Video: Earl Sweatshirt – Off Top

Earl Sweatshirt’s music has been called depressing, but it’s really just claustrophobic. The preternaturally talented Los Angeles native wowed fans and critics this spring with I Don’t Like Shit, I Don’t Got Outside, channeling his misanthropy into sparse beats and razor-sharp raps that taunted foes and turned on a dime. His new video from that set, for Off Top, is perhaps his best since the slew of material that was uploaded to Myspace in 2010.

Laying animated sequences over archival video footage, Earl burns cop cars, is gobbled up whole by disembodied mouths, bursts through the screen on a runaway train and generally doesn’t give a fuck about physics or police. Earl has a packed schedule this summer; having already played a series of festivals and shows in Australia and New Zealand, he’s about to kick off the indoor, domestic leg of his Ready To Leave Now tour.

He’ll be joined by Remy Banks and NxWorries, the duo made up of Knxwledge and recent Dr. Dre collaborator Anderson .Paak. Fans in LA can catch him tomorrow (August 8, or 8/08) at the second annual Low End Theory Festival. (Animation for “Off Top” by Taylor Johnson.)