old money // fire in the dark
The rap duo Old Money (Ahmad Julian and Andre Oswald) rifts precipitously and adroitly upon matters of realness minus the pre-packaged cross-fade of the fake and contrived. Rap music, like every other type or genre of music, is perpetually going through evolutionary cycles. And like all things Darwinian the weak and inefficient will go the way of the Dodo bird, leaving room for innovation and renovation.
This evolution is reminiscent of the undulating waves of sea change or stock market trends; the former based on mother nature and the latter a virtual artificial construct which has all too real consequences in our everyday lives. It is exactly this kind of mundane dichotomy which pushes and pulls rap music against itself, it becomes stale on one side of the coin and cannibalistic like Francisco Goya’s Saturn Devouring His Son on the flip-side. Reincarnation or regurgitation? Rerun of reinvention?
And so the pendulum swings between the blatant commercial effigies, i.e., Jay Z’s Magna Carter Holy Grail, Kanye West’s Yeezus etc. Listening to the acerbic tracks which make up the heart and head of their debut release Fire In The Dark via Dutty Artz, is kind of like unlearning bad habits, eating more fresh fruits and veggies or subscribing to Luminosity. Basically, vowing to be a better human being through the quality of the sonic images you put into your brain cavity. This curated collection of tracks is deep but not overly didactic, no superiority complex here.
This isn’t underbelly, grimy realness, but rather the mentally progressive and self-propulsive variety. Then there is the music, which is more world-pulse driven and less stereotypically typical. And further, this LP was by no means a quick fix for what Rap music was missing. In the words of duo co-founder Ahmad Julian, “It was a few years in the making, so we definitely want to make sure people get a chance to sit with it for a bit longer.” So, pull up a chair, the table is set, read the menu. Nothing but good food for thought up in here.
Also, check out Old Money’s Certified Space Trade Mix, it has more tracks than NYC’s Inwwod-Far Rockaway line. Peace.