By T J Love
To many the days that hip hop can legitimately be called what Chuck D dubbed “The Black CNN” are all but over. It sprang from a jaded and viciously disenfranchised generation experiencing the bleak realities of Reaganomics, and somewhere along the way developed an interesting dichotomy. Rappers are first and foremost entertainers and the power struggle between “keeping it real”, bodacious braggadocio, and street dreams focused on better days made for an almost schizophrenic collective psyche. As time has progressed tales of criminal enterprises and making it big have become so ubiquitous that one can’t help but assume that a lot of these cats aren’t being as forthcoming about the activities they rhyme about; CDs should come with another advisory, “By the way, rappers lie and shit.” Not so for The Doppelgangaz. Not only do they keep it real, the keep it so thoroughly honest that you can’t help but believe them.
HARK! is the newest album from the indieground darlings with their legion of worldwide followers of the Cloak Lifestyle, or as they affectionately call them “Sharks”. What is the Cloak Life? In a nutshell, it embraces the habits and idiosyncrasies of the have-nots instead of being ashamed of them. Also, they always rock black cloaks while performing, similar to MF DOOM and his mask. Matter Ov Fact and EP have been friends since childhood, both cats rhyme and produce, and their easy chemistry makes their storytelling all the more captivating. While a sizeable amount of their peers rap about bad bitches, nice whips, and slangin’ white this NY duo put themselves on front street with confessions about getting black-out drunk, ingesting heavily cut drugs, all while mashing BBWs and chickenheads with gingivitis.
Matter Ov Fact and EP are believers in the old maxim “If it ain’t broke don’t fix it” as HARK! sticks rigidly to their tried and true formula perfected over the course of previous projects; grimy tales over even grimier, laid back, dusty production. “Barbituates” is a wistful joint, complete with pensive piano keys, mournful soul samples, and plodding drums and The Doppelgangaz wax poetic about gobbling pills by the handful, patronizing prostitues, and eating spam. Matter Ov Fact and EP have garnered a certain of amount of cache in the underground for their beats and on HARK! they elected to have three instrumental tracks, “The Doppel Hobbel”, “Taking Them Pills”, and “Harken Forward”, all of which display their chops and abilities on the production tip.
HARK! maintains pretty much the same subject matter and tone for the duration of the LP, but if there was one track that stands out on the albumm it’s probably Oh Well. The beat is a certified head nod suite, with deceptively complex drum programming, intermittent keys, and a barely-there yet ever-present haunting vocal sample playing the background. EP and Matter Ov Fact drop bars that on a technical level are crazy on point and along with the chorus provide insight into their lifestyle and movement. Peep Matter Ov Fact’s verse,
Hey yo, disguise as a landscaper with a yard trimmer/At your local ATM planting debit card skimmers/He celebrate the come up, with a charred dinner/Bout to cook the carnitas, kid/Make sure you let the lard simmer/When your hope is shattered, now the shard shimmers/The nigga known the grope a fatter mama and discard slimmer…
To the unitiated, The Doppelgangaz are nothing spectacular but there’s a reason they get so much love from the likes of Redman and The Combat Jack Show. They make music for the everyman, and they are ruthlessly consistent at making solid Hip-Hop. Everything about them is subtle, from their beats to their rhyme style. That doesn’t change the fact that they deliver the goods and HARK! is an album that will grow on the listener exponentially the more it’s digested. The best way to describe them? An amalgalm of People Under the Stairs, Black Sheep, and Mobb Deep, which may sound like a stretch but it would behoove any Hip-Hop head to find out what the Cloak Life is all about.
Out of 5
Follow Us on Twitter @ http://twitter.com/planetill
Become a citizen of Planet Ill. Join our Forums
Join Us on the Planet Ill Facebook Group for more discussion
Follow us on Networked Blogs
