shirlette ammons

shirlette ammons is a true force of creativity in and of the modern American South. Born as a twin sister in the tiny eastern North Carolina town of Beautancus, ammons has wrestled with questions of identity her entire life, the queer Black sister who saw herself mirrored by someone whose name differed only by one vowel. When she headed west to the state capital for college, she discovered a thriving hip-hop underground, where spoken-word poets and backpack rap fans hosted dormitory ciphers and rock bands shared space with rappers. Inspired by Meshell Ndegeocello to begin playing bass and rhyming, ammons quickly became a central figure in the Triangle’s busy scene, from recording with a garage-soul trio to bounding in and out of a half-dozen collaborative contexts.

On her ultra-compelling third album, 2024’s Spectacles, ammons explored those questions of identity like never before. Recruiting friends like Mykki Blanco and writer Alexis Pauline Gumbs to offer their take on what it means to be a spectacle, ammons—with a proudly rural twang to her raps—considers both what it is to look like an outlier and to use that as an avenue of empowerment. A filmmaker for the likes of PBS and a vital community connector, ammons also works movement politics into these songs, considering the strength that’s possible through the solidarity of those very outliers. “I said, ‘The South’s got a voice,’ hopeful and brash as hell,” she raps at one point. ammons is key to that tone.