Ishmael Butler’s been able to do what he wants when it comes to creating music, and it’s going on for over 35 years now.

The distinguished Seattle native helped form the famed alternative hip-hop group Digable Planets after excursing from the West Coast to Brooklyn for college during the late 1980s. It was in New York that the trio of himself, Mariana "Ladybug Mecca" Vieira and Craig "Doodlebug" Irving began releasing albums under the moniker and went on to create a fanbase that he still tours off of to this day.

But years later, Butler (or Butterfly as he’s known in Digable) decided he needed a somewhat more sonically exploratory venture to satisfy his creative pallet. That’s when Shabazz Palaces was born.

Toward the latter part of the height of the Blog Era, a period in hip-hop history during the late 2000s and early 2010s where rap blogs dominated the form of consumption fans used to become informed about the culture and its primary purveyors, Butler had already returned to his native Seattle to gear up for his new outfit. Teaming up with Tendai Maraire, the duo released their critically acclaimed debut album, Black Up. This extremely experimental venture plunged curious hip-hop fans into a set of sounds that no one could fully grasp until years later. Its progressive nature caused The Guardian to describe it at the time as “inexorably forward” in nature and that “once it gets hold of you, it doesn't let go.”

Black Up proved that Butler had once again helped produce a formative endeavor in hip-hop that was unlike anything that dropped at the time. It also set himself up for four more LP releases under Shabazz over the next decade, their most recent being 2020’s The Don of Diamond Dreams.

Now, in 2023, without Tendai’s assistance for the second straight album, Butler is returning with his sixth studio LP with Shabazz. Released on Friday (October 27), Robed in Rareness is a seven-track effort that has Butler mixing a bit of the classic with much of the modern.

On the single “Woke Up In A Dream,” Butler enlists his son Lil Tracy, who has established a music career in his own right. The father-son collaboration paints a transient, mystical picture in the vein of previous Shabazz releases. Still, Butler notes it’s something particularly special when it comes to working with and learning from family.

“On that song, as with a lot of my newer music, I really take a lot of influence from him stylistically, cadence-wise, and sonically,” he tells BET during a recent interview. “I'm digging a lot of stuff him and his boys are doing so I tried to like put myself in that mind frame creatively and try to learn as much as I can.”

The collaboration marks one of the first released between the father and son duo, which Butler finds compelling, considering his son’s large presence in the music business.

“My son is way more famous and earns more money than I did at that time in his life. More famous, more followers, all of those things but that makes me proud,” he said in explaining how their working dynamic is largely harmonic. “That’s what I want. So we just never really got into no b******t. Not that other fathers and sons have, but I'm saying the way we did it was always cyclical.”

Robed In Rareness also features Camp Lo’s Geechi Suede on “Gel Bait,” a collaboration Butler says was somewhere around 28 years in the making and “magical” once they finally hit the studio. He also notes that the departure from working with Tendai is allowing him to fully bring his autonomy to the latest SB release while being proud of their original work together as well.

“That's my bro. What we were able to accomplish together in terms of what we did live, and all of the shows that we did,” Butler notes. “We had a really unique report in which we didn't really have to rehearse. We just could just make up the whole show and s**t, like really off the cuff. So I missed that aspect of it, but not in the sense that I want to go back to it, ‘cause what I'm into now is cool, too.”

On the single “Binoculars,” Butler and his fellow Seattle-based emcee Royce The Choice pull out the flex card with some witty wordplay to deliver it. “All of my jewelry is singing the harmonies / You should think again if you thinking ‘bout harming me,” the former raps. Much like most of the LP, the song is more stripped down compared to previous Shabazz releases. It’s often scant of fully formed ideas but retains the abstract nature that the outfit’s fans have come to love over the years.

Overall, Robed In Rareness is the triumphant crossroads for Ish Butler. Even at 54, he’s living vicariously through his son and two daughters while also looking for ways to innovate through sound constantly. For him, it’s a constant journey he set out for so many years ago.

“I've been lucky but it took me being able to ride the waves of the new changes in the industry,” he says. “I'm pre internet, pre cellphone with my involvement in music all the way up until now, so learning how to release and navigate these new fields in the marketplace, it's been a challenge, but life is a challenge. Love is a challenge; passion is challenging, so you just gotta be up for it.”

Presave Shabazz Palaces’ Robed In Rareness here.