Relentless experimentation and the subzero breath of spacious lyrics proved to be more than most people were ready for in the late 70’s. The late David Bowie is definitely one of music’s greatest evolutionists, having created over 26 albums worth of content during his time as a practicing musician. He was no stranger to experimentation and was the last person to be afraid of it or how its final yield would be received by mass audiences. His 1977 album Low is the perfect testament to this fact. It was created at a time in Bowie’s life where he was trying to kick his addictive habit of that powdery-white nose candy so prevalent at the time; cocaine. His movement from L.A. to Berlin was perhaps his biggest ally in accomplishing this feat.
The move triggered the dawn of a new creative process within Bowie, who was clearly battling a ton of emotional stressors. The result was a two-sided project that encompassed 11-tracks of music that would go on to change the process of musical production forever. The stark and distorted guitar on album opener, ‘Speed Of Life’ doesn’t even begin to prepare listeners for what is to come. The fantastic effect put on the drums throughout much of the album, noticed on ‘Breaking Glass’ has itself become a staple in modern popular music.
His approach to this album was to keep vocals brief and distant on most tracks, letting the sonics of the instruments have their room to stretch and be absorbed. What lyrics there are, create a sense of longing and forge a path for new discoveries to be made. Each sentence seems to be a fracture of a larger idea and therefore showcase Bowie’s new sense of intrigue and adventurousness. He seems to feel isolated within his newly sober self and is able to take in the little things in life with much more vigor on ‘Sound and Vision’.
“And I will sing, waiting for the gift of sound and vision,
Drifting into my solitude
Over my head.”
He ventures from funky croons on tracks like that to the interestingly soulful and catchy delivery of ‘Be My Wife’. Here his message is more organized and yet the piano and energetic guitar chords make his marital grab for another chance seem frantic and uncertain. Sounds continue to overlap and create entire shifts in mood throughout the album, especially noticeable in the second side of the project (tracks 8-11). Being that they are almost entirely void of lyrics, the instrumentals bear a ton of weight, and they manage to hold this weight with unwavering finesse. Even without words they speak to the listeners the same way a movie’s soundtrack can say more than the dialogue ever does.
It is experimentation at its most adventurous and refined. Low is the perfect example of a project that was released years before people could even begin to predict or understand the massive ripple effect it would have on forthcoming generations. I doubt even Bowie or Brian Eno, the producer behind the beautifully ambient soundscapes, had any idea the inspirational shift in music they would be causing years down the road. Simply put, the music on Low didn’t just break the ground, it shattered it into thousands of pieces that became the grains of sand nearly every subsequent musician has walked over.
By now you have probably seen, or at least heard about, Netflix’s new series Making A Murderer, which follows the trial and conviction of Steven Avery, a Wisconsin man who was wrongfully convicted of rape and sent away to prison for 18 years before he was exonerated by DNA evidence, only to find himself as Manitowoc County’s primary suspect of the murder of Teresa Halbach, less than two years after his release and all while Avery had an on-going multi-million dollar lawsuit against the County. The documentary focuses on themes of corruption, lack of justice, exploitation, inequality and while it is more than entertaining, the sad truth is that it centers around potentially three people losing their lives and liberty, two of which are a direct result of the very real problems in our criminal justice system.
Regardless of the guilt or innocence of Steven Avery, Making a Murder brings to light some especially troubling practices by law enforcement, which should cause us all to doubt certain aspects of our nation’s justice system. As anyone who has seen the documentary will tell you, one of these questionable practices is best demonstrated by the treatment of Brendan Dassey, a soft spoken and (then) 16-year-old boy with a 73 IQ who many believe was coerced into a bogus confession by the police. Throughout the investigation Brendan was often questioned without the presence of an attorney or parent/guardian, the legal representation he was provided was often unethical and incompetent, and if what he confessed was somehow true, the State still had no physical evidence against Dassey and convicted two people for the murder of Halbach under two completely different theories, different locations, different causes of death, etc… The filmed interrogations of this poor boy, who doesn’t know the different between a foot and a yard, are some of the scariest minutes of television you’ll watch, that even the most terrifying horror film can’t compare to.
That brings us to our latest interview at The Early Registration. While we are primarily a music publication, we can’t ignore what’s going on in the world around us, even if it’s totally outside the world of music. One thing that’s so great about music is that it relates to everything, whether it’s through an artist lyrics or backstory, or whether the music world intersects with another form of entertainment in an interesting way. So when we learned that Brad Dassey, Brendan Dassey’s half-brother, was a Christian rapper and DJ/producer, who from time-to-time talks about his family and his “Dassey” name in his music, we were more than interested in reaching out. We had our writer Evan Vogel chat with Dassey to talk about Making a Murderer, his music, and where it all intersects.
