Whatever else may be wrong with the Anticon guys, at least they're not afraid to say they need their mommies.
The Anticon hip-hop collective-- of which Sage Francis is some kind of member now-- have a reputation for brainy, convoluted lyrics and wordy self-examinations. Instead of chest-out bragging or shout-outs to their small-city hometowns, they use their rhymes to admit weakness, and to dredge up every small bad memory of childhood. Sage Francis lets it all hang out on Personal Journals, his first major solo release, using his assertive rapping and thick exterior to deliver a startlingly self-revelatory album. His voice, informed by spoken word performances, can take on a dramatic frenzy, matched by lo-fi but dynamic production from underground DJs like Odd Nosdam, Sixtoo, Jel, Joe Beats and Scott Metallic. And in case anyone thought that Francis was just a poetry slam-winning white boy who's here to read his diary, he also displays a sense of humor while flexing his lyrical muscles.
Francis takes himself apart a dozen different ways on this album, starting with two different approaches at self-portraiture. On "Personal Journalist," he explains himself with fast-paced abstract wordplay: "Non-prophet/ Artificially intelligent/ Avant-guardian angel... Loyal son, father to none." Chaotic street scenes and Jesus imagery fill out the track. On the more direct "Different," riding on a throbbing upright bassline, he pronounces himself a drug-free vegetarian who "wouldn't smoke the pot I was pissing in, and I had no dead homies to honor while pouring out the liquor I won't drink." I have seen the future of underground hip-hop, and it is straight-edge.
When he brings his family into the fray, the self-analysis gets murkier. Francis' relationship with his mother could fill volumes, and every track is full of haunting images and vague, unresolved guilt and blame. He talks about a childhood without a dad: "Eviction Notice" depicts Francis' mom fighting with her live-in boyfriends, while the disturbing atmosphere from cLOUDDEAD's Odd Nosdam evokes a picture of little Sage hiding under his bed. Francis' mom appears again in the brutal love/hate "Kill Ya Momz," which lays a heavy metal offensive over a creepy, innocent recording of young Sage doing a devoted Mother's Day rap. And then there's "Inherited Scars," one of the album's best tracks, about his younger sister; as he looks at her scars (self-mutilation? Tattoos? Are they the same thing here?), he implores her to "stick it out" at home as he tries to decide who's to blame-- their father or himself-- without ever answering the question.
Grown-up Sage isn't any less complicated. The beats are not only lo-fi, but hypnotic and claustrophobic-- especially the hand drums and drum kit that Sixtoo puts behind his fevered rapping on "Buckets of Silence." That and "Specialist" are back-to-back studies of obsessive love, where the wordplay grows frantic: "I'm a slow self-esteem engine in need of a whore's power.../ I'm holding a sleepless beauty pageant on my shark-infested waterbed until it's punctured." The rejection and his own abusive loving give us one picture-- "Mr. Feel-Nothing," who "saves his tears inside of a cup, and he drinks and he forgets that he's an asshole." But then there's the tender side that comes out in the unabashedly gorgeous "Broken Wings," gliding on a beautiful piano line from Scott Metallic's production. It takes a tough man to sing a lyric like, "We don't need no wings to fly," and Francis pulls it off.
"By the end of the record I'll make sure y'all know who Sage Francis is," he promises early on, though he never convincingly finishes the job-- he's still figuring it out himself. There are people who will criticize the wordy, convoluted lyrics, or resent the hall of mirrors that Francis drops us into. But being complex doesn't make this art: Personal Journals is a success because it turns the self-examination into poetry and then, harder still, turns the poems into great rap. And as dark as he gets, Francis makes sure we have a good time: dig his sub-karaoke live remake of Bob Seger's "Turn the Page." Clearly, nothing embarrasses this guy.
