One of the Twin Cities' most buzzed-about young hip-hop artists, Dua Saleh has issued one of the first singles in reaction to the George Floyd tragedy.
Titled "body cast," the haunting new track directly addresses police brutality and includes recorded audio from a 2019 viral clip of a Montana woman confronting police who illegally entered her home. Downloads of the song via Bandcamp and streaming revenue will benefit Minneapolis-based Black Visions Collective, a justice organization with which the rapper has ties.
The song, recorded with omnipresent Minnesota producer Psymun, was posted Monday along with a lyric video that features the names of unarmed African Americans killed by police. Saleh said in a statement the song was recorded last year and is now being released to "demand justice for the family of George Floyd and countless others who have had their lives stolen by the police."
"[I] intended to save it for a project in the future, but I can't wait that long with what is happening in my city of Minneapolis," Saleh added.
Lyrics include, "Lately I've had plaster on my mind/County ain't on shit they got bodies on the line/Lately I've been analyzing time/Y'all been dodging cameras like they bullets over crime."
Several national media outlets have already picked up on the song, including Rolling Stone, which also interviewed Saleh last week among other African American musicians in Minnesota about the death of George Floyd and the tumultuous aftermath. (Soul Asylum drummer Michael Bland and rappers Nur-D and Finding Novyon also contributed).
Saleh told Rolling Stone, "The last few days have been full of emotional anguish, triggers, and mobilization efforts. The community is grieving. George Floyd's family is still mourning. Minneapolis is still mourning."
Saleh is readying a new EP, "ROSETTA," for release in the coming weeks.
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