Nosaj Thing

There's no such thing as a beat too weird for Nosaj Thing, an artist from L.A. who counts among a small coterie of next-wave producers in the realm of smeary electronic music and hip-hop. (See also: Flying Lotus, Hudson Mohawke, Dam Funk, et al.) The sound of his name-making 2009 album Drift derives from the kind of glitchy boom-bap work popularized by the likes of Prefuse 73, but there's something decidedly newer about it—more open and curious. 

Updated 02/10/2010