Marjen

Much like the gays and summer thunderstorms, I absolutely love Canadians. I only really know three Canadians not counting all those SCTV episodes I devoured as a child. But each one has been the epitome of easy to work with. Affable and more concerned about others than with looking like a cool guy. 

Marjen, producer from Saskatoon, has the distinction of being one of those said Canadians. I can't wait to visit him someday and we can stalk factor and deface whatever edifice our Northern neighbors have erected to that little bald-ass Caillou. 

In the meantime, I'm bumping Rubies and Rust, his newest release on everybody's favorite indie French label, Hello L.A. The record is split between part spacious yet driven instrumentals and something like a label mix tape. Like a cholo's pair of starched Dickies, the instrumentals could very well stand alone. But each is reimagined in the image of Hello L.A.'s three grimiest yet huggable degenerate rappers. One of them happens to be me, Bakus. The other two are the two black halves of Sludge Factorie, V8 and Morbidly-O-Beats respectively. 

This isn't rap for the club. This isn't rap you impress girls with. This is rap music you hug yourself all alone in the dark while rubbing the black bags under your eyes and feeling the rot tingle down your spine and ripple across the filthy carpet and into the walls vibrating out to the world as alternating messages of S.O.S., KEEP OUT, S.O.S., KEEP OUT!

This is the kind of rap music you listen to when things aren't going your way. When the hate builds up inside of your cadaverous body and needs a release that's more socially acceptable than screaming at strangers on the street corner. This is the kind of rap music that keeps you from plowing your car head-on into police headquarters. This is rap music that has a black soul but not of evil, out of necessity and hurt and anguish and overwhelming confusion. This is rap music with a still-beating heart desirous of human connection if only EVERYBODY WASN'T SO FUCKING STUPID! If that statement offends you then this probably isn't the record for you. 

Marjen is the perfect blend of nice, talented, and twisted. One part skittering and industrial, the inner mind's cogs making music from machines. One part synths spaciously chasing hopeful horizons. And one part drums driven like a dump truck full of dumb luck breaking only for punk stuff. The three parts combine to buzz loud like a summer Saskatoon mosquito infestation. 

I feel grateful to have met this stable of stallions chomping at the bit to give you dope shit. I just hope that I can manage to keep up with the talent. Marjen, is positioning himself as the conductor this orchestra of disorder. He's looking like the voice of said horse race. He'll be calling out the winners from the back stretch, then cashing out his tickets with a big fat cigar. Smoke up Marc, because today is yours, man.