Music for a Monday: Shining the Light in Deserving Corners

Read the Spine note about T.I. "Achingly" and "sounds the same" are right on. *sigh*

Through a network of god-body bloggers--see the listings along the left-hand side of this page if you're confused--who identify trends, digest a range of things that I find interesting, and endlessly impress me with how well they write, I stay up on my passions and stay humbled by how much talent there is around. I've come to rely on my personal internets universe for many things, with new music notably among them. Before Ian left Georgia for California, I got introduced to the unique talent Jamie Radford (who has been known as "MC Travel" on this interweb for a while). And through Straight Bangin' West Coast Music Editor Jeff, I was reminded of how badly I've needed to review this strong underground record Sometimes There Is Trouble, a project put out by Straight Bangin' friend and comment superstar Zilla.

Jamie Radford, The Freedom to Be Reckless

Somehow this picture is a fitting representation of this music.

For his debut album, Athens, Jamie Radford assembled an electronic hip-hop record that was characterized both by its engaging idealism and frustrating inexperience. Though joints such as "This Is a Breakup Song" were filled with Radford's refreshing emotional honesty and elegant synthetic soundscapes, there were too many other moments when the rhyming sounded a little off or the beats didn't resonate. It was admirable in its intentions but stifled by its flaws. His latest EP, The Freedom to Be Reckless, serves as an encouraging sign of Radford's growth--you can pencil in an impressively higher mark along the door frame.

Still able to disarm an audience with his unembarrassed introspection but now wielding a more confident microphone presence, Radford is an MC who you'd want to know better. His topical strength lies in his stories, which are of the everyday-happenings variety that invite a listener to concentrate on what's being said in part because it sounds like a friend is talking. And though he's capable of both the boastful and the indulgent (like stringing together a memorable couplet just because), Travel's best writing comes when he discusses relationships. While listening to songs like "Not Enough or Never," the audience is treated to Radford's gift for encompassing nuanced emotion in these knowing, pithy lines, much like the song's title. The rhyming is also enhanced by Radford's more mature vocals. Whereas his last album made it sound as though he were yelling at too high a pitch too often, this latest effort benefits from a deeper, more balanced vocal timbre.

Radford's beat-making skills have also progressed, and Freedom is an eight-track experiment that is simultaneously derived from hip-hop elements but dissimilar from so many of the prevailing production modalities. The looped, grand synthesizer chords and frenetic drums and cymbals that you might hear combined in some pattern by your favorite southern producer are leading elements on this album, but the signature sound is a welcomed derivative. Nearly every track is a sonic melange of airy synths that breeze in and out, winding melodies, and an assortment of percussive elements. Ranging from a playful pastiche such as "A Harpsichord Classic" to the more traditional sounding "East Lake," the album's production catalogue, whose breadth is reminiscent of that which we might associate with an artist like Tricky, sounds like an assemblage of southern bounce stripped of its candy paint and formulas.

The album is tripped up at times by Radford's generally linear, simple rhyme schemes, and some of the hooks are generic to the point that they sound like things Eminem might write during his weaker moments. Additionally, Freedom is not a true hip-hop record in the sense that it is far more exploratory and candid that what one tends to expect from the genre. Like Athens, this record will not be for everyone, especially not the gully set. But it is interesting, nonetheless, and that's a welcomed change from the sort of boring predictability that we associate with more mainstream rappers. Just look up at the top of this post for a reminder.

Peep the album here.

Clean Guns, Sometimes There Is Trouble

I have the poster up in my apartment.

I am so remiss for not having written about this standout record earlier that I am almost embarrassed to finally be doing it now. Simply put, Sometimes There Is Trouble is an auspicious twelve-track channeling of the East Coast aggression that helped make the Wu-Tang Clan great.

That's not to say that STIT is on par with Enter the Wu-Tang. Or that they are similar in their general aesthetics. Rather, this album is aggressive from beginning to end, and Clean Guns are these muscular MCs who just try to destroy tracks with furious flows, layered lyrics, and exhausting energy. You can hear it immediately on "Blast Off," (and opening with this heatrock is a prime example of deft record sequencing), a song that sets the tone for the entire record by unleashing this unrelenting hip-hop creep that is assertive but also slyly rapacious. In boxing, an attacking fighter can stun his opponent with well-timed power shots while also wearing down his adversary with a steady barrage of body blows and smart ring generalship. That is sort of what happens as you listen to STIT. And it's a good thing.

As you might expect of a record that so strongly creates its intended mood, there is a raw energy expressed through the jagged beats that accompany the dense flows. The production is chockablock with menacing piano riffs and looped melodies played on tinny instruments that create an effective, unrefined sound. Taken with the rhyming styles of the MCs, the production is almost like an unspoken, defiant "we don't give a fuck" that complements STIT's underground feel and reinforces an appreciable, authentic devotion to rap music that Clean Guns possesses in abundance. This is not a group that needed a marketing gimmick and chose to act hard; this is a group that appreciates hip-hop technique and has not sacrificed its principles for pop appeal.