Serengeti

Serengeti, the Chicago-rooted indie rapper, pulls sonic threads from emo, indie rock, avant electronica, and additional styles to shape his output. His status as an extraordinarily productive creator rests on a steady stream of full-length releases marked by quirky character and oblique lyricism. David Cohn entered the world and passed his early years in the Chicago suburbs before relocating to the city at sixteen, the same moment he began composing rap verses. His unconventional outlook took shape amid the contrasting influences of his separated parents, with his mother acting as a political activist and self-described socialist while his father maintained an upper-middle-class existence. During his college years Cohn encountered classmate DJ Crucial, who shared comparable hip-hop goals. Crucial later established F5 Records and put out Serengeti’s first album, Dirty Flamingo, in 2003. That project inaugurated nearly a dozen long-players issued on assorted independent labels over the ensuing years. Among the notable entries were Gasoline Rainbow, an experimental rock-inflected effort released in 2006 on MF Grimm’s Day by Day label, and the inventive, blog-favored Dennehy, which appeared the same year via Bonafyde. After signing with Audio 8, Serengeti joined glitch-hop producer Polyphonic for the 2007 album Don't Give Up, then revisited Dennehy the following year in expanded form. The title track introduced the fictional Kenny Dennis, a figure who recurred across later projects such as the 2012 Kenny Dennis EP, the 2013 Kenny Dennis LP, and 2014’s Kenny Dennis III. In 2016 Serengeti partnered with Yoni Wolf, the creative force behind Why?, on the collaborative album Testarossa. Issued as Yoni & Geti through Joyful Noise, the conceptual record narrated the tale of ill-fated lovers Maddy and Davy.