Background
Give us a little background on yourself?
I grew up in Manitowoc. I was actually born in Two Rivers, Wisconsin. I lived there for 2 years as a baby, then my parents decided to move to Manitowoc. I lived in Manitowoc about 19 years of my life. Currently living in the Oshkosh, Wisconsin area as a computer repair technician and aspiring photographer, music composer, Christian rapper.
What were your early influences as far as music go?
As far as music goes, I believe music is a universal language that can speak happy or sad. Honestly, feelings can be portrayed with music and it’s a great gift from God. Some of my early influences really range from U2, Coldplay, TobyMac, Eminem, 2 Pac, just any song, group that portrays a good beat, good influence and message. Another big influence is my grandmother, Marlene. She taught me about chords.
What inspired you to start creating your own?
What really inspired me to create music was just experimentation, along with my grandmother. One day I just fell into it. Back then, I’ve always had beats and melodies in my head and felt I had to act them out on desks, tables, etc.
What sort of topics do you look to cover being a Christian rap artist?
First and foremost, Christian means, Christ like. So the messages in my music should and will portray any encouraging thing that Christ would follow as far as messages in the Bible go. If I can convey Christ like messages with a good, positive beat, then I think people will engage in the music.
Is your passion for music what led you to being a radio DJ for some time?
What led me to become a radio DJ is my passion to be funny and engaging with people. My voice is also a dead giveaway. I believe my voice is great for radio as people have told me many times.
What are some of your experiences creating and spreading word of your music?
The thing to realize when it comes to anything is, we need time to breathe, refresh and refocus. Sometimes I make music for awhile, then take breaks in between to reflect on what I’ve just done. So as far as making music goes, it’s not really every second of every day.
On “Making a Murderer”
Have you seen all of “Making A Murderer”?
I have seen it. I saw it the first night it came out. I waited up till 2 AM till it launched, caught about half of the first episode and went to bed. Woke up the next day and binge watched the entire thing.
Since its release has your music gained any popularity?
It wasn’t until I really started speaking out that people have been adding me left and right on Facebook, messaging me millions of things and they stumbled upon my music. I’ve seen my website traffic sky rocket somewhat, but it’s only less than 300 hits per day thus far. Either way, one person at a time is all that matters. If someone believes the music to be good and really enjoy it, they’ll tell others.
I also heard you released a song titled, ‘Labeled’, about how you get judged because of your relation to Steven Avery. In what ways have you noticed your life change because of this connection?
‘Labeled’ was actually a YouTube video that I posted years ago explaining how I was being judged for having the Dassey name and whatnot. I felt it was more of a backlash video to explain to people that I’m really not a bad guy. A song soon then came out called, ‘So You Wanna Judge Me.’ I put my feelings and anger into that song and out came something positive and also helps other people stand firm as well.
On Losing His Job Because of His Last Name
You lost a position you held at a radio station over this whole case, correct? What was behind that and can you tell me more about how it all unfolded?
Yes I did. I was going by the name of, DJ Dassey back then. It was an old high school name and I just used it as an on air name for radio as well. Back then, when the news director found out I was related to Brendan as a half brother, things got weird at the station. The news director was unplugging network cables and trying to sabotage the station and point the finger at me to get fired. A sales representative friend of mine who worked for that station at the time, caught him in the act and reported it. He lost his job, but then soon thereafter, I lost mine as well. The station felt since I was using Dassey as a name on air, it would harm their reputation because of the case. I tried to sue the station for damages, but lawyers told me it wasn’t one of the original classes of discrimination, so I didn’t get far other than collecting a small amount of unemployment benefits.
Has all this “new evidence” brought up in the Netflix documentary had a more positive or negative impact on your life?
I’ve honestly not been following along very well. I’m not exactly sure what the new evidence is at this point. My mind has been spinning in so many directions lately and I just really want to find time to rest and re-coop from everything. So I haven’t been following along to know what that is. I’ve even been contacted by Dr. Phil as well as radio stations for interviews. I declined with Dr. Phil at this time.
Did you/do you believe your brother (Brendan Dassey) is innocent?
Yes, I believe so. Brendan is a shy, quiet kid who wouldn’t harm a fly. There’s no way he did this.
On the Police Coercing a Confession
The documentary seems to point in the direction that Brendan was in fact coerced into confessing to the police.
