Vince Staples announced the upcoming release of his sixth full-length studio album, Dark Times , on Monday morning (May 20), revealing that his Def Jam LP will drop on Friday (May 24). The 13-track collection is described in a release as “a muscular and revelatory work refining elements that have been present in his catalog for the last decade: dense lyricism over lush, layered beats; wry, melancholic observations about life; finding pockets of light in an endless dark.” The album was previewed with the contemplative “Shame on the Devil,” whose 50-second video is a split-screen with one side containing a close-up of Staples rapping his lamentations over the song’s laconic beat.
The other side of the screen portrays the shadows of a woman and a child arguing in a room with a man in profile who, at one point, removes the halo hovering over his head as Staples rap/sings, “Shame on the devil/ I’m touched by an angel/ The lord made me special.” In a statement, Staples called the track a “personal achievement..
. it’s me mastering some things I’ve tried before that I wasn’t great at in the beginning. It’s a testament to musical growth, song structure — all the good stuff.
” A release noted that the album was recorded over seven months in North Hollywood, with the title coming to the rapper/actor “intuitively” after he listened to the whole thing and noticed some recurring “heavy” motifs. “I’m Black, and that’s what we’re evading,” he sa.