Sumach Valentine is Gonja Sufi, a San Diego rapper currently based in Las Vegas. He's a character: a yoga instructor with the mouth of a sailor, he talks a lot about spiritualism and balance, hinting at a considerable darkness in his upbringing, a violence he keeps at bay. He's a surfer, and if his debut album is shot through with a weird sense of longing, it might be because he's so far from the ocean. In interviews, he's described bringing seawater back from California and pouring it over parched Nevada soil, and you can hear something similar in his music, as dry, scratchy drum breaks soak up fluid streams of jazz, soul and even rock 'n' roll; his own voice shape-shifts between cracked gravel and a fluid falsetto.

Despite his history in the San Diego rap scene, Gonjasufi comes across more as a singer than a rapper, flitting between an agonized drawl and a lullaby hush. He's a hillbilly rocker on "She Gone," and he channels Snoop Dogg on "Dust;" it sounds like he's swallowed a kazoo on "I've Given." Much of the time, he explores the melody as though he were trying to feel his way out of a… read more »