Slique: Bridging Music’s Generation Gap

Being a member of a Boy bands can be a gift — and a curse. On one hand, each member is afforded the luxury of devoted fans, VIP treatment and sold-out concerts. The other side of the spectrum involves bad break-ups and dangerous addictions, which are a just a couple of the perils young men in the music industry face. For the Windy City’s newest crooner, Slique, the experience was more or less a positive intro to the music game. 

“We didn’t really know about the business, all we knew is we could sing and make girls scream,” Slique says of his days with pop sensation, Entourage. “Of course, the group didn’t work out and I still had a talent to sing, write songs, produce and arrange, so I just had to keep the train moving.” 

Now as an older, wiser solo artist, Slique has created a sound he calls, “rhythm and ghetto soul.” Combining his gritty urban upbringing with the vintage sounds of soul singers like Marvin Gaye and other greats of the day, Slique gives listeners the best of worlds via his album, Rhythm and Ghetto Soul. “[RNG] is all about the music, not saying the music is ghetto, but the music is me,” he says. “I write and produce my own music — it’s just another interpretation of what my sound is.” 
Skeptics aside, Slique’s music is not falling on deaf ears. His latest single, “Your Body” recently hit No. 1 on Billboard’s Bubbling Under R&B/Hip-Hop Singles chart. Like a good bowl of gumbo, Slique promises versatility.  

“There’s a lot of ingredients to get that flavor,” he says. “You’ve got your old-school, your new-school, your hip-hop … everything I listen to, you’ll hear it in Rhythm and Ghetto Soul.” –gavin philip godfrey