(resonance of reforming)
the blog of Jerry Bolton
…the king of pop and the king of glory
Jun 26th
Current Tunage: Maylene And The Sons Of Disaster – Waiting On My Deathbed
Maylene’s new record, “III”, is stellar southern hardcore. Nobody does it better.
Yesterday, Michael Jackson died. I’ll be truthful – most of my exposure to him was through Weird Al (”eat it”) and Disney stuff when I was a kid. Never much cared for pop music, nor its “king”. Although I can certainly respect his impact on music, my sadness at his passing is not one of regret and admiration, but of pity. He was a man destroyed by the sins of his father, the trap of his money, and the war of self-loathing and self-idolatry that so clearly marked his life. Although I hope he met Jesus in a real way before his death, there’s nothing to suggest that happened.
Needless to say, his death has gotten me thinking, and I had some thoughts I was going to share… but in his usual fashion, Tim Challies said my thoughts for me in his own way. You can read them here.
…from nine to nineteen
Jun 13th
Title: Cloud Nineteen
Artist: Braille & Symbolyc One
Label: Hiphop is Music
Length: 16 Tracks / 55:35
For More Info: http://www.braillehiphop.com | http://www.hiphopismusic.com
Fresh off his fourth LP, 2008’s The IV Edition, Braille has teamed up with S1 aka Symbolyc One to deliver this new project entitled Cloud Nineteen. The most immediate benefit of teaming up with a single producer like this is that it results in a cohesion and togetherness of the record’s sound that was lacking on The IV as well as 2006’s Box of Rhymes.
In the role of beatmaker and production heavyweight, S1 brings his A game. Cloud Nineteen boasts some of the best and most enjoyable beats on any of Braille’s releases, at times rivalling 2004’s Shades of Grey, widely considered to be Braille’s finest album. Actually, it’s fair to say that every release since Shades has been held up against it – and in this regard I don’t feel that Nineteen takes the title as “best Braille”. With that said, Cloud Nineteen maintains the high levels set by Braille’s other post-Shades releases – no small feat. In short, the music here is fresh and enjoyable – with songs like “Megaphone Phonics” and “That’s My Word” standing out as highlights.
What is there to say about Braille’s rhymes that hasn’t already been said before? As always, he brings honesty, true-to-life experience, and an increasing breadth of wisdom to every track. For quite some time, Braille’s vision for Cloud Nineteen has been to give away freely to folks in schools, correctional facilities, and community centers. This vision seems to have informed the content and the topics of the record, which revolve around the idea that if ‘Cloud Nine’ is the best this world has to offer, then Christ offers us something much greater… Cloud Nineteen, so to speak. Throughout the album’s 14 non-interlude tracks, Braille shares from his life and learnings to encourage and challenge his listeners. A great example of this is “Found Her”, which shares his own fledgeling mistakes with women and eventual success in meeting and marrying his wife. It’s also a great follow-up to the only track on The IV Editon produced by S1, “Blessed Man”. Another highlight for me personally was one of the albums most polarizing tracks, the atmospherically dark and brooding “Heart of God”, wherein Braille asks:
How many times have I failed to represent the heart of God with my filthy rag righteousness
It’s painful to admit my lack of discipline when I commit sins, it’s shameful, I can’t live like this
…and later…
How can I dumb down the heart of God?
He sent his Son to come down and die for me.
I was in dire need.
…and finally…
All I really want is the heart of God
But I don’t live my life like I really mean the words that I say,
I want the heart of God to speak through my lyrics,
Why should you listen to me, when I don’t listen to the Holy Spirit?
To me, this track was the album’s highest highlight – brutal honesty from Braille about his own weakness and inability to do anything truly valuable apart from what God does through transforming his heart to be more like Christ.
