Review Summary: For no good reason the album was largely ignored at the time of release, but as a hard hitting time piece of life in 1992 “Hypocrisy Is The Greatest Luxury” remains an extremely valuable piece of work.
Few Hip Hop artists spoke as eloquently as Michael Franti in 1992. He seemed to have a take on everything; consumerism, multiculturalism, capitalism, were just some of the issues he had a grip on, and his unique “Newscaster” style delivery added to the sense of knowledge and authority. Teaming up with musician Rono Tse, the pair holed up in a garage in darkest Oakland California, and set about creating a collection of Franti’s measured Rap examinations, supported by a fresh mix of mechanical thumping drum and bass rhythms with added Jazz inflection which at the time was popular with a number of Hip Hop acts. Whilst many would consider them in the same mould as Public Enemy, Disposable Heroes didn’t rant, mixed home grown and global issues effectively and delivered in an analytical style which showed a genuine originality yet experienced in the genre.
The highlight, and most popular example of Franti and Tse's skill is for the vehement swipe at the centrepiece of modern life. The outstanding “Television, The Drug Of The Nation” casts a hard hitting examination of television and the moral decay of society created by the box in the corner of the room. “Where imagination is sucked out of children by a cathode ray nipple” he warns, and his views on the American nation’s fixation with surface beauty is succinctly wrapped up in the line “Where straight teeth in your mouth are more important than the words that come out of it”. “Famous And Dandy (Like Amos And Andy)” assimilates the stereotypical duality of African Americans and the “expectations” required to recognition in life as Franti explains “As our souls watch astounded, our characters flounder, duplicitous identity, diction and contradiction have become the skills of assimilation”.
Franti isn’t afraid to self analyse either and on the emotionally tender jazz number “Music And Politics” he sings of his own shortcomings, observations delivered with a almost mournful soul as he tells us “I might be able to listen in silence to your concerns, rather than hearing everything as an accusation, or an indictment against me”. A clever rework of The Dead Kennedys’ Punk anthem "California Uber Alles," with lyrics targeting the then governor of the state, Pete Wilson is biting and perfectly honours the original song.
For no good reason the album was largely ignored at the time of release, but as a hard hitting time piece of life in 1992 “Hypocrisy Is The Greatest Luxury” remains an extremely valuable piece of work.
