If you follow me on social vortex, Twitter dot com, you may be aware that we’ve launched POW Recordings. I’ll spare the mission statements and manifestos. This is the same as it’s been for the last decade. We’re trying to ride for unique music, expose new gifted talents to the world, and collectively contribute to the world mackling a little less.
We won’t be the kind of label where the CEO will be all in the videos dancing. Although I can’t promise that our CEO, Hannibal Moncrief, won’t wear the occasional silver suit or perform a jiggy two-step or three. Our general manager is Haley Potiker, previously of Stones Throw, who you may know from her excellent writing and impeccable lack of chill.
Our first release is a cassette tape and digital copy of Chester Watson’s Past Cloaks. You can stream Past Cloaks below and read a short description about the album.Chester Watson is one of my favorite musicians and I’m very proud that this is our first release. Should you feel so inclined, a purchase would be appreciated. So would a follow on our Twitter and Facebook. If you’re broke, cheap, or too wise for social media, it’s all good — just enjoy it. In conclusion, come to Death Row.
“Inhabit Past Cloaks. 19 narcotic hexes from Chester Watson, written and recorded while he was 15, 16, and 17, created with cheap equipment, powerful weed, and a restless mind. Early work culled from his first mixtape, Phantom (2012), Tin Wooki (2014), and Soundcloud loosies.
Past Cloaks is the first release on POW Recordings, an introduction to one of the most gifted teenaged rappers this side of Earl, Nas, or Andre. These are the first experiments and random blades from the Monotone Samurai, the leader of Nu Age, lungs black as his irises, tangents to open up the ears of the ancient.
These are the results of a young searcher wrestling with the present and future. An adolescent gypsy skating through St. Louis, Georgia, and Florida, blessed with a wild imagination, precocity, and a dark temperament. He re-imagines himself as a cursed black Pharaoh covered in golden scarabs, an enigma with wings, spitting raps as hot as Guatemalan springs. A new anti-hero with venom, the beast hallucinated on ayahuasca or just too much liquor. As Watson says himself, “the best villain since Mad-V.”
The beats come from all over. Some originals from Watson, some from Psymun, Bobby Raps, and Art Vandelay, others are repurposed. It’s dusted and damaged psychedelic music, ideal for imprecations and illicit behavior, baleful hymns and bleak parables. Rap for warm-hearted skeptics and seekers, smokers and sippers. The sort of songs where you catch as much on the 5th listen as you do on the 50th. So wear it out.”
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