Review Summary: I'm the youngest old man you know, if ya soul intact, let me know
Sweatpants is at it again in what is proving to be the most rewarding year to be an early stan in years. When I saw this *** dropped i was sitting on the toilet while the fire alarm was going off. Fire alarms go off like twice a week in my building apparently because "people can't cook" I don't know, I can't really cook like that either but I
don't cook I guess that's what it really comes down to, but these days whenever I'm in my room and the fire alarm goes off I head straight to the toilet and it's because I'm still paranoid of getting caught (it happened to my suitemate he got a fine) but I'm not doing the fire drill thing anymore I did for the longest and its weak where I live, point blank.
Earl talked about
Solace in his last interview with NPR (which is mad good and I think an essential aid to
I Don't Like ***, I Don't Go Outside if just for the DNA story) and I was like "okay sick". And now it's here, on youtube, with a sick pink cover.
I Don't Like ***, I Don't Go Outside made me feel like I was at a funeral but it was taking place on a ferry ride. My
Solace thoughts are an extension of that, but more wet, like being in a submarine. It's a few weeks after the funeral though. Thus, this ten minute YouTube clip is in no way " sad music". Quite the opposite in fact. The music breathes easily while depicting sad situations because sadness is always too much of the truth, and earl tells you his truth with conviction, even in his softest tone or describing the worst reality. That's something a good mom does. Tell you how you ***ed up while making you feel safe at the same time. (Shout out my mom, earl's mom, all the moms.)
When earl was rattling on twitter a whole while back about how he rediscovered his voice, he wasn't lying.
IDLS was, in a way, a celebration of earl finding his groove as a rapper. A fool's glance might tell you its a subdued record, but it's really just low-pitched. It's thoughtful (because earl is at his core, an intellectual), impulsive at times, and most importantly aggressive.
Solace is the quiet after the storm even if one or seven stay brewing in your mind. Earl's voice is softer and deeper here than even a few months before when
IDLS was recorded. He sounds very comfortable mummble rapping half asleep on the second verse about his "nibbling conscience", and snapping into a devastating soliloquy on the third where Nak's sleeping on the couch and thebe's hands remind him of his grandma and are driving him to tears. He says things you can understand if you've ever felt like you lost someone forever, or if you think you think too much.
The three verses are surrounded by Earl's own instrumentation, and as it happens he has grown into a fire ass producer. I prefer his style to Tyler's these days even after
chur bum blew me away on that front. It's rewarding to hear earl's beats if you're an OF fan, because he's the only producer at his level that counts Ace & Left Brain as some of his primary influences. He watched over their shoulders while they produced projects like
Blackened White and
Rolling Papers and his own
Earl and while he was in Samoa he would listen to the former and
Goblin every day. Those are the type of beats he used to sound best on, but now those are his own. Which is why his voice makes him sound like he's living inside of them. He samples similar sounds as Left Brain but earl gravitates more towards richer melody, and he muffles them while giving the kicks plenty of sub (I think it's sub), which sounds like if I was underwater and heard music playing from above while blood pumps my pulse in my ear. He also likes warm sounding keys, from the oriental/Charlie Brown sounding chords around the 2:00 mark to the bluesy refrain behind his third verse. It all feels very dreamlike
This music makes me think of a river. I don't know how to explain what that means, but if you think of the same thing, let me know. I do know that definitely *** with rivers and I definitely *** with
Solace. It's the type of music that makes me excited for the path my mistakes have led me to.
