by Dan O

Televangel has a feel for setting a song in motion and building on top of that.

In America, we don’t care much or care to know much about most parts of America. It’s designed that way. We care about New York because it is a financial and cultural hub for the world. We care about Florida and Texas because terrible and impossible things always seem to happen there. You have to make us care about your region. Hip Hop takes that to the extreme with countless examples (NWA and Compton, 2 Live Crew and Miami) so what Televangel did in 2023 is pretty fantastic when you look at it beyond simply lacing dope beats for dope albums. Televangel produced 3 full projects this year: Incorruptible Saints with Sleep Sinatra, The Fish That Saved Portland with Milc, and Parthian Shots with AJ Suede. Every one of these projects feature AJ Suede and Milc, two of them feature Nacho Picasso. Lord Olo dropped a scene stealing opening verse on Fire Forged off Incorruptible Saints. When you collaborate with Televangel you cross over into his dimension. It doesn’t limit the kind of music you make, quite the opposite. The cast of characters and sounds are going to be vivid, distinctly separate from anything you’ve ever done before. Televangel has a feel for setting a song in motion and building on top of that. In 2023, that feel and follow through took hold in a way that left an imprint on people that follow this scene. This is what the northwest sounds like.

Don’t mistake that last sentence for something about the northwest JUST NOW doing its thing. I waited in line to buy the Blue Scholars debut album in 2005. The work has been there. Greater outside media wasn’t aptly able to describe the characteristics of Northwest Hip Hop. The work Televangel has done creates a comfortable space for that world to define itself for the listeners. Each of these three projects help to do that.

Listen to Mankind off The Fish That Saved Portland. It’s moody as hell with spooky warbling ghost sounds from fifty seconds on. A giant sized mood that envelopes you but if you put that song on in your car you can’t wait for the twenty three second mark when the beat really drops and Milc is off to the races. It knocks while building the mood and then brings in Nacho Picasso for one of my favorite guest verses of 2023. Very few people can balance the mood with the satisfying head nod factor we as listeners need. Televangel did it better than anyone in the world in 2023.

On top of that he brings a cast of characters you won’t find elsewhere. Televangel has no desire to beg for the same features and collaborations everyone else is working towards. He calls Old Grape God, Lord Olo, or Nacho Picasso and over a beat that doesn’t sound like it could come from anywhere but him you get a set of features completely unique to the Televangel-verse.

I could count on every Televangel release to be great but beyond that to challenge what I expected it to be. Great directors submerge themselves in the details. They don’t just want to know where the character is going but what the street looks like, what color car they are getting in. A good director masters the proper execution of those details a great one takes them in hand and reshuffles. Finds every available order and maps it to the mission. I hope Televangel marshals resources and creates a full label, a hub of the kind of hip hop we got in 2023. A place where Khrist Koopa can grow a fanbase like AJ Suede did. One well curated project after another. Successful Indie labels can cause ripples that change the history of this form. That is how impressive Televangel’s year was, I would entrust him with all of that responsibility and enjoy the show.