There are things I just downright hate about Cody ChesnuTT and his Headphone Masterpiece. For one, what the fuck is up with the double-capitalized T's at the end of his name? I hereby refuse to do it for the rest of the review (and if it still appears, it's all on Ott). Secondly, two discs? Nearly two hours of music? This hasn't even worked out for the best of them-- ask Billy Corgan and Jay-Z. There's actually a great album buried in here, but the key word is buried, and Cody, I have to say it, you are one misogynistic piece of shit. I get the feeling it's just a big joke to you, but I'd be lax in my liberal guilt if I didn't say something about it. Grow up.
And yet, there's something about The Headphone Masterpiece I just can't help but love. Sure, the double-disc thing is complete overkill, but you've gotta respect the fucking gall it takes to dump something this overly ambitious on an unsuspecting public as your debut. Chesnutt's also stumbled upon an absolutely killer gimmick, running soul/funk/what-have-you through a GBV filter of tape hiss and fragmented arrangements. It's a recipe designed to kill with indie rockers looking to branch out, and it sure as hell slew me.
With all these journalistic jumping points at play, it's clear why Chesnutt's got the hype-o-meter needle rapidly on the rise-- it was just given a significant boost by his eye-raising appearance on The Roots' cover of his own "The Seed". But Chesnutt is simply a damned interesting guy; one could easily imagine him stepping into the role The Streets' Mike Skinner currently holds, that of hyper-profiled basement visionary and loner suddenly thrust into the limelight. Cody even has his own "Weak Become Heroes", an anthemic celebration of his cultural sect called "Serve This Royalty", which concerns the ephemeral neo-soul genre rather than raver transcendence.
Of course, Original Pirate Material has less of the self-indulgence, lack of focus, and unbridled sonic and lyrical crudity that make The Headphone Masterpiece so frustrating, yet compelling. Chesnutt wastes no time letting his listeners know what they're in for, leading with a thirty-second Rhodes and vocal snippet that's followed by a lengthy bit of simplistic drum machination under guest-star spoken word poetry that-- I'm pretty sure-- contains the phrase "hymen gauze."
But just as you're ready to file the album under Project/Vanity, Chesnutt brings the goods: "Upstairs in a Blowout", a punchy two-minute slice of percussive guitar, remedial drums, and in-the-ballpark-of-on-key vocals. The track indicates Chesnutt knows what he's doing with this lack of fidelity; done slick, the song could very easily pass for a Lenny Kravitz single, but loose and hissy, it has the raw immediacy lacking in modern-day waiting-room soul. And while the superior "realness" of lo-fi music is a troublesome indie contention-- and I have no clue whether the four-track was chosen out of aesthetic or financial considerations-- The Headphone Masterpiece's finest moments hearken back to the sepia-toned days of Stax/Volt grittiness, when the number of tracks available for recording was a technological rather than conscious limitation. Chesnutt is no nostalgia act, thank God, but would it be wrong of me to think he's trying to link up with those simpler days, circumventing the last three decades of glossy soul crooning?
Theoretically exciting stuff, sure, but that's what makes it so tragic when the rest of disc one degenerates into catastrophe. Promising beats are saddled with snippets of studio chatter rather than vocals ("Setting the System", "Batman v. Blackman"), embarrassingly juvenile, sexist pseudo-raps ("Bitch, I'm Broke", "War Between the Sexes"), and clichéd Soul 101 romances that fail to seduce ("Can We Teach Each Other", "Smoke and Love"). The highlights-- Chesnutt's hypersexual egotism takes on a tone of evolutionary bravado in "The Seed" and the Latin folk/laser-snare contrast of "Michelle"-- are far too occasional; the amount of filler in these twenty-three tracks far exceeds regulations.
When disc two started with a great piano loop squandered beneath a five-minute conversation between Chesnutt and his cousin, I prepared myself for further exasperation, but what followed was, astonishingly, Chesnutt living up to about 90% of his potential, minus the in-jokes, offensiveness, and undercooked ideas. Were the two discs of The Headphone Masterpiece released separately, this would serve as the payoff to disc one's flawed declaration of potential. Many of the tracks benefit from reductionist arrangements, like the simple strum and short harmonica puffs of "My Women, My Guitars", the nearly a capella "Somebody's Parent", and the electric piano monologue "5 on a Joyride". Purified to the basics, Chesnutt shows himself both skilled in melody and capable of holding your attention with the minimum trappings, though this is due in no small part to the off-putting, lo-fi intimacy.
Nowhere else on the album does Chesnutt's Tascam talent shine through like it does on "If We Don't Disagree", which capitalizes not on simplicity, but on that most exhilarating of lo-fi moments: when a clearly epic song pushes up against the sonic limitations of the equipment, producing an exquisite tension I'll refer to as "Pollardism." "6 Seconds" and "Look Good in Leather" show similar mastery and comfort with his own sound, the former inhabiting classic soul without spilling over into retro, and the latter wrapping his boasts in a funky strut that-- just barely-- makes his ego palatable.
Naturally, disc two has its own dead weight, like the atmospherically dull "Juicin' the Dark" and the goo-goo ga-ga's of "Daddy's Baby". Trade "Upstairs in a Blowout" and "The Seed" for these duds, and a single-disc Headphone Masterpiece might've warranted a 9+ rating, a character profile that's as good as it is intriguing. As it stands, a surplus of uniqueness overshadows a respectable aptitude, and whether or not it announces an Exciting New Talent, The Headphone Masterpiece is an album I want to like a lot more than I actually do.
