Born in the U.S. but spending much of his childhood in Africa and the West Indies, as the child of a Jamaican intellectual and a would-be Marxist revolutionary, billy woods is a rapper who defies categorization. On the mic, his work is as eclectic. After spending much of the 2000s in relative obscurity woods stuck a nerve with 2012’s audacious mission statement, History Will Absolve Me. In 2013 woods and fellow NYC artist Elucid joined forces as Armand Hammer and released the incendiary Race Music. In the years that followed, woods has released a steady stream of critically acclaimed projects, both as a solo artist and with Armand Hammer.