Psychic Wars - review

Cinematic, self-aware, alive with thought. The notion of a cohesive and comprehensive album is attractive to all fans of music. Wordsound's Spectre has always been at the forefront of establishing the sound of the grimy Brooklyn-based label, and on his latest release he's out to bang your head into shape with a concept that is significantly more focused in comparison to some of his previous, looser LP's. The album's very overt purpose is laid out in the first track The struggle continues, as Spectre himself adresses us in his familiar slowed down and distorted voice. "You are your own worst enemy, you create jealousy, hate, lust, greed, through you savage ways and actions." The no-nonsense messages are made all the more effective and credible as they are delivered over the impossible drum patterns and dark samples that Spectre has become known for. This creates a universe that is both full of knowledge and wisdom, yet attainable only through a journey to the darkest of places, which as the atmospheric, yet extremely entertaining Intro suggests, this album undoubtedly is.

Other opening tracks like Valour and Love display the awareness of the vast musical cultures around us. Spectre samples and pitch-shifts eastern music in new and interesting ways, the music is always experimental, nearly always totally fresh, and significantly minimal in it's construction and conclusions. This is not the typical instrumental hip-hop you may be used to if you are fans of say, DJ Shadow, indeed as Spectre himself noted in our recent interview, sometimes "it's not even hip-hop", so if you have the intention of making a purchase, be aware that you are stepping into new musical territory with Psychic wars.

The album rolls along at a fairly quick-pace, and the various guest spots enhance all the tracks in just the right ways, most impressively, Honeychild (slightly remeniscent of Portisheads Beth Gibbons) lends her lively yet sensual voice to Secrets. Spectre puts her vocals through a number of filters, all to fairly atmospheric effect, where other female vocalists might be drowned out by these filters, Honeychilds strong and devious voice seems to stand up to almost excessive reverbs and distortions. Keep your ears peeled as her floetry dances over a very simple sampled break that Rza himself could have cooked up back in '93. Further along, the unstoppable Sensational returns from the shadows of the Wordsound wilderness on the very live Blazed, proving that Spectre can still make a banger or two when it comes to straight hip-hop beats. The Brooklyn MC sounds fresher and hungrier than ever before, "Society ain't got shit on me!" undoubtedly one of the highlights of the album for any hip-hop purist.

The international influences on Psychic Wars also manifest themselves in vocal samples, "Angst is nicht gut!" German for "anger is not good" continuing the very serious bombardment of positive messages throughout. Other vocal samples clearly heard are in French and Japanese. Treacherous best embodies Wordsound and Spectre, a hardocre and dark track almost randomly placed at the end, anonymous and yet impossible to ignore, it fades out into silence with no more messages and no more speech. No-one ever said Wordsound music was easy to swallow though. Psychic wars is a comprehensive and focused effort that really takes an open mind to embrace fully, yet will also appeal to fans of many different genres/cultures of music. Similarly if you, like myself, find simple pleasures in hearing something totally off the wall and different- then be sure to check this one out.

Y.Misdaq aka Yoshi, 28 Jun 2003