Forager

Twenty years ago, a humble preteen girl visited a thrift store in Kelowna, BC, for the first time. I still remember every detail of the dress in the shop that caught my eye: an ivory white silk slip with a ruched waist and an eyelet lace collar that reached high up the neck, with sterling silver clasps that came together neatly in the back.In today's lingo, the piece would be called "true vintage." It was from the '50s or '60s and definitely someone's wedding dress, or maybe something they'd slipped on for a more intimate moment post-ceremony. "I'd like to get married in a dress like that one day," I thought to myself. It was priced at $20, and truly one-of-a-kind. Naturally, I didn't buy it. To this day, I've never found another one like it.Once upon a time, "true vintage" pieces like that were reasonably priced, and available in abundance. Value Village had a terrible reputation as the kind of place "sketchy" people shopped at, and persistent urban legends made being stabbed in a fitting room there feel like a very real possibility. There were no ads, no social media campaigns, and definitely no Halloween sections — just fluorescent lights and people trying to survive the best they could.Wearing thrifted clothes and shoes were one of the class markers that got you bullied growing up in the early aughts. Thrift stores were decidedly uncool; a place your well-intentioned mom took you to instead of the mall, despite endless pleading. They smelled like artificial lavender and Lysol, with rolled-up socks in plastic bins alongside unwashed boys' gym shorts, flame shirts, bedazzled jeans and grungy sneakers.I'm typically not a fan of inserting myself into the reviews I write — let alone in attempting to critique the new record of someone who is a seasoned music critic himself — but in this instance, I feel like it emphasizes the cultural shift of the art of thrifting in Canada; something that's gone from embarrassing to très chic in a mere two decades.Cadence Weapon's latest release Forager is an ode to this cultural phenomenon, told from the perspective of someone whose first job was working at a vintage store in Edmonton. A concept album paying homage to the golden age of hip-hop, it's rife with lyrical references to the collaborative albums of the Alchemist, with beats crafted by Junia-T that evoke MF DOOM and J Dilla nostalgia. Created by a former poet laureate, it's sealed with verbose rhymes and a pen game straight from an inkwell.First and foremost, the artist born Rollie Pemberton is a writer — that much is clear in abundance, from the scathing social criticism found within 2021's Polaris Prize-winning Parallel World to the electronic grime of Hope in Dirt City. Even on deep cuts like "Connor McDavid," Pemberton's always been great at putting his finger to the pulse of what's relevant in any given cultural moment.But there's something that doesn't quite sit right with his latest release, and, unlike him, I'm still having some trouble putting my finger on it. Perhaps it's the record's accompanying write-up, which explains Weapon's fascination with thrifting: "I was getting so good at finding cool stuff at rock-bottom prices that I turned it into a business," he writes, describing the trials and tribulations of launching his own reselling venture. On his Substack, Weapon further details the adventures of rescuing valuable pieces from a rag house and selling them at a pop-up in Hamilton. That's the place where I was born, to a postal worker father and a librarian mother. I don't remember it much, because we moved to an even smaller and more remote Canadian town soon after.Perhaps it's some of the lines found on the record, which speak of customs only accessible to the Toronto-dwelling upper echelon. Pemberton describes himself perfectly as "Sonically adventurous / Chronically vociferous," humble-bragging, "I don't pay no rent," and, "Excellence is what I channel through my network." He's a wife guy, boasting that his girl "looks like she dates creative directors."There's certainly class criticism baked into lines proclaiming, "I will never ever work for a tech jerk / Who steps in dirt and claims that it's his best work" ("Raghouse"), but what's also apparent is an element of choice in Weapon's experiences — like going on a "Babymoon" — that simply aren't available to some. It's a bizarre take coming from a guy I've seen grace many a folk festival stage in and around Alberta.To say Cadence Weapon's music has been gentrified is way too far a stretch, and probably something that would piss him off. But his new record does succeed in matching the cultural shift that's occurred around thrifting, something that used to be reserved exclusively for poor people that's now pursued as a savvy entrepreneurial business adventure. The rise of vintage resellers like Pemberton has undoubtedly removed the accessibility of thrifting from those who need it most, the whole process — based on "salvaging" items from recycling plants or charity shops — ferrying thrifting to artsy community markets and jacking up the price.That's where a large portion of fashionable Gen Z and millennials now source their clothes, as fast fashion is continually made with the cheapest possible materials by people working in the worst possible conditions. There's a shared sense amongst resellers that what they do is form of "rescuing," but does taking a quality item away from a community in need (and then selling it with a 30 percent markup) really do anything to save the world?There are some definite strengths in the record, usually when Pemberton's cadence leans more towards syncopation (e.g., "Yves Klein Blue"). The beats on Forager were composed by Junia-T, whose jazz-influenced 2020 record Studio Monk sent shockwaves across the country when it was first released. Tinker-tailored using samples then replaced with live instrumentation, it's a bold way to approach beatmaking, especially in the age of AI-generated music.Pemberton claims the songs aren't "about anything" in particular, but the exploration of colour on "Yves Klein Blue" combined with the eroticism of its beat harken back to the Kool Keith epoch of crate-digging. Lines about the mysterious origin of garments "carefully soaked in a vat of indigo" speak to fashion's colonial history and the ubiquity of the blue jean: an American wardrobe staple built on the back of slavery. This harkens back to Parallel World's social critique, although it's far more subtle, lockstitched over a beat that sounds like it came from the laptop of a rapper like monti (Chester Watson) or R.A.P. Ferreira.In an age where hip-hop doesn't have quite the radio prevalence and mass industry appeal it once did, independent thrift stores are increasingly hard to come by (unlike the for-profit Value Village, which is now a massive corporate conglomerate), making true vintage pieces like the Burberry shirts and discontinued Ralph Lauren boots Pemberton covets even more difficult to find. Maybe that's the point of Forager, and I just don't get it; I've definitely never had the luxury of owning an abundance of jackets, new or thrifted. Then again, I don't have the Woolmark logo tattooed on me either.