In March we welcomed LA-based, Abilene, TX-raised musician Plato III to the PV family, today we are proud to announce his label debut The Devil Has Texas, arriving June 17. Pre-order a limited edition Early Bird vinyl on Fire (Clear w/ Orange Swirl) from the Polyvinyl Store. 

With his music, the hiphop artist born Ryan Silva fuses his musical influences – from the conscious hip-hop of Black Star to indie rock icons Modest Mouse – with nimble bars and outlaw anthem guitars to guide us down the dusty streets and empty plains of his hometown of Abilene, TX. The specter of Abilene haunts the entirety of the Phillip Odom co-produced album: we are tumbleweed-ed into a realm of crabgrass browning under desolate skies, pitbulls slobbering behind rusted fences, and doomed trailer park pipe dreams. Welcome to West Texas. “Hip-hop is so regional,” notes Ryan. “I want to make a sound that feels like where I lived. I want to dig into my upbringing.” 

Today's album announcement arrives alongside an official video for new single "Sorry If I Dissed You," whose main line is a sample from Modest Mouse's “Trailer Trash” and whose title is taken from its notable closing line. Ryan shared – 

“Modest Mouse was a big deal in our trailer park. A girl who used to drive me to school showed me ‘Trailer Trash,’ and it just hit. After listening to The Lonesome Crowded West, I just assumed it was about West Texas because it reflected everything I was seeing: the long highways of endless plains, the malls that were becoming ghost towns, and the hopelessness surrounding it all. I had wanted to sample it for a while but never found a way. I finally cracked the code though and used it to exorcize some of my own demons.” Watch below. 

Plato III recently welcomed the world to the Wild Wild West Texas, sharing his video for two of the album tracks: "Give ‘Em Hell"– a Morricone-meets-hip hop track featuring underappreciated rap heroes from his city (Merk, MoneyM!ll$, Blasé, & Mickey Matta), and "It's Alright, It's Okay." The video also kicks off with Silva's cover of Daniel Johnston's “Spirit World Rising,” featuring labelmate Mike Kinsella (American Football, Cap'n Jazz). 

Raised by his single-mother while opportunity was scant, Silva took off for Austin at eighteen where he attended the University of Texas, and then Los Angeles, where he now lives. He felt a lingering guilt leaving his hometown, and his mother, behind, but saw music as a way out of poverty. Growing up in this place held challenges beyond poverty for Silva. Once a frontier town, Abilene is over seventy-five percent white. At one point, the city held the simultaneous distinction of having the most churches and the most teen pregnancies per capita of any city in America. Abilene is no stranger to records of dubious merit – in 2020, over eighty-percent of its voters cast their ballot for Donald Trump, the highest ratio in the nation. It seemed the devil really did have Texas. Yet Abilene remains rooted in his psyche, like a weed that survives a blazing, rainless Texas summer.