Brendan clearly wasn’t aware of what was going on. I believe if anything, it was a complete cop out for the police investigators to do what he did. He was misrepresented and was not given a fair crack at defending himself. He honestly should have never said anything unless his mother or lawyer were present, but he was clearly tricked into saying things that I believe to be untrue. There’s no way his story completely adds up to the things he says they did. From reading statements exactly from him, you can tell something is a bit, “off” with his mentality. The police got to his head and I believe he made things up because he thought he was going to go back to school that day. Which clearly didn’t happen.
How the Case Affects His Music/Career
What role did the whole course of this trial and imprisonment have in your music, if any?
The case came out, was big news, then was open and shut real fast in their faces with continued denied appeals over the years. Nothing really big has happened up until now.
Have you thought about how this documentary and a potential new trial for your half-brother and his uncle would affect your career?
I thought about it, but I see mostly the entire world is on our side now, so I’m not afraid to come out of the shadows any longer. I’m not afraid. I believe Brendan if anything, should either be freed, or gain a new trial. The only thing they got on him was a bum confession. No REAL DNA evidence of anything.
Anything else you want to say about your music or the case that I didn’t ask about?
Yes. If people want to reach out to me, please make sure you see the documentary first. If you are going to be rude and cocky to me, I am a real honest human being and will answer the best I can, but I deserve respect just as well as the next person. People who have not seen the documentary are still holding strong to their guilt and believe they both did it and deserve to rot in hell. I can’t speak for Steven, but if you knew my half brother, you would change your answer in a heartbeat. He’s a kind and gentle person. He wouldn’t hurt anyone. I believe it’s not fair to judge someone you really don’t know.
Submission Showcase’ is a weekly column where we go through songs submitted to us and showcase the best ones. If you’d like to submit music to us, find out how to here.
Welcome to The Early Registration’s Submission Showcase Christmas Special-bonzana-kwanza-special thing. It’s been a while since a showcase has been uploaded so we’ll stockpile a lot into one Christmas and New Year edition of the column. Hooray!
Chri$ Born – 20 Freestyle
Detroit-native Chri$ Born has been featured a lot in this column, not only because we love him, but because he’s great at what he does. He’s back again with a new album, and a new freestyle to celebrate his 20th birthday, in which his production channels his inner Wondagurl/Eestbound combo, with bars and a flow similar to that of Tre Capital on his Gundam Part 2 project. Take a listen below and cop his new album through his Soundcloud.
California-bedroom-space-pop project Barons of Hiddenhausen (that’s a mouthful) is here with Realm Of The Edge (V.2), a track from his Bedroom Edits EP. The track itself is well performed, with some great vocals and an almost grung-ey sound, blending sounds from Ricky Hil to Kurt Cobain, while instrumetally sounding like the El Vy project. Check it out below.
Mickey Blue – We Just Be
Canadian RnB singer Mickey Blue brings back the 90s with ‘We Just Be’, a guitar-strummed, laid-back and relaxedcut about, well, love, being beautiful and wanting to be with someone, featuring some magnificent yet deep vocals, mixed with some rapping between hooks too. A nice, warm track from this dude. Take a listen.
Three-piece live band PillowTalk reimagines ‘If This World Were Mine’ by Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell, looping the outro vocals and adding a whole new instrumentation, making a jazz-frunk cut of the original song, with rolling drums and a smooth bassline, while a rhodes piano plays here and there. The vocals even get chopped here and there, quite a modern touch on such an old track. Really nice.
Terminé – Sideways (Roisto Remix)
Finnish producer Roisto remixes Termine’s ‘Sideways’, incorporating funk and disco elements, turning it into a dancefloor killer. From the sweet chords to the kick and snare combos, this remix is bound to get you moving your feet in one way or another. Check it out below.
It seems as though the wait for new Frank Ocean music may finally be over.
Twitter user @Swxnky recently tweeted that he had a clip of the rumoured new Frank Ocean tune ‘White Ferarri’ that Montréal DJ and producer A-Trak had hinted towards earlier this month, but nothing really seperated him from any other Twitter-troll–that is, before he posted a snippet of the song itself.
The snippet in question can be found here, and is extremely short, but sounds identical to Frank Ocean. User Swxnky then went on to disclose more details about the alleged magazine, tease the ‘Nikes’ video reported on earlier this year, and then go on to say that Frank would be putting out an album within the next two weeks. Swxnky also went on to post a video of someone speaking in frame that sounds EXACTLY like Frank Ocean. @Swxnky is either the real deal, or an extremely talented, heartless troll. Screenshots of the tweets are below.