Between S1’s consistent and engaging production and Braille’s consistent and precise vision for Cloud Nineteen, this is one of 2009’s best hip-hop records and will retain that status despite being released early in the year. Once again, I find myself impressed by and thankful for Braille and his desire to be a voice for hope and our need for the redemption and heart-level transformation that can only come through Christ. His vision to share this record freely with kids in group homes and cons in prison is to be applauded, and much more than that, it’s something to support. Here we have a guy who, rather than trying to cash in on his abilities, feels called to share his life, his talent, and his Saviour with the broken and outcast. That’s something worth getting behind. Getting behind it requires that you pick up a copy of this great album to enjoy, and that goes way beyond ‘cloud 9′ status and on to Cloud Nineteen. I’ll see you there.
Four clouds out of five.
Standout Tracks: It’s Nineteen, Broken Heart, That’s My Word, Heart of God, Megaphone Phonics, Hardrock.
Jerry Bolton – for The Phantom Tollbooth.
June 13th, 2009
…glitching to fix something
Jun 11th
Title: Future Stars And Small Wonders
Artist: Bizzart
Label: Joyful Noise Recordings
Length: 12 Tracks / 32:33
What do you get when you combine bizzare with art? Bizzart, apparently. Future Stars And Small Wonders, the most recent release from Bizzart, is certainly bizzare – whether or not it’s “art” is ultimately up to each listener.
The record comes in a basic package with no indication of who the artist is, or of what the album is called. The liner notes are printed on a single square page, coded in HTML. The distorted, out-of-focus cover image kindly gives a hint at what the sound contents will resemble.
If you load up Future Stars And Small Wonders, Here’s what you’re going to hear: shout-rap vocals that generally favour oblique lyrical abstraction, weird juxtapositions of sound, erratic/glitchy electronics, schizophrenic loops, acoustic guitar/piano, and vocal samples that seem to bear no connection to the songs in which they are placed. Certainly, there’s a lot of effort that’s gone into this, even just to achieve the amount of layering and mashing of sounds (sometimes complimentary, sometimes intentionally dischordant). Song structures are anything but standardized – constantly doubling back on you and breaking conventions that have been set up in the first two minutes of a song only to frusterate or intrigue the listener. The same can be said of the album, which will follow a spazzy electronic indie rap song (”Android Hearts”) with a quiet piano number (”Changing Stars”) – though both of the songs named fit those descriptions in only the most basic sense. The only thing that comes to mind as a basis for comparison is Soul Junk (particularly at Glenn Galaxy’s more rappish and/or contemplative moments).
With all of these things in mind, this is a complicated record to listen to, and that’s probably an intentional move. The most important things to note about Future Stars And Small Wonders, however, is that there doesn’t seem to be a whole lot of substance here to take hold of, much less to reward a listener’s time and effort.
The promotional material for the record calls it “sound-collage hip-hop meets belligerent poetry for robots in love”, I’m more inclined to call it “difficult to enjoy”.
Check out Bizzart if you’re into Soul Junk and other crazy schizophrenic “sound-collage” music, as this will likely be a profitable listen. Otherwise, you’re better off elsewhere.
Two future stars out of five.
Standout Tracks: Android Heart, Future Girls, Wood Is Whyte.
Jerry Bolton – for The Phantom Tollbooth.
June 11th, 2009
…forever and a day
Jun 5th
Current Tunage: mewithoutYou – every thought a Thought of You
“um ya, its good song” – me
So I was just looking at my calendar. The last couple weeks have been insano-crazy. In the busy sense, of course.
How so? I recently graduated from Trent University (BA Joint Hons. in Philosophy and English), I’ve already attended my first pool party of the summer, worked my first-ever 12-hour shift, been to more than one Barbecue, and all this week I’ve been hard at work doing landscaping – resulting in some serious suntan and muscle-mass growth.
The summer is shaping up to be quite exciting, with two wedding to attend, trips up north (one to Timmins & New Liskeard, one to Baptiste Lake), a first-anniversary getaway weekend, DVBS at Harvest, and quite literally “God knows what else”. I’m excited.
That’s it for now. This is your irregularly scheduled update.