Brian Ennals and Blockhead Detail New Album Boatshoes, Share “Aldente”

Brian Ennals is coming off one of last year’s most unpredictable rap albums. A City Drowned In God’s Black Tears, built with producer Infinity Knives, was a raw, DIY collision of noise and confession. Now Ennals has stepped into a different orbit entirely. His next record, Boatshoes, pairs him with Blockhead, the New York producer whose beats have anchored decades of independent rap, from Aesop Rock to billy woods.

The first single makes the chemistry plain. “Aldente” rides a dense, layered Blockhead production threaded with harmonica, a sound you don’t hear much in rap outside a handful of Wu-Tang-affiliated deep cuts. Ennals comes in sharp, repeatedly pulling the hook from 2Pac’s “Hail Mary,” a nod to Pac’s brief childhood years in Baltimore. It’s a subtle thread that ties the city to the song without feeling forced.

The album was announced today. It’s called Boatshoes, out July 17 on Phantom Limb. The tracklist shows a record pulling from a specific pool of underground guests: Fatboi Sharif, ShrapKnel, Defcee, DeathIRL, and Mike Mayo among them. There’s also a new installment in Blockhead’s long-running “Now That’s What I Call A Posse Cut” series.

In the announcement, Ennals said he felt the weight of Blockhead’s catalog. “This is a dude that’s made albums with Aesop Rock and billy woods, so I was aware there was a level of quality I had to reach.” He described the beats as funky and almost pop, but still entirely rap. For Blockhead, the outcome stands apart: “We ended up with an album that sounds nothing like anything we have done before. And when you’ve been doing this as long as I have, that’s a rare accomplishment.”

The single is out now. The album’s tracklist and preorder links are live. Boatshoes doesn’t sound like either artist’s comfort zone, and that looks to be exactly the point.