What do you think? Is this yet another L for Frank fans, or is the world finally about to be blessed with new music? Let us know @TheEarlyReg on Twitter!
Justin Bieber was thrust into fame at a young age and almost immediately became the poster-boy for YouTube discovered stardom. Clearly, no one taught him how to handle his jet-like propulsion into the spotlight of fame and let’s just say, mistakes were made. As it turned out, mistakes were also accompanied by pretty good music. Mega-hit, ‘Baby’ has long since had over a billion views on YouTube and ironically, the title of that song is not far removed from the descriptions many people have placed on him in the last half-decade. It seemed as though Bugatti Biebz would never escape the sonic purgatory that his music occupied, somewhere between Kidz Bop and early Justin Timberlake. Then he dropped a collection of perception-altering tracks with 2013’s, Journals.
Gone were the days of elementary infatuation songs and playground references. Bieber had started to link up with artists like R. Kelly, Lil Wayne and Future that carried with them more varied fan-bases and definitely helped open Bieber’s mind to creating more conceptual music. After a nearly two-year hiatus, while Bieber’s newest project, Purpose, isn’t necessarily a bursting through into adult-R&B conversations, it’s definitely another foot through the wall. Almost making his past musical endeavors a distant afterthought, this project focuses on repentance, change and love in a surprising and coherently adult way.
Much of this new direction is no doubt a symptom of collaboration efforts with Skrillex, Diplo and PooBear. Purpose, is an album that sonically seems concerned with weaving Bieber’s light R&B vocals between emotionally synthesized electronic dance music. It typically works too, although I don’t think Bieber comes across as earnestly as he intends. On album opener, ‘Mark My Words’ he starts things off by reaffirming his history and seemingly endless love for Selena Gomez. Bieber’s own voice is sampled in the background of the track and it sounds as though he is reaching for an all but lost love through his elevated falsetto.
How soon he asks us to forget about his past after just sinking in it himself. The second track, ‘I’ll Show You’ is a delicately-delivered ballad where Bieber writes off his own past as “nonsense”. He stresses the age old misconception that the pressure of fame are easy to deal with. It’s a story we have all heard before and his laments seem somewhat vague and confined to the outer layers rather than his deeper anxieties. The chorus fills the audible space with hi-hats and light which seems to be a common course for many of the project’s tracks to take. Verses pick apart the issues of his past and the choruses ring out as anthemic projections of his new direction.
After the first few tracks allow Bieber to get his vague apologies out to the omnipresent listener, rather than leaving the lyrical theme, they become more specifically targeted at love. His metaphors become the emotional void-fillers in his life on songs like ‘No Sense’ with Travis Scott where he compares his heart to a vacant house whenever the girl he’s with isn’t around. Immediately before this we get the slow-burn build of ‘No Pressure’ with Big Sean. The two artists adjust to indecisiveness over an acoustic guitar backed 90’s R&B instrumental where distant echoes of Ginuwine’s classic, ‘Differences’ can be heard. This two-step of mixed-emotions in these back to back tracks creates a consistent tone. Bieber just gets done telling the receiver of his affection that she can take her time and then says that it doesn’t make any sense for them to be apart because his life is meaningless without her.
The follow-up track, ‘The Feeling’ featuring Halsey emphasizes just how foreign true love is to a person who seemingly missed the last part of growing up due to his fame-induced life. He can’t recognize love, but he is aware of the fact that it eludes him. The picture starts to come together, forming a much more matured and aware person because of the fact that he is finally asking these questions about love rather than just taking things for face-value. He follows the formula of giving self-advice based on his new view of himself and asking for acceptance for the rest of the album. Verses build to highly-produced choruses that manage to never sound too commercial.
Looking back on Bieber’s journey through fame and the fact that it seemed to culminate to this album, I definitely think it serves it’s purpose of reinvention without ever fully occupying the depth of emotion he reaches for. It provides enough poppy-highs and soothing lows to satisfy any Belieber and is potentially grown enough to draw in fans that had him written off since the beginning. Though much the songwriting leaves something be desired this new Bieber is a more honest and compassionate Bieber, finally able to pull us along on the journey away from his misguided youth.
Stepping outside the box in the music industry has always be a risky task. Labels expect their artists to garner mainstream appeal with their records and even fans get weary when they hear about their beloved artist stepping into a new musical lane. So, what better way to overstep these barriers than to form a massive musical collective and develop your own sonic expectations based on what you want to do. That is exactly what Ceelo and his ‘Dungeon Family’ collective of Atlanta-based musicians did. Given complete creative freedom on his solo label debut was the best thing that could have happened to Ceelo.
