djchameleon

This week’s Razor’s edge is a little behind schedule because I wanted to get the Time Warp post out but anyways here we go. This week I latched onto the album Believers by ¡Mayday!. Supposedly this band has been around since 2006 but only over the past two years or so they added another rapper Wreckonize. ¡Mayday! is an American hip hop group from Miami, Florida The group consists of rapper Bernbiz, rapper Ben Miller (aka Wrekonize), producer, keyboard player and guitarist Aaron Eckhart (aka Plex Luthor), percussionist Andrews Mujica (aka NonMS), drummer Terrel (aka L T Hopkins), and bassist Gianni Perocapi (aka Gianni Cash). The band is currently signed to Tech N9ne's Strange Music label. The only reason I found out about them is because of their connection to Tech N9ne and being on his label. When I listen to a new album especially a more mainstream one I can’t help but shuffle tracks into three categories. One “Is this hit/radio quality track”, two “this is a gem on the album but not radio worthy” and Three “this is just plain awful and filler for the album”. My first impression listen to this album lead me to believe that it was filled with fillers. They would have one good track then the next right after felt like a filler and this would go on for 18 tracks or so. I picked up the deluxe edition so it has 3 bonus tracks at the end totaling 18 tracks on this album.


The first track that really stood out to me was one called “Unplug” they were talking about unplugging from society and even drug culture of not taking substances and also not being connected all the time to everyone through new technology. I related to this song so much because I ended up “unplugging” for a little under a year last year. I wanted to get a grasp on all the free flowing information that I was constantly feeding into my head and at times made me feel like I was ADD or had ADHD. I felt like it was extremely hard for me to concentrate and focus on certain things.


Two tracks later “High Ride” begins and when it gets to the chorus they start to mention flashing lights. Just having the words flashing lights makes this radio quality because of the association that it makes with other songs that have flashing lights in its chorus but this is a catchy little ditty. Two more tracks later we come across “My Life” any song that tends to have the word life in it usually catches my attention and is introspective. This song is no different and follows that formula. This song is a little lighter fare though but yes it’s catchy and it is telling its listeners that he’s “just living his life” which talks about his carefree life and how he came from nothing and now he’s just living it the way he wants all extravagantly. There is also the message of live your life the way you want and don’t worry about how someone else is living their life.



After repeated listenings I ended up liking 13 tracks out of 18 which is really good imo.

__________________

Fame, fortune, power, titties. People say these are the most crucial things in life, but you can have a pocket full o' gold and it doesn't mean sh*t if you don't have someone to share that gold with. Seems simple. Yet it's an important lesson to learn. Even lone wolves run in packs sometimes.

djchameleon

The Razor’s Edge is a bit dull because the releases that I’m talking about in this entry were released last week. I just had a weird busy week and even though I might have had time to do a write up. I just never got around to it. I had a really hard time deciding between two great albums I heard this week on which one I would feature on Razor’s edge so I decided to cover them both. Hands Like Houses and Gogol Bordello.


This is my first time hearing Hands Like Houses and they remind me so much of bands like Trapt and Taking Back Sunday. Hands Like Houses is an Australian rock band from Canberra. Formed in 2008, the group is currently signed to Rise Records. This is pretty much another radio alt rock band so they aren’t too spectacular or breaking any molds but I still love them nonetheless. I even went to FYE to pick up their album so I could have a physical copy and I ended up finding their album from last year which I didn’t know about. I asked the clerk if they had any copies and he’s like “yeah no, we won’t be ordering that or getting any copies in.” If you have been in plug with me lately, I pretty damn sure you’ve heard at least one of their songs but I’ll put two here for you to listen to.






This song triggers happy memories for me when I was in my late teens and listened to alt rock heavily. My teen years weren't all sunshine and golden but I did have some good memories and this song takes me back.
Another bonus to this album is that it’s only 11 tracks so you don’t have to drown in too much mediocrity but I’ve listened to this album repeatedly all last week and into this week.




I’m late on catching onto Gogol Bordello apparently. Gogol Bordello is a Gypsy punk band from the Lower East Side of Manhattan, formed in 1999 and known for theatrical stage shows and persistent touring. Much of the band's sound is inspired by Gypsy music. The band incorporates accordion and violin (and on some albums, saxophone) mixed with punk and dub. I went into this album not knowing what to expect and I was pleasantly surprised by the sound gracing my ears. This is their 6th album and I will most definitely look into earlier albums based on how much play I gave this album over the span of a week. My favorite track Dig Deep Enough has a mariachi playing and some flamenco that gives it an excellent latin flair.



