Ricki Monique
The most important thing is the story. Stories connect us, heal us, teach us, and lift us. We celebrate stories, sometimes intimately, sometimes with crowds - but a story is only as good as its storyteller. Without question, Ricki Monique is one of the next great storytellers. With a visceral, intimate, and powerful lyrical style, she effortlessly combines elements of spoken word, hip-hop, soul, and jazz to weave witty rhymes with deep contemplations. Each track is undeniably authentic, straight from the soul. There isn’t a single note, word, or beat that isn’t fully “Ricki Monique”. Her tracks delve into complex, intimate topics. Ideas like artistic permanence, the intertwining of her story with stories of past and future, and the internal struggle of creating new art. Ideas that can sometimes crush an artist instead flourish under Monique’s style and lyricism.
This week we’re featuring her brand new single “IMMORTAL”, produced with yourbeautifulruin. Monique describes the collaboration as “less spontaneous, but more like we’re connecting.” They speak with each other about how their feeling, what’s happening with their lives, and then - as if they were attuned to each other in some cosmically sonic way - they write in tandem. yourbeautifulruin produces a beat and chorus that serves as the perfect foundation for the deep introspection that Monique is so gifted with. The collaboration is more symbiotic; the beat can’t exist without the lyrics and vice-versa. If Monique is the storyteller, then yourbeautifulruin is the illustrator, serving the story but never overshadowing it.
At the end of it all, Ricki Monique describes collaboration as the secret to artistic immortality. The stories we tell together serve as our combined, shared legacy. That collaboration continues in her community with the Tangible Collective - an arts and education collective co-founded by Monique and her best friend Za’Nia Sephra Coleman. The collective engages their local community through art, conversation, activism, and holding space. Going into their 5th year, the collective continues to provide a platform for artists to engage the community in thought, providing new curriculum, events, and performances. You can find out more about Tangible Collective here.
