Shiloh Dynasty

An enigmatic singer and songwriter, Shiloh Dynasty has released languid, melancholic music in fragments via social media. A spate of uploads from 2014 and 2015 has been sampled and interpolated innumerable times. Most prominently, the artist's material was used for three songs on XXXTentacion's 17 (2017), including the Top 20 multi-platinum hit "Jocelyn Flores."

Shiloh Dynasty began to attract attention online in 2014 with six-second clips uploaded to Vine. The videos, which showed Shiloh's face partially obscured, with eyes closed when viewable, were eventually looped in the millions, drawing a rapt following for their distinctively tuneful if downcast quality. A countless procession of fledgling producers began to sample the clips for their own material, sometimes crediting Shiloh as a featured artist. Among the group was Swell, whose "I'm Sorry" racked up streams into seven figures. Although Shiloh had ceased to upload new clips by mid-2015, they had become a phenomenon whose personal life and well-being became the subject of rumors. Their reputation grew in 2017, when three tracks on XXXTentacion's 17 featured music from the uploads. (Songwriting credits for these songs were attributed to XXX's birth name and Ciara Simms.) Among the album's bigger hits was "Jocelyn Flores," which reached number 19 on the Billboard Hot 100 and by the end of the following June was certified double platinum. Shiloh's years-old clips continued to be sampled and interpolated by artists into 2019, heard most prominently on "Climax" by Young Thug. Shiloh remained quiet all the while. ~ Andy Kellman, Rovi