Music Go Music: Expressions
Tuesday, October 27th, 2009
The members of Music Go Music must want you to believe they’re Scandinavian fairies living in the mountains, with only synthesizers and pixie sticks to sustain them. Why else would they give themselves pseudonyms like Gala Bell, Kamer Maza and TORG, and play the airiest, most sugary-sweet dance pop imaginable on their debut, Expressions? The group is actually composed of members of Los Angeles indie-rock outfit Bodies of Water, and this project sees them indulging their love of ’80s electro, cheesy love stories and “whoa whoa whoa” sing-alongs. It’s all as much fun as it sounds, and track highlights like “Love, Violent Love,” “Explorers of the Heart” and “Light of Love” offer enough low-commitment escapist melodies to power a Matthew McConaughey movie. The only difference is that, while you can probably wait for Ghosts of Girlfriends Past to get to cable, you’d be wise to give Expressions a spin post-haste. (Secretly Canadian) 4 stars out of 5
(Photo Courtesy Secretly Canadian)
With another Madvillainy CD in the works and MF Doom’s collaboration with Ghostface in the final stages (according to Nature Sounds owner Devin Horwitz), Doom fans might feel less than fulfilled by his new collection Unexpected Guests. It contains rarities, vinyl-only singles and remixes but not a single new song, after all, and some of these tracks — such as “Da Supafriendz” with Vast Aire — have probably been heard on a half-dozen other albums. Still, like pizza, sex and Coen brothers’ movies, even when a Doom album is bad, it’s good. Thus, the largely rehashed Unexpected Guests is still a winner. “Fly That Not” with Talib Kweli, for example, is as hot as the first 50 times you heard it. Throughout, Doom’s gags, double entendres and stream of consciousness rhymes satisfy without ever being, uh, unexpected. (Gold Dust) 3 stars out of 5
“They say just live your life, but I’ma live mine twice,” goes the hook on “True Star,” off of Warren G’s latest album, The G Files. For someone so closely associated with ’90s G-funk this is a tall task, as G has been unable to revitalize his career unlike such Cali vets as Snoop Dogg and Dr. Dre, G’s stepbrother. The G Files continues in the mellow vein of his last album, 2005’s In the Mid-Nite Hour. Instead of G-funk, it offers sleepy R&B with only the faintest hints of West Coast flavor. “Let’s Get High” is a tired ode to bud, while “Drinks Ain’t Free” is a purportedly humorous club satire that makes one wonder how G is holding up financially these days. “100 Miles and Runnin’” is a winner, featuring a rejuvenated Raekwon and a gothic-sounding harpsichord beat from G. But for the most part, these tracks just make you want to dust off your copy of Regulate…G Funk Era. (Ttl Records)
Brown Bag AllStars aren’t so much a supergroup as a collective of hip-hop supergeeks who work at Manhattan record store Fat Beats. Fortunately their talents as MCs and producers are as great as their passion for record collecting, which makes their debut project, The Brown Tape, 10 tons of fun. A digital reissue of their first mixtape (which they sold in the shop last year), the work’s golden-era influence is obvious through its generous use of cuts, scratches, samples and relentlessly goofy punch lines. “I’m Soul Khan/You know me/I only drink breast milk and Old E,” raps Soul Khan on “Get Up,” an album highlight along with “The City Never Sleeps” and “Undeniable (Audible Doctor Remix).” Mostly devoid of politics, whining about the industry, or current hip-hop production gimmicks, The Brown Tape is a throwback rap album of the best kind — the kind that doesn’t take itself too seriously. (Coalmine Records) 4 stars out of 5
Shafiq Husayn was a producer on Ice-T’s O.G. Original Gangster, and later became a member of Los Angeles group Sa-Ra Creative Partners, in addition to writing and producing beats for Erykah Badu. The music on his debut album, Shafiq En’ A-Free-Ka, often veers closer to the neo-soul and experimental sounds of Badu’s New Amerykah, Part One (4th World War), however, than Ice-T or the electro funk and rap on Sa-Ra’s discs. Husayn’s title references Kemetism, a new age spin on an ancient Egyptian religion, and the album’s lyrics focus on spirituality, metaphysics and existentialism. They are difficult to follow, but Husayn’s production is quite accessible, despite floating from jazz to hip-hop to downbeat techno, sometimes midsong. He has enlisted such singers as Bilal, Fatima and Jimetta Rose, many of whom bring a Badu-like flavor to the proceedings. Overall, it feels like the debut of a man who has evolved and may even have found his true calling. (Plug Research) 4 stars out of 5
After being more or less discovered by Mick Jagger in the late ’80s, Living Colour’s flurry of colored braids and screeching guitars quickly became part of the American musical consciousness. The group’s double-platinum 1988 debut Vivid, which featured hits such as “Cult of Personality” and “Glamour Boys,” mixed funk metal, hard rock and socio-political lyrics and made it one of the era’s most popular black rock bands. Many fans felt the group saved its strongest work for 1990’s Time’s Up, but neither it nor 1993’s Stain lived up to commercial expectations. Frustrated with poor album sales and ferocious infighting between band members, Epic dropped the group and its members retreated into hibernation.