producers: bluecyde, alias, moodswing9, skala, sole

"Pictures At An Exhibition" is a piece of art, a collection of compositions for the piano by M.P. Mussorgskij. What he did is, back in 1874, he visited an exhibition of pictures by his friend V. Hartmann and he composed songs, trying to capture in music what he saw on canvas. The comparison to this Logan Projects album is of course far fetched, but that's actually a thought that for some reason came up, while listening to this album. See, it's easier to just make a song, but it's harder to try to do something with it, either create emotions, or mental pictures. It's easier to stroke brains with words, than it is with the language of music. And basically hip hop doesn't even try. Those that do, they are dismissed as 'avant garde' or have people throw even worse labels at them. They are shoved in the corner of nerd rap, and are kept there. Don't even front, hip hop heads are just a bunch of magpies, chasing after everything that sparkles a little. There's no room left for someone that prefers linen to nylon.

The "Intro" manifests the alternative way of doing something, with a slowly building, a drum on something hollow lead, and a whistle being combined to chant the name of the artist, marching past us, sucking us in like a black hole. "Words Aren't Real" then explores the gap of reality and reflected and handed down descriptions. The piano and the quick drum are pushing us forward, while Logan or JD Walker is moving with a flow that has been heard in a reminiscing way done by a gang of hooraying hounds. There's not much time to reflect on that though, as we are entering the Alias produced "Character Assassination", that features this Anticon luminary also on the mic, along with Sole, who was JD's partner in Live Poets, the group with Moodwing9, that was coming down from Maine like a cold weather front. Alias also offered the beat for "Fragile" that features KGB rhyming over another very dopely produced track.

The complaining could start with "Random Thoughts", that creeps on you with Vangelis like layers, that then are abandoned for a bass(ic) alternative, that has JD reflects on the here and now, as much as the me and myself. Not a black spot on a intended to kept white surface, but it's being hard on you, also to go through it without suffering. The suffering is intended on "Kerry". What Moodswing9 did, wasn't intended to be swallowed like milk and honey. That's why this is dark, and that's why this is menacing. And that's what's kept going with "Breath", actually one of the best tracks, not only due to the dope beat by Skala and Blucyde. When JD says "I just want to live my life", then that also means that he will not be walking along with you, and at the end of the day, it's still his own shoes that he laces up.

The oddness of "Part Of Me" is then kept too similar to used oddness. The off beat is like a previously explored second alternative. On the other hand, "One" is not trying to repeat anything, not even if it's a different version. That doesn't mean that this is incredible though. Not like "Zombie", a track we let you sneakingly prelisten. A track we can relate to, and a beat that allows us to enjoy the track without first having to get cobwebs out the way. And the way it resolves itself at the end, with a few nifty stumbles, makes it even the more welcome.

Further we go through the slowly talked over "Dirty Words", a track that is making you feel like a tranquilizer has slowed down your reception of the world, it's like the short moment after you had enough to drink, now having had too much to drink. The clarity is different in such a state. Alias then returns with "The Music", a track that puts a double-bass to the foreground, with JD giving in, giving over and on the brink to give up. And while we are back with the Anticon family again, we shall stay here, as Sole provided the next beat on "Here I Sit", where JD sounds like someone else first, before he sounds like he never sounded before, and where the beat that Sole did sounds stolen from a Tarantino interlude. What then finally gets us to "I Want More", that concludes the poetism, the way JD exposes his happenings inside of his brain to us. Again doing the banging on something hollow effect, combining it with a low companion, JD is not reaching conclusions as he throws thoughts in front of us, like we are a bunch of chickens, and truths can be found in corn. But the truth is often only the size of a corn. And the most honest men often refuses to take themselves too serious. But we shouldn't praise JD with badges that aren't suiting him, and don't put him anywhere higher than where he can still comfortably see grains on the ground.

Grains that don't glisten, like this record does not glisten, but it's not dull either. It's just different. It's even different to those that try so hard to also be different. It's something that will make it easy for so many to diss it and not like it, while those that care to plant themselves in front of painted pictures, looking at them, and trying to feel what the painter wanted to capture, and that maybe even will go home and compose music, inspired by the impressions, those people will find refugee in an album like "Character Assassination", and they will find themselves within the rocky surface and the oil paint.