Ackryte is a producer from Minneapolis who has been making beautiful instrumental hip hop for years, along with producing for a few emcees like Rich Garvey. After working at a pretty prolific pace for quite some time, Ackryte took some time off, or at least relatively so. This is all to say that two years after his last solo release, ok cool, we now get his return to form, Hiatus.

Here’s the things about hiatuses in general. They make you appreciate you have more when it’s not readily avaible. After many years of pumping out some of the most beautiful and complex instrumental tracks, it was a little easy to take Ackryte for granted sometimes, like you could dial up these sophisticated jazz samples played against intricate rhythmic patterns any time you like. And then he takes two years off, and now I’m like, “Oh boy, did I miss these soothing, intimate beats with layers upon layers of involved melodies and countermelodies!” Ackryte has a real knack for composing instrumental music that is incredibly calm and inviting, something that you can just listen to on headphones and lose yourself inside your head, but you can also listen to actively, and just be amazed by all of the minutiae that he is tending to as he makes his beats sound so simple and straightforward. Hiatus is no exception – Ackryte is just delivering exactly what you’d expect after taking a little time off, and it sounds great. Maybe if he follows this up in the near future, we might get something more experimental, but right now let’s just all enjoy the beautiful jazzy instrumental hip hop from Minneapolis that we’ve missed so much.

Hiatus isn’t anything too crazy, it’s just classic Ackryte at his best. It’s soothing, it’s engaging, and it’s just really enjoyable to listen to as you wind your way through all of the tracks.