Height Keech is a musician from Baltimore that has been carving out his own unique path for almost twenty years now. We last heard from him a little over a year ago when he released his full-length album, Computer Rocker. Now it’s time for his thirteenth album, Raw Routes.

If you’ve listened to Height Keech before, you might have some idea what to expect from one of his albums, but if you haven’t, you might be a little surprised. That’s because Keech has been walking a path for the past two decades that carefully exists between hip hop, garage and psychedelic rock, blues, post punk, and soul, where the music is never one thing, always at least a couple at once, and sometimes so many things that it truly becomes it’s own thing. One of the things that hit me the most as I pressed play on this album is how amazing the drums sound on this album, and how that injection of energy brings the album to life and drives it through to the end. On top of that, this is a groove-driven album, and Keech has grooves for days, coming up with some amazing riffs, whether they be on keyboard, guitar, horns, or some combination. On the mic, Keech continues to find this in-between area, where he’s often sing-rapping in a way that not many do. Usually, when you hear a term like “sing-rap,” you’ll think of someone like Slimkid3 with a jazz-influenced style, or you’ll think of someone like Myka9, who brings a lot of R&B and reggae into the mix. That’s not where Keech is coming from, though. He sounds more like a combination of MCA and Craig Finn, and depending on the song, he might lean more in one direction, but more often than not, he’s in the middle of the spectrum. This means that you get a mix of songs like “I Can’t Believe There’s a Meme Shooter,” which is reminiscent of The Kinks or early Stones, right alongside songs like “Gang Way,” featuring ialive, Hemlock Ernst, Goldzilla, PT Burnem, and Mister, which easily could have been a posse cut on Check Your Head. Lyrically, everything is on the table, as Keech tackles politics, religion, the music industry, capitalism, and technology, all with an absurdist sense of humor. This is evident on songs like, “If Hitler Won The War, There Would Be No Rock & Roll,” or “That’s A Wrap For Radio Shack,” which will certainly grab your attention with their titles, but reward you with some substantial food for thought we you pay closer attention to the verses.

You won’t hear another album in 2019 that sounds like Raw Routes, that’s for sure. Height Keech could easily have phoned it in or called it quits this far into his career, but he’s obviously still hungry and inspired, creating an album bursting with energy and ideas for days. This is an album that works on so many levels, you can keep returning to it and enjoy it a different way each time through.