I should go to misspoptart and get some more gypsy music recs from her. I really enjoyed this album that much that it turned me onto gypsy music.

__________________

Fame, fortune, power, titties. People say these are the most crucial things in life, but you can have a pocket full o' gold and it doesn't mean sh*t if you don't have someone to share that gold with. Seems simple. Yet it's an important lesson to learn. Even lone wolves run in packs sometimes.

djchameleon

I’m going to have to give this week’s edge to Selena “Babyface” Gomez. She helped me out in a time of need. I was at the halfway mark in my cardio session and just finished up listening to Jay Sean’s latest release when her album started with a song called Birthday which just gave me a jolt of energy to press on and continue my 60 min. workout routine.




I want to take this time to give the producers all the credit in the world for this great album. I didn’t expect to like a Selena Gomez album as much as I did and it had enough infectious pop to push me through my workout which was a plus. The Cataracs, Rock Mafia, Dreamlab, Stargate, The Monsters and Strangerz along with a few others but her production is what really sold me on this album. This is her debut album solo while it’s her 4th record overall. The other albums she had were with her band The Scene. I don’t know if this album has less personality than her other records. I will have to check it out for myself but I can’t stop gushing over how much I loved the production and the influences that were being used. The only gripe I had was when she’s doing reggae-ish type songs. The voice that she was using for them sounded pretty awful. She sounded like someone pretending to be West Indian and that’s the worst sound in the world to my ears because my family is West Indian and I know what it should sound like properly. Actually that’s not even my only gripe, a major problem I have that I know Selena and other former Disney singers are doing lately is cultural appropriation and it’s hard to stand by and watch them let this happen like nothing is going on. It’s kind of weird that Selena does it because she was in fucking Spring Breakers! Spring Breakers wasn’t only about showcasing the hedonistic culture of young people these days but there was also a perception of the characters trying to adapt this black ghetto mentality or what they thought this mentality was and how they should act. I guess she didn’t watch her own movie that she starred in or she just didn’t take away the lesson she was supposed to get from it. The more I talk about issues I have with Selena more are popping up but I swear this is the last one in my rant. She looks like a 12 year old, they really need to stop trying to make her look sexy. I don’t care how old she really is. She has a baby face and gyrating in music videos is going to make me over look that face of hers so just they just need to stop and give it a rest with giving her a sexual phase.

__________________

Fame, fortune, power, titties. People say these are the most crucial things in life, but you can have a pocket full o' gold and it doesn't mean sh*t if you don't have someone to share that gold with. Seems simple. Yet it's an important lesson to learn. Even lone wolves run in packs sometimes.

djchameleon

I was outside waiting for my taxi when this thought just flew through my head. If I had a sit down with President Obama, what would I talk to him about? All the politic type of topics and issues that I have started to flow through my head but I came to the conclusion that I wouldn’t want to talk about anything of the sort with him. I would want to tap into my inner Howard the Duck and ask him the most asinine questions that I can come up with. I’m sure some of the information would be readily available out there but I’d love to hear them come from his mouth in conversation.

First and foremost I would want to know if he had time to play video games which system would he play and if he was interested in them at all whatsoever. I would probably hear him respond about casual games like Angry Birds or some other mobile game because maybe that’s all he has time for but it would be interesting to hear his answer to that question. I would pick his brain about recent music releases that he was into but dig a bit deeper to find out his favorite artist of the 1980s and also today but with today he would have to name album and favorite track. He needs to tell me what movie he watched recently that touched his heart. It would probably be some Oscar bait drama movie but I need to know. Last but not least if he was in the middle of any books and what’s his favorite genre to read. It would most likely be some non-fiction dribble but I would want to hear about his taste in fiction material.

__________________

Fame, fortune, power, titties. People say these are the most crucial things in life, but you can have a pocket full o' gold and it doesn't mean sh*t if you don't have someone to share that gold with. Seems simple. Yet it's an important lesson to learn. Even lone wolves run in packs sometimes.