Future

Just as the human body is always naked under its clothes, the human voice is always bare, even when covered in thick layers of rasp and Auto-Tune. Taking cues from the rapper-turned-singer pantheon of T-Pain, Kanye, Wayne, Drake, and Akon, ATL’s Future often raps and sings “At the Same Damn Time,” in an cadence that turns the old field holler of the African-American South into a syrupy shout from the heart of the turn-up generation. Ballad- bangers like “Turn on the Lights” from 2012’s Pluto show exactly how Future can automate his voice without making it seem less human by using the pitch correction to emphasize the wide spectrum of emotion that resides in the gaps between pitch and timbre. This year’s Honest further highlights the timber of Future’s voice by dialing back on the Auto-Tune and trusting in the formula that says: a unique voice + slamming beats = hit music. For a rapper in 2014, that’s about as honest as you can get.

Tue., June 3, 8 p.m., 2014