Ceelo Green and His Perfect Imperfections, left almost no territory untraveled. Everything from blues to rock to hip-hop and gospel has a place on this project. Tried plenty of times before, this formula often ends up sounding like an incohesive mess. Rather than sounding like a confused artist trying to find his place, Ceelo manages to stand out as a man that simply is able to juggle styles with competence and ease.
His voice is his most masterfully wielded tool. Capable of swinging bluesy croons over the working man’s country ballad ‘Country Love’ and modulated, soulful vocal over a funky-guitar riddled track like, ‘El Dorado Sunrise’. His voice, undeniably bluesy and soulful, is the element that allows us to make sense of how this eclectic album works. His rapidly delivered bars and screechy yelps on the intro, ‘Bad Motha’ echo the sounds of funkmaster, James Brown. Not only can the man belt out some incredibly pitched sounds, but damn, the man can rhyme. His adept singing voice make it all the more interesting when you hear him spit some incredibly rhythmic and intellectual bars over the airy instrumental of ‘Big Ol Words’. Incredibly wordy, it comes across sounding like spoken-word poetry at an open mic night was put to music.
The instrumentals were another extension of his weird, expansive style. He essentially handled the entire production of the album himself. It is reminiscent of Timbaland in the way it plays with and combines sounds that very few other people were at the time. There’s really no order to this chaotic album. Its sound will move from funk to heavy rock and back to neo-funk in a matter of minutes, genres be damned. His strengths are illuminated by spotlights and made easily recognizable thanks to his hasty variations in style. It becomes clear that his more mellowed out, soulful tracks are where Ceelo is in top form. It is so apparent that the other tracks begin to feel slightly underwhelming. It’s not that the other songs are bad, they just fail to match the level of beauty that is Ceelo’s voice. Ceelo pulls in so many different directions, even as efficiently as he does it, it still ends up lacking an identity. Even without an identity, the music is competent enough to stand on its own as a collection of well made, genre-blending tracks that more than confirms Ceelo’s status as a future pop-culture mainstay.
Singer/rapper D.R.A.M., most famously known for his record ‘Cha Cha’, is currently on a huge tour with Chicago’s Chance The Rapper. But don’t think a big tour is going to stop him from putting out new music, as today he released his new record, titled ‘Caretaker (Extended)’. Featuring TDE singer, SZA, this collaboration is a extended version from Donnie Trumpet and The Social Experiment’s album Surf and it is awesome! You’ll be able to find this one on D.R.A.M.’s forthcoming EP GAHDAMN!, which drops in just a few days on October 23rd.
Stream ‘Caretaker (Extended)’ below and peep our photos of D.R.A.M. and Chance’s Milwaukee stop on their Family Matters tour.
We are going out on limb here, but Hopsin is probably not a big fan of autotuned raps of Future, Young Thug and Fetty Wap, if his new music video for ‘No Words’ is any indication. “Man rap today fucking sucks bad,” Hopsin says in the track’s intro. “They’re not even saying words anymore, they just got a hard ass fucking beat to trick dumbasses like you to make you think you like the shit.” Full of cars, guns, and women, Hopsin does his best worse impression of rap today in his new video.
Here at The Early Registration we like to pride ourselves on our music knowledge. To stay polished on our musical expertise, our new feature is a little game of musical “6 Degrees”. For those who are unfamiliar, six degrees of separation is the theory that everyone in the world is connected by six or fewer steps, so we are now taking the liberty of connecting musicians whom you would never think could be connected, in exactly six steps. This week our 6˚ piece is dedicated to Lollapalooza amazing lineup, which is coming to Chicago in just a couple of weeks. To keep things interesting we challenged ourself to connect one Lollapalooza headliner (Sam Smith) to another Lollapalooza headliner (Paul McCartney). The twist is can we do this using only other artists from Lollapalooza’s lineup this year? Find out below!
Bay Area MC Dee Dot Jones is entering a new era in his career, and to celebrate the transition, he’s released his campiest video yet along with uncomfortable (in the way that you can’t stop looking at it) artwork for a heavy 2 minute bumrush entitled “Racing Fluid”. The artwork’s style references the cover for his last project Forever Forward, which featured collaborations with Chynna producer Cloud Atrium. He also cleverly reveals the release date for his debut album in the video (it’s June 20th if you can’t catch it).
Stream the track and watch the video for it below.
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