Rapper, songwriter, poet and multi-instrumentalist, Khemist is a Philadelphia-bred artist and musical savant beloved as a bonafide lyrical force. Hailing from the city’s Logan Valley, Khemist is an extraterrestrial talent endowed with the hawkish ability to see the streets and set the Dickensian conditions of his formative years to music. Plied with eloquence and empathy, his catalog is punctuated by the monotone delivery and rough hewn exterior he developed surviving a charmed but bittersweet life amidst the blighted haunts, brutalist architecture and cold shoulders of a hardscrabble, post-industrial city.
Incited by the decision to stop speaking as a child, Khemist’s career as journeyman lyricist began at a local playground, when he darted to retrieve a loose ball. That led to a fortuitous encounter with a man facing certain death.
“I didn’t even start talking in school until I went to high school. My whole middle school experience, I didn’t talk at all. I went to the park at Barrett playground. The ball bounced behind the rec and I went to retrieve it and saw this man just bleeding out –– lying there. Me and my man looked for a second, then some oldhead came and told us to move. He told us not to say anything so we never said nothing. We went back to playing ball. I still don’t know what happened to that guy. After that I didn’t talk in school from fifth to eighth grade.” - Khemist
‘This is by far the most honest music I’ve ever made. Being introspective, and trying new things that I may have been hesitant to do earlier in my career –– like experimenting with and ultimately growing to love my voice. Being around the musicians I’m around has encouraged me to take more ownership over each component of the music I’m making.’
