Few artists can even come close to touching the long, varied, and prolific career that Chicago emcee Serengeti has put together after more than two decades in the game. One of the fun things about following his career is that you never know when what you’re listening to might turn into bigger project. Just ask anyone when they first heard the character Kenny Dennis make an appearance if they knew then that Serengeti would periodically go back and mine multiple album-length stories that gave you one of the most well-rounded characters in all of hip hop. We haven’t gotten quite to that level yet, but back in 2017, Serengeti teamed up with producer Rob Kleiner (Tub Ring, Mindless Self Indulgence, Super 8 Bit Brothers) to release a four-song EP called Kaleidoscope. It was certainly enjoyable, but at the time it didn’t seem like anything more than a one-off project. Then, in 2019, when got four more songs with Kaleidoscope 2. Now, Serengeti has once again teamed up with Kleiner to now release a full-length album, Kaleidoscope III.

If you’ve spent any amount of time with Serengeti’s music over the years, you know that he really gives himself over to the style of the musicians he’s working with. He still has a distinct voice on the mic that immediately lets you know that it is him, but he always rises to the challenge of making himself fit in new spaces by working with different artists. You’re never going to confuse his work with Open Mike Eagle with his work with Greg from Deerhoof or his work with Odd Nosdam, just to give a few examples. In working with Rob Kleiner, Serengeti gives us his most indie rock/synth pop album to date, one that is gentle and infectious upon first listen. Kleiner has a great feel for pop song structure, and he finds a great balance between giving us an album that you can completely get lost in as well as giving us singles that will absolutely stick in your head all day long. That balance is just right for someone like Serengeti, who can definitely deliver a hook and give you something to hold onto as a listener, but he can also put together epic poems and tell stories over the course of one or more songs that just allow you to let go as a listener and just trust your narrator. The whole album has this chilly, overcast feeling to it, like these fellow Chicago musicians were working through a cold Midwestern winter, the type where the cold weather inspires you to stay inside and work through your thoughts and emotions. As a result, this becomes an album that sounds beautiful on headphones, where you can really close yourself off from the outside world for a moment and just dive in completely into the world of Kaleidoscope III.

At this point in his career, we should just assume that every one-off single, unreleased B-side, or unassuming tweet from Serengeti could later be mined for inspiration to deliver a wonderful full-length album somewhere down the line. With Kaleidoscope III, we see Serengeti and Rob Kleiner move from a few nice songs together to crafting a beautiful and complex hip hop/synth pop album with rich production, great hooks, and incredible character development and storytelling.