Bartees Unusual performed six units throughout SXSW 2023, with a remaining set on Thursday, March 16. He spent the competition, devoted to music and tech at a number of venues together with Austin Motel, Empire and The Parish. He kicked off the ultimate set at Austin’s Cheer Up Charlies together with his hit ‘Boomer’, proper after telling the gang that a lot of his gear was lacking.
Regardless of that truth, and a strong run of reveals in Texas for the competition, Unusual was excited to carry out his hits to the gang. “Dwelling on the east coast is cool however I miss it right here,” the Oklahoma native advised the Texas viewers.
Earlier than performing his hit monitor, ‘Mustang’, Unusual dug into his previous and what it was prefer to develop up within the southwest. “This track is about being the one Black individual in my county,” Unusual mentioned. “There was my household, then there was everyone else.”
He additionally spoke about his upbringing earlier than his monitor, ‘Hennessey’, discussing how he used to deliver a “Hennessey bag to highschool” with all of his belongings in it. Digging into the sultry monitor, he defined, “now that I’m grown, I’ve extra respect for Hennessey”.
In the meantime, Bartees Unusual just lately dropped an unique single on Amazon Music, placing his blues-imbued folks spin on Freddie Gibbs’ ScHoolboy Q-assisted single ‘Gang Indicators’. For his new tackle the track, the Ipswich, England-born, Oklahoma-raised indie-rocker locks into the texture of the unique monitor’s mild, groove-driven instrumental. He re-appropriates the melody with crisp and roomy electrical guitars, noodling away whereas he emulates Gibbs’ biting swagger together with his rapped verses.