the short time since his move, VINSON has released a series of acclaimed projects (Loose Rap, SoftSweetRadical, Break A Sweat, Knowledge of Self, Rhythmic Pool) and curates a quarterly showcase of alternative artists called Good Company, whose participants have included The Koreatown Oddity, Qu’ran Shaheed, and Silas Short.