George Maple takes her soul to the strip club in new track Sticks And Horses feat. GoldLink

George Maple takes her soul to the strip club in new track Sticks And Horses feat. GoldLink

A racy step into US rap territory for the accomplished singer.

22 year-old Washington, D.C. rapper Goldlink made serious waves with his 2014 mixtape The God Complex, where he managed to find a bright, upbeat middle ground between house music and hip hop, mixing soft production (the kind that would make you think of Kaytranda, or SBTRKT) with hard, street-savvy rhymes. Last year’s And After That, We Didn’t Talk saw those rhymes coloured with emotional detail, with Goldlink venturing more into R & B territory, and singing a fair bit.

It’s in that house / R & B realm that Goldlink and Australian singer songwriter George Maple share a common thread – Maple’s soulful voice is prime for an R & B cut, and her solid house resume features strong vocal features on productions for smooth-dance acts like Flight Facilities and Snakehips. Her more recent work singing with the more heavier trap style of What So Not brings her even closer into Goldlink’s trap/rap realm.

Given the above, Goldlink and Maple are not as unexpected a pairing as you might think – and on Maple’s new track Sticks and Horses, they show us exactly how well they make it work; contrasting the hard and soft elements of both of their music styles with skill; with Noah Breakfast, WILLIS and What So Not rounding out a compelling production. 

The accompanying racy video clip, which is partly shot in red and pink hues reminiscent of Goldlink’s video clips, locates itself in typical rap video territory - open desert, stripclubs, shady boudoirs – and depicts a scantily-clad Maple writhing about on a bed covered in cash. Then she's tucking money into the G-strings of strippers, then there's some kidnapping-type story line where she gags a guy and rubs up against him in leather and shoves a gun in his face. As far as ‘strip club revenge’ video clips go, it kind of comes across as uninspired - a poor man’s version of Rihanna’s Bitch Better Have My Money - and feels inauthentic, despite Maple’s more recent aesthetic foray into a bondage-fashion driven style. Which is a shame, because this is an inspired and authentic song.

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Listen / watch below: 

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